Mine Water Geothermal Resource Atlas for Scotland

A Web Mapping Feature layer identifying optimal locations across Scotland for mine water geothermal development.

Mine water geothermal energy describes the low-carbon practice of using water held in abandoned flooded mines to heat or cool surface thermal demands. The low temperatures (as low as 10°C) require heat pump technology to upgrade thermal energy to usable temperatures for heating homes or industrial applications. The intention of the mine water geothermal resource atlas is to highlight optimal areas to exploit MWG energy in Scotland. If the scale of Scotland’s mine water thermal resource, estimated at 12 GW, becomes better communicated we envisage that this atlas will prove influential for increasing the rate and success of MWG deployment. Ideally, the provision of feasible MWG sites will influence stakeholder decisions i.e., where to invest and develop land to make the best use of the low-carbon resource, resulting in MWG potential included as part of a standard appraisal for a residential or industrial development plan. Whilst it is acknowledged that focused expert input would be required to integrate surface heat demand and subsurface resources in detail, the atlas provides non-experts and decision makers with a first-pass high-level summary of the potential MWG resource located within their area of interest.

The four criteria for site selection are summarised below:

1. There are more than one (overlapping) mined seams.

2. The mined seams are deeper than 30 m to minimise subsidence risk.

3. The mine water head (i.e., mine “water table”) is not excessively deep (< 60 m below ground level) to avoid excessive pumping costs.

4. The mined seams are shallower than 250 m below ground level to minimise drilling costs.

As a result, this atlas has identified a total of 370.3 km2 across 19 local authority areas which are most suitable for MWG development.

Symbology:

The calculated depths for mine water head (Criterion 3) are mapped in 10 m increments with shallower values (0 m – 20 m BGL) shown in shades of pink and deeper values (20 m - 60 m BGL) shown in shades of blue. Where mine water head is shallow (0 m - 20 m BGL) there may be some risk that reinjection may cause mine water heads to approach the surface (depending on the transmissivity of the workings). “Open loop with discharge” may be more feasible for areas with very shallow mine water (0 m - 20 m BGL), but may require additional permitting (discharge consents) and available land for treatment depending on water chemistry. Areas shaded blue (20 m - 60 m BGL) correlate with deeper mine water heads which are most suited to the ‘open-loop with reinjection’ configuration. Both configurations are presented in Walls et al. (2022) - https://doi.org/10.3390/en14196215. Depths greater than 60 m BGL are not included since they indicate situations which would face excessive pumping costs.

The Mine Water Geothermal Resource Atlas for Scotland (MiRAS) was the work of David Walls, a PhD researcher at the Universities of Strathclyde and Glasgow. David has been supervised by Dr Neil Burnside of the University of Strathclyde, David Banks of the University of Glasgow and Prof. Adrian Boyce of SUERC. The PhD studentship was funded by Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council and some of the analysis was funded through the John Mather Trust Rising Star Award. Further contextual details of this work including the input data, specific processing and quality assurance can be found in David’s PhD (How can optimal sites for mine water geothermal energy systems be identified and where are they in Scotland?) and accompanying paper (to be shared when available). If you have any queries regarding the MiRAS, assistance can be provided via emails to david.walls@strath.ac.uk; or you can reach David at his new post with TownRock Energy at david.walls@townrock.com.

Identification info

Alternative title: mwgt

Metadata Language: English (en)

Character set

Dataset Reference Date (): 2023-04-11

Identifier: www.spatialhub.scot / sh_mwgt

The Improvement Service - Spatial Hub Custodian

Livingston , West Lothian , EH54 6AX , United Kingdom

01506 282012

Maintenance and update frequency

GEMET - INSPIRE themes, version 1.0 ()

Hydrography
Geology
Bio-geographical regions
Energy resources

Limitations on Public Access

Other constraints: No limitations on public access

Use constraints

Other constraints: Non-Commercial Government Licence

Spatial representation type

Topic category

Environment
Geoscientific information

Code: EPSG:4258

Code: EPSG:27700

Code: EPSG:3857

Distribution Information

Data format

Data format

OGC:WMC ( 1.3.0 )

Transfer options

Resource Locator: Web Mapping Tiled Service ( OGC:WMTS )
WMTS of Mine Water Geothermal Resource Atlas for Scotland

Resource Locator: Geospatial Data Catalogue: Coal Authority ( WWW:LINK-1.0-http--link )

Resource Locator: Mine Water Geothermal Resource Atlas - Scotland ( WWW:LINK-1.0-http--link )
A link to the CKAN metadata record on the Spatial Hub. A direct link to the Web Map Tiled Service is available here also.

Quality Scope

Report

Dataset Reference Date (): 2010-12-08

Degree

Statement: Underground workings. Polygons representing worked portions of mined seams. Converted to GIS format from mine abandonment plans. 33,651 polygons (104 MB) The Coal Authority (Tipper, 2015b)

Shallow workings. Derived from the ‘underground workings’ dataset by extracting all workings, or parts whose depth is 30 metres or less from the surface. 12,222 polygons (25 MB) The Coal Authority (Abbate, 2016)

In seam level. Point data representing the level of underground working at a specific point, in a specific seam, relative to Ordnance Datum (sea level) 82,794 points (39 MB) The Coal Authority (Tipper, 2015a)

Monitored mine water head. X and Y data of TCA monitored mine water head observation points from boreholes or shafts, with Z values relative to Ordnance Datum 48 locations The Coal Authority (Pers comms, 2022)

Mine water discharge locations. X and Y data of unmonitored mine water discharges, Z data created by extraction from DTM 81 locations Walls et al. (2022)

Digital terrain model (DTM). Raster layer of surface elevation for 5m grid squares 2.8 GB Crown copyright and database rights 2022 Ordnance Survey.

Metadata

File identifier: 63ccefed-0165-461d-a5a5-025b0b2463c5 XML

Metadata Language: English (en)

Resource type

Metadata Date: 2023-05-26T08:58:09

Metadata standard name: UK GEMINI

Metadata standard version: 2.3