GENERIC OVERVIEW OF GEOTHERMAL WELLHEAD GENERATING UNITS.

In recent years, wellhead generating units have become of major interest to the geothermal power industry. As their name suggests, wellhead units are situated next to a production wellpad and are generally supplied with hot water or steam from one or several production wells. Several features distinguish geothermal wellhead generating units from a central geothermal power plant. One is that the gross output of wellhead units is generally in the 1 to 15 MW range, with the largest offered now being 25 MW. Another is that wellhead generating units have very short steam lines. (Central geothermal power plants characteristically have long, interconnecting cross-country pipelines to transport the steam from the various wellpads to the central unit). The most characteristic feature of a wellhead generation facility is its modular construction.