MOSCOW, October 2. /TASS/. Drilling a well 10 kilometers deep for geothermal power plants, which are viewed as promising renewable energy sources for the future, is estimated to come to about 2 bln rubles ($30.6 mln), Russian Academy of Sciences Member Sergei Alekseenko said at a TASS press conference on Tuesday.

"The most promising way of getting energy in future is from the earth’s interior (geothermal energy). However, there is one problem - the drilling price. If we build a geothermal plant, then [drilling to the depth] of 10 km, for example, costs about 2 bln rubles ($30.6 mln). If you miss the mark and drill to an improper point, then you will lose that 2 bln rubles. So, scientific engineering studies and new drilling methods are needed here," the researcher stressed.

According to Alekseenko, the highest level of geothermal energy development today is in the United States, where favorable environment conditions for this have taken shape. "The US estimated energy reserves at depths to 10,000 meters that would be enough for 50,000 years for them. Imagine a depth of hundreds of kilometers, energy resources there would cover many hundreds of thousands of years," he noted.

Developing ecofriendly and high-performance technologies for raw hydrocarbons processing, such as gas-fired power plants and combined steam and gas units, is the upcoming perspective for energy sector’s development across the globe for the next decades, the researcher says. The longer-term prospects include renewables and new methods of energy storage.

"Solar energy and definitely geothermal energy are among the most promising areas in this sphere. Not thermal pools that are small in numbers but namely the heat of the deep layers of the earth. The latter area should be invested in heavily by now," Alekseenko said.