Vulcan Energy Resources Limited (Vulcan) has been granted a new geothermal and lithium exploration license covering a region of Frankfurt am Main in Germany. The “Luftbrücke” license gives the company the privilege to explore geothermal energy and lithium-containing brine within the 207-sq. km. license area.
The “Luftbrücke” license area is located in the northernmost part of the Vulcan Zero Carbon Lithium Project area and encompasses a number of industrial facilities including the Höchst Chemical Park and Frankfurt Airport. The City of Frankfurt aims to achieve carbon neutrality by 2035 – no small feat considering that the city has a very carbon-intensive heat supply, 80% of which comes from gas and coal, serving a high heat demand in the range of 6-12 TWh per year.
This new licence and recent collaboration with the City of Frankfurt is a strong signal to renewable energy developers that Germany is unlocking demand for renewable heating to de-risk its reliance on foreign fossil gas.
Vulcan also reports investing in joint research well in the region together with the City of Frankfurt, the Hessian Ministry of Economics, the LandesEnergieAgentur Hessen GmbH (LEA), the state geological survey, the BäderBetriebe Frankfurt GmbH, Mainova AG, the Leibniz Institute of Applied Geophysics (LIAG) and GLU Freiberg GmbH to test the heat and lithium concentrations. The well has been drilled, and brine sampling and analysis work are underway.
Vulcan is also assessing whether the high lithium concentrations in the Buntsandstein brine reservoir extend into the “Rotliegend” brine reservoir to the north under Luftbrücke.