Balázs KULCSÁR
Faculty of Engineering, University of Debrecen, H-4028 Debrecen, Ótemető str. 2-4, E-mail: kulcsarb@eng.unideb.hu

REGIONAL AND SECTORAL VARIATIONS IN THE UTILIZATION OF THERMAL WATERS AND GEOTHERMAL POTENTIALS IN NORTHEASTERN HUNGARY

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The north-eastern part of Hungary possesses favourable geothermal endowments. There exist various forms of the utilization of thermal waters involving several fields of the economy and public administration. With respect to the existing capacities, the region holds substantial, unutilized reserves of thermal waters and geothermal energies. The broadening of our experience, the changing economic and natural landscape calls for the evaluation of the current situation from time to time, as well as setting new priorities for the fields of utilization. The focal point of this study is the analysis of the north-eastern part of Hungary in terms of economic geography, from the perspective of trends in the utilization of thermal waters and geothermal energy. The area of study is the North Great Plain Region, i.e. Hungary’s north-eastern region and it is part of the EU’s statistical planning areas statistical planning, which encompasses three counties: Szabolcs-Szatmár-Bereg, Hajdú-Bihar and Jász-Nagykun-Szolnok. Our studies have examined the actual extent of the utilization of geothermal energy, as to which fields of economy and public administration it involves. With these investigations, I have wanted to find out for the satisfaction of what economic demands thermal waters have been established, and how the purpose of utilization has changed in the course of operations, and currently, in 2011 how the sectoral distribution of the utilization of wells looks like. The number of the currently unutilized wells has also been established. These investigations have relied on quantitative and deductive methods, and besides empirical studies have been performed.