Geothermal Training Programme

This year, the annual UNU Visiting Lecturer was Dr. Ernst Huenges, who leads the International Geothermal Research Centre at the Helmholtz-Zentrum Potsdam Deutsches GeoForschungsZentrum (GFZ).  Dr. Huenges gave a series of lectures on Enhanced Geothermal Systems. Dr. Huenges is chair of an interdisciplinary working group with engineers and geoscientists and head of the petrophysical laboratories at the GFZ.  He has been involved in a number of scientific deep drilling projects and geothermal projects.  He is a contributing author of the IPCC special report on renewable energies and in 2010, he edited a book on Geothermal Energy Systems.

The lectures were attended by UNU-GTP Fellows and various members of the Icelandic geothermal community.

The 33rd annual session of the UNU-GTP

The 33rd annual session of the UNU-GTP opened on Monday 2nd of May.  

The Vice Rector of UNU, Prof. Takeuchi was an honourary guest at the opening. The opening ceremony was lead by the Director of the UNU-GTP, Dr. Ingvar B. Fridleifsson, and included a speech by the invited speaker, the Permanent Secretary of State,  Dr. Einar Gunnarsson. After the ceremony the UNU Vice Rector gave a presentation on the work of the United Nations University. This was followed by presentations about the UNU-GTP, the UNU Fisheries Training Programme (UNU-FTP), and the UNU Land Restoration Training Programme (UNU-LRT).

This year a record number of 30 UNU Fellows from 16 countries participated in the six month specialized courses. The Fellows came from Bangladesh 2, China 3, Costa Rica 1, El Salvador 2, Honduras 1, Indonesia 2, Iran 1, Kenya 9, Mexico 1, Mongolia 1, Morrocco 1, Nicaragua 1, Rwanda 1, Sri Lanka 1,Tanzania 2, and Uganda 1, and attended training in Borehole Geology 3, Geophysical Exploration 4, Chemistry of Thermal Fluids 3, Reservoir Engineering 8, Environmental Studies 4, Geothermal Utilization 7, and Drilling Technology 1. In 2011, the UNU-GTP welcomed participants from three new countries: Bangladesh, Morocco, and Sri Lanka.

Millennium Workshops and Short Courses

The “Short Course on Geothermal Drilling, Resource Development and Power Plants” was organized and conducted by the UNU-GTP and LaGeo S.A. de C.V. in Santa Tecla, El Salvador on January 16-22, 2011. It was a part of the UNU-GTP Millennium short course series for Central America. The course had been scheduled for late 2010, but was postponed until after the holiday season for organizational reasons.

The main lecturers/presenters for the short course came from, El Salvador (11), Iceland (6), Costa Rica (2) and the Philippines (1), while contributions were also given by Mexico (1) and Nevis (1), and some of the other participating nations.

A record number of participants were registered at the short course, 62 in all, from Costa Rica (6), Guatemala (2), Honduras (5), Nicaragua (13), Mexico (3) and El Salvador (23). From the Caribbean Islands: Dominica (2) and Nevis (2), and from South America: Colombia (5) and Ecuador (1).

This was the first time that Colombia and Ecuador participated in events given by UNU-GTP. The tendency has been for the Millennium short course series to reach a broader audience every year. It is anticipated that more South American countries may take part in the years to come, as geothermal resources are abundant along the Andean mountain range. 

Costumer Designed Short Courses

The fourth Costumer Designed Short Course, financed by Kenya Electricity Generating Company, Ltd. – KenGen, and the most extensive to date was the “Course on Geoscientific Exploration for Geothermal Resources”. The course started on 13 September 2010. It was scheduled to be 12 week long, and extended with intervals into mid-January 2011. Participants in this course were about 35, and all staff members of KenGen. The first three courses carried out in 2010 were described in Q4, 2010.