SURROUNDED on all sides by desert, over 1000 kilometres from the nearest city, lies the tiny town of Innamincka, South Australia.
Innamincka has a permanent population of just 12, but each year up to 50,000 tourists swell their numbers, keen to experience the Australian outback, if not its lack of creature comforts. To keep these visitors cool, the tiny town runs up diesel bills of roughly $250,000 each year.
Come next January, however, the town could be powered for free, with electricity generated from heat mined from subterranean “hot rocks”.
Conventional geothermal power taps hot water rising naturally…
