Vulcan Energy Advances Lionheart Project with Drilling of Second Production Well at Schleidberg Site

Posted by Alphaxioms Geothermal News | February 19, 2026

In the rapidly evolving world of renewable energy and sustainable resource extraction, few projects capture the imagination quite like Vulcan Energy Resources' Phase One Lionheart Project in Germany's Upper Rhine Valley. This innovative endeavor combines geothermal energy production with the extraction of battery-grade lithium from deep geothermal brines, offering a low-carbon, domestic solution to Europe's growing demand for critical minerals in the electric vehicle (EV) revolution.

The latest milestone comes from Vercana GmbH, Vulcan's in-house drilling subsidiary. In a recent update shared on social media, Vercana announced the commencement of drilling for the second production well, designated LSC-2, at the Schleidberg site. This follows the successful completion of testing at the first new well, LSC-1 (including its sidetrack LSC-1b), and a smooth transition of the V20 drilling rig to the next phase.

The post highlighted the teamwork involved: "Thank you to the Vercana and Vulcan teams, for delivering a safe and efficient start to LSC-2." Accompanied by an impressive photo of the drilling crew gathered around the massive drill bit, the image underscores the human element behind this high-tech operation—workers in high-visibility gear proudly posing with the equipment that is literally tapping into the Earth's heat and resources.

The Lionheart Project: A Dual-Purpose PowerhouseResearched and Written by Alphaxioms.blogspot.com

The Lionheart Project represents a groundbreaking approach to resource development. Located in the Upper Rhine Graben—a geologically active rift zone rich in hot geothermal brines—Phase One aims to produce 24,000 tonnes per annum of lithium hydroxide monohydrate (LHM), sufficient to supply batteries for approximately 500,000 electric vehicles each year. As a co-product, the project will generate significant renewable energy: around 275 GWh of electricity and 560 GWh of heat annually over a projected 30-year lifespan.

What sets this apart from traditional lithium mining is its sustainability profile. Instead of open-pit mining or evaporation ponds that consume vast amounts of water and energy, Vulcan uses a closed-loop system. Hot brine is pumped from deep reservoirs (typically several kilometers underground), where it naturally contains dissolved lithium. The heat drives geothermal power generation via Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) technology—supplied by partners like Turboden for a 32 MWe plant—before the lithium is extracted using proven direct lithium extraction (DLE) methods. The cooled, depleted brine is then reinjected, minimizing environmental impact and maintaining reservoir pressure.

This integrated model not only produces zero-direct-emission lithium but also delivers baseload renewable power and heat to local communities. Vulcan already operates the NatürLich Insheim geothermal plant in the area, which has been supplying carbon-neutral electricity to about 6,500 households since before the company's major expansion.

Drilling Progress: From LSC-1 to LSC-2

The Schleidberg site near Landau has become a focal point for Vulcan's field development plan (FDP). The first new well, LSC-1, was completed with sidetracks (LSC-1a and LSC-1b) to optimize reservoir access. Production testing on LSC-1b showed excellent results: flow rates of 105–125 liters per second under operational drawdown, with a productivity index of 2.1–2.5 liters per second per bar. These figures align with or exceed the expectations in Vulcan's FDP, confirming strong reservoir quality, lithium grades (around 181 mg/L on average in the area), permeability, and heat content.

The smooth skidding of the V20 rig—moving it efficiently from one well pad position to the next—allowed operations to transition directly into drilling LSC-2 without delays. This efficiency is crucial for a project that plans up to 24 production and injection wells in Phase One. Drilling is expected to continue through 2026, potentially with a second rig mobilized later in the year.

Vercana's role here is noteworthy. Established as Vulcan's dedicated geothermal drilling company, it addresses the specialized needs of deep, high-temperature wells in geothermal environments. Partnerships with firms like Odfjell Technology for tubular running services further enhance operational capabilities.

