The Mine Thermal Energy Storage project in Bochum - lessons learned from the HEATSTORE project

The Ruhr-Area - Germany’s former biggest coherent mining region, where until 2018 for more than 150 years hard coal had been excavated - has the potential to be transformed into a geothermal mining region by extracting mine water for heating and cooling purposes. The idea of obtaining thermal energy from an inoperative and flooded colliery has already been pursued for a long time, although to a comparatively limited extent in the present time. Up to this point a pilot plant has not been established, in which the possibility of thermal energy storage in a former colliery has been considered reutilizing a distinctive mine void volume in the subsurface made by drifts, shafts and coal seam excavation