Governor Polis: We are excited to be a part of helping Colorado Mesa University become the first university in the country that's 100% geothermal.

Well, it's exciting to see a geothermal system in scale that's used for building, heatin and cooling across campus.

Majority of the campus already has buildings heated and cooled with geothermal.

Well, right now the system is pretty extensive insofar as we've built a relatively new campus.

There's been a tremendous building boom over the last 15 years.

And so we have a lot of new square footage.

And every time we brought a new building on line, we attach it to GEO.

So today we sit at about two thirds of our campus that is heated and cooled with GEO.

Tim Foster: It had never really been done at scale.

There was nothing that suggested it wouldn't work.

So we put in enough pipe there to really continue to utilize it for additional buildings.

And our hope was if it worked, yeah, that we would continue to go and maybe slowly but surely convert older buildings.

The optimistic look, the hope, kind of cross your fingers, was yeah let's get ourselves 100%.

The construction of our geo exchange system at Colorado Mason University began back in 2007.

We investigated the use of geo exchange at the same time that we started building our academic classroom building, which is now known as Domingues Hall on our campus.

It was from that point that we leveraged that existing drill field to continue adding additional pieces to provide that geo resource to various buildings across campus.

And over the last ten or 15 years, we've just kept expanding the system to employ other technologies.

Another exciting element is the way that President John Marshall has calculated what the savings are, the tangible savings to students from not having a utility bill to costs that has to be passed along to students in tuition, and it saves students about 2% a year on tuition.

So the lowest cost form of energy is wind and solar, and they're terrific, but they don't provide that base-load right.

You only produce wind energy about 300 days a year, depending on where you're at, when the wind's blowing, solar only during the day.

What geothermal can provide is day or night, summer or winter, regardless of the weather, it's there producing energy, whether it's building heating or cooling, or increasingly for electric.

So geothermal systems can go anywhere.

You can change how exactly the system is configured underground to make it work anywhere.

However, here at CMU, we do have optimal conditions and those conditions are typically characterized by a high groundwater table.

One way to think about it is if you have water flowing past your tube with your geothermal loop in it, there's something always in contact with that, and it's always effectively cooling or heating your tube.

Kent Marsh: In the drill field, we drill a hole that's 500 feet deep, and in that hole we stick a piece of pipe that's two inches in diameter.

And then from that hole, we connect to the next hole that's drilled 25 feet apart and do the same thing.

We have five or six drill fields times, you know, 40 or 50 holes times 500 feet begins to be a really big number.

And then on top of that, we have 18 inch diameter HDPE pipe that connects all of those drill fields together.

And that central loop runs from North Avenue, which is our southern boundary of our campus, north to Orchard Avenue, which is our northern boundary of campus.

That's one of the beauties of what's happening here at Colorado University, because they've started this literally decades ago.

There is a large economy of scale.

So the geothermal system at Colorado Mesa University is comprised of bore fields that are located underneath parking lots and green spaces on campus.

Water, in this case, is the medium of transfer flows up and down that pipe and then either dissipates heat or absorbs heat from the ground.

That water then is pumped back to central mechanical rooms, two or three places on campus, and then piping is distributed to water source heat pumps typically, and that water source heat pump has a heat exchanger in there where there is geothermal water on one side and then a refrigerant system on the other.

Air blows over the refrigerant coil and you get heating and cooling air to maintain thermal comfort.

Trying to understand how we go from a geothermal system with loops in the ground at about 57, 58 degrees to heat a building tens of degrees warmer than that.

Before we heat exchange our refrigerant is a liquid.

We go through the heat exchange with the ground loop.

The heat from the ground is transferred into our refrigerat At the temperature, about 50 something degrees, the geothermal loop phase changes our working fluid to a vapor, and then we compress that vapo, the compressed vapor, you add a ton of energy through that compression.

And then we go through another heat exchange where we use that as the heat pump.

It's very hot and the air blows across it.

And then we can heat the building to much hotter than the geothermal loop.

As we take the energy away from that working fluid, it condenses.

Then we go through an expansion valve where we drop the energy again, and then it's exposed to the geothermal loop again.

We also have another loop of water inside the buildings that runs basically on each floor of a building, and that loop of water is connected to heat pumps.

And, so it allows us to move waste heat within a building; between a building in the central loop and another building; between buildings on campus and the ground between the ground buildings, the swimming pool, the irrigation system.

So rather than wasting that heat to the environment through a condenser on a refrigeration system, we're keeping that heat and we're moving it around.

