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90 million euro order in Utah (USA) for Turboden, a Brescia-based company of the Mitsubishi Heavy Industries group specialized in Orc (Organic Rankine Cycle) systems capable of generating energy from various sources. «We will supply three Orc turbogenerators for a total of 90 MW to the American Fervo Energy for its Cape Station site, in Utah, where it is developing a project of 400 MW in total. Our plants will be operational from 2026: they represent our most significant commercial commitment in the geothermal energy sector”, says Turboden CEO Paolo Bertuzzi.
American market
The Italian company’s commitment concerns the surface part of the power plant «we are indirectly involved in the underground part. Fervo Energy has a substantial pipeline regarding this type of project and we are already supporting them with calculations, layout and timing. We must reserve an important fraction of our capacity for them and they are giving us constant evidence of the development of the pipelines. We already have joint working tables to study cost reduction. The American market is very promising, together with the European one: we are opening an office in the USA, we already have around fifteen plants in North America, including biomass, heat recovery and geothermal energy”, continues Bertuzzi.
Esg (Enhanced Geothermal Systems)
Fervo Energy’s Cape Station project is particularly significant because it is one of the first in the world of this ESG (Enhanced Geothermal Systems) type size: «We are not looking for high temperature water resources underground, but through the digging of wells and an action During fracking, water is inserted which, with an induced circulation mechanism, reaches 150 degrees on the surface”, explains the CEO: “This makes it replicable on a large scale and plannable. A model that attracts investors, especially in the USA, where they have already developed fracking technology linked to shale gas. It is no coincidence that among Fervo’s main shareholders there are Bill Gates’ Breakthrough Energy, Macquarie, Capricorn as well as American oil & gas companies such as Devon. Furthermore, the support of the US Department of Energy is fundamental.”
Turboden has 348 employees; it closed 2023 with 131 million euros in revenues, up from 80 in 2022. It envisages development not only in energy generation systems but also in large-scale heat pumps.