Broader Implications for Europe’s Energy and Materials Security

Europe faces a critical challenge: securing lithium supplies for the booming EV and battery sector while reducing dependence on imports from regions with higher environmental and geopolitical risks. The Lionheart Project directly tackles this by creating a local, sustainable supply chain. Backed by major financing—including €250 million from the European Investment Bank (EIB) and a total package approaching €2.2 billion—the project received its Final Investment Decision (FID) in late 2025.

Key contractors like ABB (electrical infrastructure), Turboden (geothermal power plant), and ACS Group/Sedgman/HOCHTIEF (lithium plants) are involved, ensuring world-class execution. The project's strategic importance has earned support as part of the EU's push for raw material autonomy and decarbonization.

Geothermal energy itself gains momentum in Germany, where the government aims to expand capacity significantly. With 36 plants already operating and more in development, projects like Lionheart demonstrate how geothermal can provide reliable, renewable baseload power alongside valuable mineral extraction.

Challenges and the Path Forward

While progress is impressive, challenges remain. Deep drilling in geothermal settings requires precision to handle high temperatures, pressures, and potential formation issues. However, Vulcan's experience with existing wells and positive test results from LSC-1b bode well. Commercial lithium production is targeted for 2028, with upstream facilities like the Geothermal Lithium Extraction Plant (G-LEP) under construction.

The Lionheart Project exemplifies how innovation can align economic, environmental, and energy security goals. By turning geothermal brines into dual streams of renewable energy and critical materials, Vulcan is pioneering a model that could inspire similar developments worldwide.

As drilling advances at Schleidberg, the geothermal and lithium communities watch closely. This is more than a project—it's a step toward a cleaner, more self-reliant future for Europe's green transition.

Stay tuned to Alphaxioms Geothermal News for more updates on this and other geothermal advancements.

Connect with us: LinkedIn, X

Source: Researched and Written by Alphaxioms

Comments

Hot Topics 🔥

Blowout at Cape Station: Fervo Energy’s First Major Crisis After Blockbuster IPO

Just weeks after a record-breaking IPO, the flagship project of the "geothermal unicorn" faces its first major operational crisis. By : Robert Buluma Beaver County, Utah – The morning of May 27, 2026, began like any other at the Cape Station construction site in rural Utah. Workers for Fervo Energy, the newly public darling of the renewable energy world, were engaged in the complex task of drilling deep into the Earth’s crust to unlock what the company promised would be the future of 24/7 clean power. But by the afternoon, the routine had turned into a crisis. The site had experienced a blowout—an uncontrolled release of fluid or pressure from a well. For any energy company, a blowout is a serious matter. For Fervo Energy, which had just raised $1.89 billion in a blockbuster Nasdaq debut two weeks prior, it represents an immediate stress test of its technology, its safety protocols, and its $7.7 billion market valuation. While the well has since been contained and no injur...

Germany’s Hidden Heat Rush: Inside the Massive Urban Geothermal Hunt Beneath Erfurt’s Streets

Germany’s Urban Geothermal Gamble: Inside the Massive 3D Seismic Campaign Beneath Erfurt’s Streets by Geofizyka Torun By : Robert Buluma In the heart of Germany, something extraordinary is happening beneath the sidewalks, apartment blocks, cafés, and busy streets of Erfurt. While most residents move through their daily routines unaware, fleets of heavy vibrotrucks and thousands of seismic receivers have been quietly scanning the Earth below the city in one of Europe’s most ambitious urban geothermal exploration campaigns. The recent completion of a demanding 3D seismic survey campaign by Geofizyka Torun S.A. marks far more than a technical milestone. It represents a glimpse into the future of European energy — a future where cities no longer rely heavily on imported fossil fuels, but instead tap into the immense heat hidden beneath their own foundations. Germany’s geothermal race is accelerating, and Erfurt has suddenly become one of the most fascinating battlegrounds in Europe’...

