Geothermal Could be Cheaper than Fossil Fuels with $3 Billion DOE Investment Says NYU Study
Geothermal could be cheaper than fossil fuels, according to a study just published at NYU Stern. Yet, strangely, geothermal received the fewest Federal DOE dollars invested in R&D over the last 8 years.
Hm. I wonder why that was?
The first study to compare efficiency improvement of various renewable energy alternatives in response to government funding found that geothermal has yielded the highest returns per R&D dollars invested by the Department of Energy.
NYU Stern Professor Melissa Schilling; an expert in strategic management and technology and innovation management found that of all renewable energy technologies the performance of geothermal improves the most per dollar of R&D invested. Wind power was the next, and solar power received the most Federal R&D funding.
But they have all lagged fossil fuel funding. The United States still invests more government dollars yearly on R&D for fossil fuel technologies than for all of the renewable energies combined. By contrast, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom spend more R&D on renewable energies than fossil fuel technologies, the study found.
Despite getting the most funding in the US, fossil fuel technologies are no longer improving efficiency much or at all.
Below the fold: one geothermal breakthrough birthed by $1 Million in US DOE R&D funding:
