UGA Calendar

Emergent, Experimental, and Established Geothermal Resources in Utah’s Great Basin: A Preview of the 2025 UGA Field Trip

Eugene Szymanski, PhD Utah Geological Survey

Utah Department of Natural Resources Building

1594 W N Temple St, Salt Lake City, 1st Floor

Room 1040/1050

In a first-of-its-kind partnership, the Geological Society of America is teaming up with the Utah Geological Association to offer the UGA Annual Field Trip as part of their selection of trips associated with 2025 GSA CONNECTS. The UGA Annual Field Trip aligns with one of the general meeting themes (Energy and Resource Innovations in the 21st Century) and is one of several excursions that are being offered across the country for local geologists to attend (e.g., Catalina Island; Grand Canyon).

• Hosts: Utah Geological Association & Geological Society of America
• Leaders: Eugene Szymanski, Christian Hardwick, Stefan Kirby (Utah Geological Survey), and Clay Jones (University of Utah EGI)
• Date: Thu-Fri. 16-17 Oct. 2025
• Departure/Return: Utah Department of Natural Resources (1594 West North Temple, Salt Lake City, Utah 84116) – times TBA
• Price: $225. Cost includes a Field Guide (see GSA Field Guide 73), transportation, lunches, snacks, water, and overnight accommodations (double-occupancy, Holiday Inn Express in Cedar City). For single occupancy or local pricing (i.e., no hotel), please contact Rebecca Taormina, GSA Field Trip and Short Program Coordinator: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
• Registration: https://store.geosociety.org/products/ft25cn428

Abstract 

Utah (USA) is naturally gifted with bountiful geothermal energy resources. Located along the eastern boundary of the Great Basin, a physiographic region with abundant geothermal heat close to Earth’s surface, Utah’s geothermal resources are a product of several large-scale geologic processes working together: regional hydrological systems flush water from high mountain ranges through adjacent lowlands, accommodated by heavily fractured bedrock and (still active) crustal-scale faults that bound each valley, and sweep geothermal energy from a nearly limitless supply of deep subsurface heat radiating from a relatively shallow intracontinental mantle and geologically recent volcanic intrusive suites. Intended for students and working professionals alike, this field trip showcases a wide range of geothermal resources that are in different phases of exploration and/or development, from established geothermal power plants operating within traditional hydrothermal systems since the 1980s, to world-class, natural field laboratories where experimental technologies are being developed to engineer efficient closed-system fracture sets within hot rock bodies, to emergent geothermal resource leads at the very beginning of subsurface characterization to assess their true resource potential. Field-trip attendees will explore the Black Rock Desert, visit two different working geothermal power plants, tour the U.S. Department of Energy–funded Frontier Observatory for Research in Geothermal Energy (FORGE) site for Enhanced Geothermal Systems research, investigate a siliceous sinter deposit at the Opal Mound fault zone, experience scenic drives through Utah’s Renewable Energy Corridor, and learn ways in which geoscientists conduct geothermal energy resource assessments in areas with strong blind/hidden geothermal resource potential.