US Department of Energy announced a new collaboration effort aimed at generating electricity from geothermal sources stemming from oil drilling operations. DoE's Office of Fossil Energy (FE) will merge efforts and research resources of the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy's (EERE) Geothermal Technologies Program and try to demonstrate how low temperature geothermal power generation systems, using co-produced water from oilfield operations at FE's Rocky Mountain Oilfield Testing Center (RMOTC), can be used to produce clean electricity.

EERE will provide the funds for the purchase of geothermal electricity produced by an Ormat Technologies unit. RMOTC will server as an optimal test facility for geothermal technologies.

The new system will use wasted water into an energy resource. How? The used water is hot, carrying significant heat energy, that would otherwise be discarded. For every barrel of oil, about ten barrels of heated waste water are created. The generated electricity will be used to power oilfield installations and equipment, making them self-sustainable in terms of power consumption, and make their operation cleaner (a bit ironic). All the operational and performance data will be collected and made available to the public, emphasizing the significance of co-produced water as an energy source.