The basis for ERDWERK's commitment to start its first R&D project in 2008 was the increased amount of geothermal data in the greater Munich area after the publication of the Geothermal Atlas. The BMU (Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety) supported the project in cooperation with the Freie Universität in Berlin (FKZ 0327671AB), thus enabling a regional, cross-project and independent study on geology and geothermal energy.

The aim was to expand the geoscientific knowledge base and to integrate new methods into the geothermal exploration approach: the disciplines of structural geology, lithofacies and hydraulics were comprehensively studied with a large number of logs and seismic surveys, drill cutting samples and pump test data and converted into a new conceptual reservoir model. In retrospect, the groundwork for the future was thus laid, resulting in an optimized development strategy, an adapted temperature prognosis as well as new methods for the evaluation of the productivity and minimizing well interaction.

The information exchange meetings with the LIAG (Leibnitz Institute for Applied Geophysics) in association with the LfU (Bavarian State Office for the Environment) on the parallel research project, the so-called Greater Munich Model, were also trend-setting. In numerous working meetings and discussion rounds, the foundations for a hydrostratigaphic model of the Malm were jointly developed.

To this day, the geoscientific methods and integrated investigation strategies developed therein are applied and further developed. The results made a significant contribution to the development of hydrogeological and numerical flow models for the standardised collection of hydrogeological and geothermal parameters and for the optimised assessment of the geological exploration risk.

The final report on the research project can be downloaded in full from the "Technical Information Library" page.