Part of a story in the Australian todayBut Australia - and the...

Part of a story in the Australian today

But Australia - and the Australian share market - could be on to one of the big winners in renewable energy, in the form of geothermal energy using hot dry rocks (HDR) technology, which pumps water deep into the earth to form super-heated vapour.

Geodynamics, which listed in September 2002, holds a geothermal resource in the Cooper Basin that has "the most favourable conditions of any global HDR development to date", says Roger Leaning, analyst at ABN AMRO Morgans.

"The area is the hottest known locality on Earth outside volcanic regions, and contains a geothermal energy resource equivalent to 50billion barrels of oil - greater than the proven oil reserve energy equivalent of North America and the Asia Pacific."

As if that were not compelling enough, says Leaning, Geodynamics estimates that the recovery cost of this energy is less than $40 per MW hour - rivalling that of coal and oil. "There's no other renewable energy source that would even get close to cost parity with fossil fuels. It is an extremely attractive proposition."

There is only one small problem: the extraction and energy generation process - while none of it new in its own right - is not proven in this application.

"Geodynamics has to prove the reserve, prove the process and prove the cost at which they can do this," says Leaning. He rates Geodynamics - which has turned its 50c issue price into $1.35 in just under two years - as a "very long-term speculative buy".

Last week, Geodynamics was joined on the sharemarket by Petratherm, which will explore for HDR potential in the South Australian Heat Flow Anomaly, in areas to the south of the Cooper Basin.
Hope they keep going up.

Cheers Rog.
I;m so glad I got on the share price offer of 90c