Drilling into magma and the implications of the Iceland Deep Drilling Project (IDDP) for high-temperature geothermal systems worldwide

• The IDDP is investigating deep unconventional geothermal resources.
• The main thrust is to access supercritical hydrothermal fluids.
• Such fluids are abundant beneath young volcanic terrains.
• The first IDDP well encountered molten magma.
• Shallow magmatic intrusions are also potential geothermal resources.

Drilling deeper in high-temperature geothermal systems by the IDDP is aimed at increasing the power output of shallower high-temperature geothermal fields by an order of magnitude without increasing their environmental footprints. The main thrust of the IDDP is to develop deep supercritical systems, but an unexpected encounter with a shallow body of magma demonstrated that very high power outputs are also possible from the contact zone of an intrusion. In the future it may be feasible to produce energy directly from magma. Favorable environments to implement these concepts are likely worldwide wherever active volcanoes and young volcanic rocks occur.