Hungarian town upgrades geothermal network with Swiss support

The town of Bóly (SW Hungary) launched a HUF 189m upgrade of its geothermal heating network with support from the Swiss-Hungarian Cooperation Programme on Monday.

Bóly is drilling new geothermal wells using HUF 93m of local council funding, HUF 81m from the Swiss-Hungarian Cooperation Programme, and HUF 14m from the central government.

Bóly drilled its first geothermal well more than twenty years earlier and now harnesses around 20 TJ of heat for public institutions and factories, said mayor Dávid Fehérvári. He added that new wells were needed to boost the network’s capacity.

Attila Steiner, the state secretary for energy and climate policy, said Hungary aimed to double its geothermal energy production by 2030 and that the Bóly project was a model for the country and even Europe.

Steiner noted that over HUF 70bn of the resources in the government’s HUF 440bn Jedlik Ányos Programme for energy-efficiency upgrades had been earmarked for geothermal projects.