So when we look at our total system between the energy that a heat pump consumes, the energy that our large pumps that move the geo water around campus, we're looking at using about ten kilowatt hours per square foot per year versus a traditional system that would consume about 22 kilowatt hours per square foot per year.

And so we're consuming less than half.

The missing part of our system that makes us wholly sustainable is that solar piece.

Could we install solars on our buildings across campus that would deliver some amount of that electricity through a sustainable source to our sustainable geo exchange system?

We're considering options that include a large solar array somewhere off campus.

We have acres of parking that we could potentially cover with a structure that provided shade and that also generated solar electricity.

When we build a new building, whether that building gets a solar array or not, it's future proofed, which means the building, the dead loads have been calculated to accommodate a solar system in the future.

The energy saving is really has to do with the difference of electricity that I would consume in a building that's served with a traditional HVAC system versus the electricity that's consumed for a geo system.

That is almost an energy hedge over time, as energy costs continue to increase and continue to rise, our energy consumption on this campus is a much flatter curve than it would normally be.

So the difference between that steeper curve and the flatter curve, those are our savings and that's our hedge against the cost of future electricity.

The one thing I would like to add is just that we have this incredible resource.

CMU was a pioneer in geothermal heating and cooling.

We had the biggest system in the country for a long time.

So we have this resource here.

We have this technology here.

We have this innovation here that is really unparalleled.

And I love that our students are exposed to it throughout a variety of classes.

I love incorporating it into all of my classes, and so my students have exposure to the concepts and the design component of drilling these deep holes and how the geothermal system can heat buildings.

We also have our system operators, our utilities folks and facilities folks come in, lecture to our class.

We do field trips around campus where we get to see the infrastructure.

This is one of those win win wins.

It's good for the economy insofar as we're spending less than we would otherwise.

It's good for the environment in that it's a really low draw power source heating and cooling system.

It's good for us because we also then are able to utilize this and fulfill our educational mission with students.

So it really is in every conceivable way a win for our campus.

As part of the Western Governors Association, we've had a number of sessions across the West here in Colorado and around at Colorado Mesa, and of course, many other cities and states across the west looking at the potential for geothermal and how it's been leveraged in different ways.

But the really exciting opportunity is leveraging some of the technology from the extraction industry and being able to inexpensively drill deeper down where there's high levels of heat almost everywhere in the state.

And if we can figure out the economics around that, that'll really unlock the ability to do geothermal electric really almost across our entire state.

We've been seeing fluctuating prices of gas.

It's very volatile right now and the cost of electricity is far more stable.

And so by having that reliable source and renewable source of electricity coming into your home from something like geothermal, absolutely.

I think it's a very viable option for people, especially as costs start to drive down.

There's definitely money coming down from the state and from federal governments to incentivize some of those transitions.

So making sure that we're leveraging those dollars that are coming down would definitely help with that sustainable just transition.

So some of the green technologies that we're seeing show up here in Grand Junction in development are like Darren Carei's fully electrified subdivision.

Grand Junction's first ever electric only subdivision that will be powered by solar and clean energy through the grid.

As we develop the site and as we develop the houses, we will have a product that is near net zero energy, which means that the house itself is producing as much as the energy that is being used.

Well the long term benefits, of course, are environmental and economic.

Everybody wants to do better for their future, but most people want to do it at the same cost as they have other choices today.

So, when we are putting a five kilowatt solar system on the roof and we have an electrified heating and cooling, then that offsets that increased cost.

So once you have the building to the efficient standard as makes the most common economic sense, then we put the renewables on top and most of our homeowners see a utility bill of less than $100 a month.

Alpine Bank wants to build their buildings with a return on our investment.

We call it an asset.

And then we also want to reduce our carbon footprint when we're building something.

We have geothermal in some of our other locations.

We figured we would install geothermal in this.

The initial investment was higher, but we were looking at a return on investment within ten years, and it would add value to the building.

With the lead certification in this building, it's leadership environmental and energy design.

This one we did the insulation, the windows, the building materials and the geothermal.

We probably save about $300 a month in energy costs compared to a building say that we have that's about 50 miles away from here.

I use that bank as a comparison because it's about the same square footage.

It's a different building altogether, but what we're looking at is I'm saving $300 a month on average.

Over the course of ten years, that's $36,000.

We spent a little extra money, but we got that return of the investment back and then we can use those savings for something else.

I think really any type of development could incorporate geothermal.

It's a pretty accessible, renewable energy source.

You just need the space to either lay the groundwork, whether it's horizontal or vertical.

