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Geothermal Resources Database in Saudi Arabia (GRDiSA): GIS model and geothermal favorability map

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Abstract

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has many geothermal resources along the Red Sea coast, volcanoes, and hot springs. Geoscience researchers within Saudi Arabia were looking for this type of energy five decades ago or even more, but studies are still in academic shelves and no economic geothermal project. The economic vision of Saudi Arabia attempts to use this type of energy for new projects. In the current research, we are trying to collect the previous studies and literatures in geothermal energy to be in a database format. This database will assist decision-makers in drawing up a road map to explore, evaluate, and assess geothermal energy exploration in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Accordingly, geological, geophysical, and related studies are collected in a digital form to build the first Geothermal Resources Database in Saudi Arabia (GRDiSA) using the power full of the GIS environment. Additionally, built-in GIS extension is used as a modeler tool to target the potentiality of geothermal resources in Saudi Arabia. As a result, the first geothermal favorability map is generated based on the GIS model, indicating that the western side, where volcanoes and hot springs are located, is favorable for further geothermal exploration development.

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Acknowledgments

Authors greatly give thanks to all staff in Geohazards Research Center for their support and help in this research work.

Funding

This project was funded by the Deanship of Scientific Research (DSR) at King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, under the grant no. G-546-869-39. The authors, therefore, acknowledge with thanks to DSR for technical and financial support.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. GeoHazards Research Center, King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia

    Essam Aboud, Atef Qaddah, Hussein Harbi & Faisal Alqahtani

  2. National Research Institute of Astronomy and Geophysics (NRIAG), Helwan, Cairo, Egypt

    Essam Aboud

  3. Geophysics department, Faculty of Earth Sciences, King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia

    Hussein Harbi

  4. Faculty of Earth Sciences, King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia

    Faisal Alqahtani

Authors
  1. Essam Aboud
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  2. Atef Qaddah
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  3. Hussein Harbi
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  4. Faisal Alqahtani
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Correspondence to Essam Aboud.

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Responsible Editor: Narasimman Sundararajan

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Aboud, E., Qaddah, A., Harbi, H. et al. Geothermal Resources Database in Saudi Arabia (GRDiSA): GIS model and geothermal favorability map. Arab J Geosci 14, 112 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12517-020-06426-z

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12517-020-06426-z

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