The Australian Federal Government is giving away $50m to geothermal developers. The money will be used to cover the costs of exploration and drilling. The initiative comes after findings from Geoscience Australia which say that just 1 per cent of Australia’s latent Geothermal energy could produce 26,000 times the amount of energy used by Australians each year.

The potential for Geothermal energy is well known, but the high capital cost of developing the power plants is thought to be holding developers back. Energy is created by pumping cold water down into the earth, where it can collect heat from the the earth’s core. Some drilling shafts are as much as 5km deep.

The Australian Geothermal Energy Conference kicks off today in Melbourne.