For all sites preparations and installations and various activities are ongoing. Key advances are collection of core material at initial drillings in Delft, Litomĕřice and Berlin, as well as installations in Darmstadt, Bochum and Litomĕřice, water quality reference sampling in Delft, Berlin, Bochum and United Downs. Some delays are experienced due to complex system, slow decision making / permitting, lack of standards, or lack of available materials/human resources. Co-simulation and control activities generally lag behind in original planning, but problems there are resolved and activities up-to speed.
At each site, the stakeholder mapping exercise carried out in has been updated and has been used to design site-specific stakeholder engagement plans. Those plans are now being implemented, with various engagement activities either being carried out or being planned at each site. Bimonthly meetings continue to be held between WP2 team and site leads, to ensure that the planning, implementation and monitoring of engagement activities is on track. This offers opportunities for peer-learning through reflection and sharing of ideas. Partners have been invited to contribute to an engagement catalogue, a resource which will be made publicly available and which gathers many practical and creative ways to engage communities with the subsurface. National and regional perception surveys to each site have been administered, yielding 5,800 responses and are being analysed. An infographic on creating accessible events was designed and shared with the consortium and online. Several webinars for peer-learning have been hosted (1/ Lessons learnt on social license to operate; 2/ managing spillover and controversies, and 3/ co-creating the engagement catalogue).
The development of two open-source simulation tools is finished and made publicly available: a model to simulate the techno-economic performance of the technologies, and a tool to identify LCOE and carbon emissions reference heating systems without heat storage. The over-all levelised costs of heat storage in the subsurface (LCOE) analysis/simulations for site has started, still ongoing.
Regulation and Policy: Desk-based review of existing regulations at the project sites supported with specific inputs and information provided by site leaders is carried out. A participatory session with site leads was used to gather additional inputs about project status, planning and permitting, and to identify stakeholders for the site interviews. Deliverable on legislation has been submitted. Interviews with operators and regulators at project sites are ongoing (>80% progressed) and to be completed by the end of year 3. Current work is focused on the analysis of the interviews and on extracting key learnings for the final deliverable of recommendations.
Drilling: A SWOT analysis has formed the basis of the current technology development and testing plans, which has been integrated with the site plans. For example, casing while drilling with current technology proved to require drill rig development for which resource has been allocated. The performance of other various well technological components is ongoing. Fibre optics form the main sensoring technology, with progress following site progress.
Control: Initial specifications of control objectives and scope have been established following a thorough analysis of the systems and the storage technologies.
Water quality: A site-by-site approach was used to draw a clear picture of each site’s water quality aspects, and integration with the site activities to enable sampling or access to sampling. Sampling has been carried out at Delft, Darmstadt, Cornwall, Bochum and Berlin, with experimental protocol development and modelling being initiated.
Performance assessment: Hot Push-Pull Tests is carried out in Berlin and planned for Delft, with the protocol and equipment being finalised. The E-GRT was performed in Darmstadt providing the results to evaluate reservoir performance. Co-simulation methodology and procedures have been clarified for each site. Models run for Darmstadt are done and are currently being built for the other two main demo sites.