So horizontal closed loop versus vertical closed loop.

The horizontal takes a lot more surface area that you really don't want to have under houses, under buildings, things like that.

So if you could do it under the street or something like that in a subdivision, it would apply.

But a lot of times it's better to go vertical.

It takes less square footage of site to do vertical because you're doing your heat exchange down through the ground instead of horizontally.

Where we see horizontal loops doing well is football fields at schools and things like that.

So horizontal systems and other parts of Colorado are Telluride, Aspen, Snowmass Mountain Village.

And where it really, really comes in handy is where they're digging these houses into the side of hills.

They're putting ten or 12 feet of dirt over this system again anyway, so they're just laying down the horizontal and then they're burying it with the groundwork they've already got to do.

So, it's really free excavation because they had to do it anyway.

So vertical closed loop and horizontal closed loops are expensive to put in.

The pond system; if the pond is already there and there's running water going through the pond, then it's a lot less expensive to put that heat exchanger in a pond, and it's a lot easier to get out later if something goes wrong.

As long as the water's running in a pond and it's deep enough, it's a really economical way to get heat exchange for a heat pump system.

In Gateway, in some ways it was easier and in a lot of ways it was more complicated.

The easier part is, it's a pretty simple idea to get at the heat exchangers is in the ground or in a pond.

And so the outside piece was fairly easy.

Where it becomes complicated is the inside piece and an institution like Gateway, which is a large square footage institution with events centers and hotels and restaurants and things like that, to have somebody operate the inside piece of these control systems is very complicated at times.

There are other types of renewable energy sources that are probably more feasible for existing developments, like putting on solar PV panels or transitioning to air source heat pumps rather than ground source heat pumps.

They're really more cost effective for the homeowner, because when Gateway, for example, started to put these heat pump system in drilling and horizontal was a lot cheaper to do.

You know, the drilling costs at that time were four and $5 a vertical foot, and today you'd see 40 and $50 a vertical foot.

So the air source heat pumps are almost as efficient as ground source heat pumps, but you don't have to do all the drilling, things like that.

In newer, different builds, sds different settings where you don't have all this incredible infrastructure.

I think that air source heat pumps are becoming a lot more efficient.

For individual homeowners, the cost is so much lower, and the savings again is very large.

I think the return on investment they always pay for themselves in their lifetimes.

In an institutional setting where we already have such incredible geothermal infrastructure, I think that the overall costs support's continuing to build into that system, as long as your heating and cooling loads can sustain it.

The problem is getting the capital costs up front, and that's part of why the governor's initiative is so important, because it can help.

Governor Polis: There's huge opportunities at the home level at the sub development level for geothermal heating and cooling.

Living is a lot more affordable when you don't have a monthly utility bill for heating and cooling.

So, that's one less thing to worry about for sub developments for towns that have geothermal heating and cooling.

Imagine no heating bill in winter, no cooling bill in summer, and yet you're able to keep your place where you live at a comfortable temperature all year long.

There's another element to this, and that is, as you think about the state of Colorado as a whole, and if you're a policymaker, a decision maker or lawmaker, and you start to think about, well long term, what are the ways that we operate an entire system of state buildings, whether that's a prison or a school or a university or other service buildings?

And the answer is that when you can put all of those things together through GEO, and we can pilot that and demonstrate that it works at scale, well, now the state of Colorado can shine a light here in rural western Colorado and say there's a flag in the ground over there.

That is the future.

That's how we want to heat and cool our buildings all across the state of Colorado.

So the exciting thing for us is if we can demonstrate this works at scale, if we can demonstrate that it can be done here in Grand Junction, it can be done anywhere.

Governor Polis: We also were able to get into law about a $30 million investment in geothermal.

Looking at everything from small scale to large scale.

We also recently signed a new tax credit that will help make it more available across the state.

Also in discussions with the city, with the school district about how the university can provide heating and cooling beyond just this community.

But I think it is a technology of the future that will see a lot of adoption.

And it's great for common space, whether it's under detention ponds or whether it's under parks, and it's something every house or commercial building within a development can tap into.

And I don't know why they wouldn't take it because again, it's just natural heat from the earth.

You've got the heat beneath your feet, the energy is right there and that's what you're tapping into.

And so your monthly utility cost is obviously going to be less.

So it's just a cost benefit analysis at that point.

Can you substantiate the large upfront cost?

As more people get interested, as there's more supply, more demand, than I think you're going to see those upfront costs start to come down.

You'll start to see it become more affordable and adopted more broadly.

