Geothermal as a Sustainable Energy Source in Turkey: Comparison with Italy

Although Turkey is on an essential geothermal belt and has more than 1300 resources, it could not benefit from geothermal energy in the best way possible until recent years. Since the domestic production amount of fossil fuels such as oil and natural gas cannot meet the consumption amount in Turkey, these resources are imported from abroad. However, with the use of geothermal energy, in areas such as heating and energy production, the use of fossil energy will decrease, contributing to the reduction of foreign dependency in terms of energy. Thanks to the production and consumption of geothermal energy, Turkey's current account deficit will decrease, and it will be possible for this situation to affect economic growth positively. In this thesis, which is aimed to examine geothermal energy as a sustainable resource in Turkey, firstly, the concept of energy and its planning in Turkey are mentioned. Then energy types, non-renewable and renewable energy resources are analyzed. Additionally, this chapter includes the critical concept of Sustainable Development and its goals and how they can be integrated into the energy sector. In the next chapter, geothermal is introduced, and its importance in terms of environment and sustainable energy policies are examined, making it a sustainable energy source. In addition, the uses of geothermal energy are explained thoroughly. In the third chapter, the potential of geothermal energy worldwide and Turkey is examined, giving a central idea of the serviceability of this sustainable energy source. Finally, a comparison is made concerning the geothermal resource use of Turkey and Italy, which is one of the essential geothermal resource users in the world, where the first geothermal use applications were realized. This chapter aims to give both parties an idea about how the source can be used more efficiently by taking each country's recent statistics and practices into consideration to meliorate and promote the best uses. Ultimately, discussions and suggestions are made concerning Turkey’s use of its vast geothermal potential and how a sustainable passage to a more beneficial energy source can be achieved, bearing in mind the beforementioned comparison and cases of Italy to give an opinion about the improved use of geothermal throughout the country. This thesis was partly completed in Ankara, Turkey, thanks to the supervision of academicians from Middle East Technical University during the mobility period. Additionally, professionals from many offices and companies were contacted while obtaining a significant amount of information used in this thesis. Furthermore, the referred information acquired during this study was obtained using various domestic (Turkish) and foreign studies and publications. Moreover, international search engines were used to get some documents.