879e0ee2-cb4f-4515-8239-8a6c0b3f2bca English British Geological Survey +44 131 667 1000 The Lyell Centre, Research Avenue South EDINBURGH LOTHIAN EH14 4AP United Kingdom enquiries@bgs.ac.uk 2025-07-25T11:25:30.915941Z UK GEMINI 2.3 http://data.bgs.ac.uk/id/dataHolding/13608361 OSGB 1936 / British National Grid (EPSG::27700) Legacy BGS geothermal models: theoretical potential 'heat-in-place' for the early Carboniferous limestone (hot sedimentary aquifer resources) in northern and southern England 2023 http://data.bgs.ac.uk/id/dataHolding/13608361 This raster dataset shows the modelled P50 distribution of the theoretical potential 'heat-in-place' (HIP) across the northern and southern early Carboniferous limestone in Great Britain (PJ / km2), at a resolution of 2500 m x 2500 m. The HIP is calculated for resource temperatures greater than 50 degrees Celsius, which represents the minimum temperature required for direct use of heat from hot sedimentary aquifer resources. The HIP characterises the heat resource available in an aquifer according to the USGS definition described in e.g. Muffler and Cataldi (1978). Its calculation is part of the research published by D J.R. Jones, T. Randles, T. Kearsey, T.C. Pharaoh, A. Newell (2023). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geothermics.2023.102649. Areas of high uncertainty are delineated in the published paper. Enquiries British Geological Survey 0115 936 3142 0115 936 3276 The Lyell Centre, Research Avenue South EDINBURGH LOTHIAN EH14 4AP United Kingdom enquiries@bgs.ac.uk Enquiries British Geological Survey 0115 936 3142 0115 936 3276 The Lyell Centre, Research Avenue South EDINBURGH LOTHIAN EH14 4AP United Kingdom enquiries@bgs.ac.uk https://resources.bgs.ac.uk/images/geonetworkThumbs/879e0ee2-cb4f-4515-8239-8a6c0b3f2bca.png Geology GEMET - INSPIRE themes, version 1.0 2008-06-01 UK Location (INSPIRE) Aquifers Geothermal maps Geothermal energy Limestone Carboniferous BGS Thesaurus of Geosciences 2022 UK Location (INSPIRE) NERC_DDC Access constraints: no limitations. Use constraints: this dataset is available to view under the Open Government Licence V3 (https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/) to encourage its use and re-use, subject to the following acknowledgement accompanying the reproduced BGS materials: 'Contains British Geological Survey materials © UKRI [year]'. Some of the data shown in the BGS view-only service layers are available to licence. The licence cost will generally be a licence administration fee, depending on the usage type and the area coverage of the dataset requested. Companies and other commercial organisations with an interest in reselling BGS data or developing value-added products and services based on BGS data will need a BGS data resellers licence. For more information, contact digitaldata@bgs.ac.uk. 2500 English geoscientificInformation British Geological Survey Gazetteer: Geographical hierarchy from Geosaurus 1979 NORTHERN ENGLAND [id=151000] British Geological Survey Gazetteer: Geographical hierarchy from Geosaurus 1979 SOUTHERN ENGLAND [id=158800] -3.0764 1.1171 50.767 54.0358 2022 2025 Enquiries British Geological Survey 0115 936 3142 0115 936 3276 The Lyell Centre, Research Avenue South EDINBURGH LOTHIAN EH14 4AP United Kingdom enquiries@bgs.ac.uk https://ukgtp.bgs.ac.uk WWW:LINK-1.0-http--link UK Geothermal Platform Web Map An interactive Web map for exploring geothermal energy potential, assessing constraints, and making informed exploration decisions. https://ukgeothermalplatform.org WWW:LINK-1.0-http--link UK Geothermal Platform An online platform for exploring geothermal energy potential, assessing constraints, and making informed exploration decisions. dataset INSPIRE Implementing rules laying down technical arrangements for the interoperability and harmonisation of Geology 2011 See the referenced specification false Commission Regulation (EU) No 1089/2010 of 23 November 2010 implementing Directive 2007/2/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council as regards interoperability of spatial data sets and services 2010-12-08 See http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2010:323:0011:0102:EN:PDF false The study was conducted to assess the theoretical potential of the geothermal resource from the early Carboniferous limestone (ECL) in Great Britain. The theoretical potential 'heat-in-place' was calculated using the 3DHIP tool (Piris et al., 2021), which is based on the USGS volumetric 'heat-in-place' method developed by Muffler and Cataldi (1978). The method uses a Monte Carlo simulation to calculate the P50 probability distribution function for the HIP using the P50 distribution of reservoir volume and rock density derived from the 3D geological models of the ECL lithofacies for each study area, gridded at an XYZ spatial resolution of 2500 x 2500 x 50 m, and the temperature distribution. The model assumes a triangular porosity distribution, a constant fluid density (1040 kg / m3), fluid specific heat capacity (3.8 kJ/kg°C), and rock specific heat capacity (0.86 kJ/kg°C) and a reference/reinjection temperature of 21 °C. Geothermal gradient and mean surface temperature were defined as constants for each model. An upper depth cut-off of 1000 m and 1200 m was applied to northern and southern models respectively, which corresponds to a reservoir temperature of 50 °C and is judged to be the minimum temperature required for direct-use applications of geothermal energy. The heat-in-place is highly sensitive to the thickness, which is influenced by the depth to the top (well constrained by seismic interpretation and well picks) and base (less/no well coverage and poor constrained in some areas) of the base Carboniferous.