I like the model that CMU is putting together because they're developing kind of a community geothermal.

They want other people to be able to tap into their geothermal.

And I think that's a better model than every single individual going out there and putting their own geothermal system in their own little quarter acre slice of heaven.

Could we truly make this a community system?

When I think of this university, we're basically a community.

We have 11,000 students, just under 3 million square feet of buildings.

So we in above itself, we are a community.

But I'd really like to see our resource leveraged to members that are across the street, larger members of the community.

A perfect case scenario is we have been able to expand our geo exchange system to allow us to connect an additional 800,000 square feet of existing campus buildings that aren't currently connected.

I would love to see us being able to share this geo resource with perhaps the school district across the street, the brand new Grand Junction High School.

So if we extended our system across the street, potentially we're allowed to drill some holes in their new recreation field; we can connect that system to the existing infrastructure they're installing and simply replace those condensers that dump waste heat to the environment, to move that waste heat into the geo system.

That would that would be perfect case scenario.

I think as there's a greater understanding as technology becomes more affordable, we will see that.

I think long range planning, strategic planning for the future is where it needs to be so that the market can adapt to something like this.

I think tax incentives or some type of incentive is better than regulation.

So, I think dangling the fruit rather than the big stick is a better approach.

What reliable clean energy can do; geothermal, solar, electric, is really provide for that ongoing support for energy, which we always need.

And we're not beholden to international prices or what's going on in the geopolitical landscape.

Colorado is very well situated in part because of our geophysical characteristics.

We have 300 days of sunshine in most parts of the state.

Great characteristics for wind.

The American West is one of the active areas for geothermal activity.

Colorado has a lot going for us.

Of course we also have our legacy fuels oil, gas, coal also prevalent in the area.

It's ironic because, you know, we come from from a community that's viewed as a very extractive industries, supportive of, you know, oil and gas till I die.

And, you know, I give a lot of credit to the folks in the industry, in the energy industry, who are supportive of us doing it as well.

And so you would think they would have gone, Yeah, if you can ground source, then you won't buy gas, but you didn't see any of that.

And so the community's passion for this university sort of negated that.

And they appreciated the fact that we were trying to manage costs and do something good, and there would still be need for natural gas elsewhere.

We will always need a little bit of backup on really cold days and really hot days.

So... Cody Davis: I like geothermal better than solar.

I mean, geothermal just takes less.

It's something that's sustainable long term.

And you can do a lot with geothermal.

You can use it as an exchange system.

You can use it to actually generate electricity.

So there's so much we can do with thermal.

And it's right there.

I think it's absolutely going to become prevalent in the next 30, 40 years.

I mean, CMU is kind of standing out as the paragon, the great example for how to utilize it.

And eventually I believe geothermal is going to become more affordable and less expensive upfront where one can justify those expenditures.

So I think it's the future.

I think any time you can draw attention to rural parts of the country, like Grand Junction, that maybe get overlooked day to day, and there is sometimes a feeling that there's this rural urban divide.

When we can bring the focus in such a positive way around this really impressive technology that is in some ways so simple and yet so revolutionary for the West, well, that's a really positive thing for Colorado Mason University.

You know, this kind of geothermal is is really can be used essentially anywhere.

When you go down about 30 feet, it's about 56 degrees.

And that's good for cooling buildings in summer.

It's good for heating buildings in winter.

We're able to do a heat exchange with the water.

It's very close to zero, ongoing operating costs.

So it's really just a matter of getting together and building it upfront and then recognizing the savings.

The future is strong and I think that what you're seeing is more and more people looking at innovative ways to reduce their utility bill.

That includes things like geothermal electric.

It includes things like electrifying compared to natural gas.

Electric vehicle charging; a lot less expensive than filling up your vehicle, whether it's three-fifty a gallon or $3 or $2.50 a gallon, a lot less expensive.

It costs about a third to get an electric charge into your vehicle for the same range, 2 to 300 miles.

So really, people are just the power of the checkbook is what is dictating this.

People are just sick and tired of paying too much for energy.

And there's a whole lot of ways that new technology is bringing to reduce those costs, including geothermal.

You know, as chair of the bipartisan Western Governors Association, we've made my initiative the heat beneath our feet.

How we can better tap geothermal resources across the American West.

If you look at a heat map of the United States, much of the geothermal capacity is in the West, and we just need to make sure that we can find ways to tap it, both for geothermal heating and cooling like we do here at Colorado Mason University, and also geothermal electric.

There's a lot that we can learn from what's going on, and we can plot the energy future for the American West.