Eavor Geretsried Geothermal Breakthrough: Inside the Closed-Loop Energy Revolution, Drilling Challenges, and Path to Scalable Clean Power

The Geothermal “Holy Grail” Just Got a Reality Check: Inside Eavor’s Geretsried Breakthrough By: Robert Buluma May 22, 2026 It’s not every day a deep-tech energy company publishes a detailed technical report that openly documents what went wrong on its flagship project—and still comes out looking stronger. That’s exactly what Eavor Technologies did with its Geretsried geothermal project in Bavaria, Germany. The result is unusually transparent: part technical post-mortem, part validation of a technology many have doubted for years. And the core message is simple. They built it. It works. But it wasn’t smooth. The short version Eavor is trying to solve one of geothermal energy’s hardest problems: how to produce reliable heat and power anywhere, not just in rare volcanic hotspots. Their claim has always been bold: a closed-loop geothermal system that is scalable, dispatchable, low-carbon, and independent of natural reservoirs. Critics have long argued it wouldn’t survive...

New Zealand’s Geoheat Breakthrough: Inside the 2026–2027 Action Plan to Scale Low-Carbon Heat Nationwide

New Zealand’s Geoheat Revolution: How Earth Sciences New Zealand and Ara Ake Are Reshaping the Future of Low-Carbon Heat New Zealand is quietly positioning itself at the forefront of one of the most underappreciated but transformative energy transitions in the world: the large-scale adoption of geoheat. While global attention often gravitates toward geothermal electricity, hydrogen, or solar megaprojects, a more immediate and highly practical revolution is unfolding beneath the surface—direct-use geothermal heat under 150°C, now being systematically developed through a coordinated national strategy. The recently released 2026–2027 Geoheat Action Plan marks a pivotal moment in this journey. Developed through a partnership between Earth Sciences New Zealand and Ara Ake, the country’s energy innovation centre, the plan represents a structured attempt to move geoheat from scattered pilot projects into a coordinated, scalable national system. It is not just a research document—it is a depl...

Rodatherm Energy: The Refrigerant Gambit

By: Robert Buluma Rodatherm Energy has done something no other geothermal startup has attempted at commercial scale: swapped water for refrigerant in a closed-loop system. The claim is 50% higher thermal efficiency than water-based binary cycles, achieved by circulating a proprietary phase-change fluid through a fully cased, pressurized wellbore. The company emerged from stealth in September 2025 with a $38 million Series A—the largest first venture raise in geothermal history. Lead investor Evok Innovations was joined by Toyota Ventures, TDK Ventures, and the Grantham Foundation. The engineering thesis is elegant. The execution risks are significant. This is an Alphaxioms examination of both. II. The Thermodynamic Distinction Every geothermal company you've covered moves heat using water or steam. Rodatherm moves heat using a fluid that boils and condenses inside the wellbore. In a conventional closed-loop water system (Eavor's model), water circulates as a single-phase liq...

Ignis H2 Energy and the Mount Augustine Geothermal Breakthrough: How Alaska Is Becoming a Blueprint for Multi-Vector Clean Energy Systems

Ignis H2 Energy and the Mount Augustine Geothermal Breakthrough: Inside Alaska’s Emerging Multi-Vector Energy Frontier By: Robert Buluma Introduction: A Quiet Deal With Loud Global Implications The energy transition is increasingly being shaped not by isolated power plants, but by integrated energy ecosystems that combine electricity, fuels, minerals, and industrial feedstocks into a single resource base. One of the clearest signals of this shift has emerged from Alaska, where a landmark memorandum of understanding between the State of Alaska and South Korea’s POSCO International has placed the Mount Augustine geothermal project at the center of a multi-sector development vision. While the headlines focus on geopolitics, clean energy expansion, and industrial decarbonization, the deeper story lies in a relatively less publicly visible but strategically important developer: Ignis H2 Energy Inc . Ignis is not just a project developer in this narrative. It is the technical arch...

Eavor steps back from operator role in the Geretsried geothermal project

Eavor at the Crossroads: What Geretsried Really Tells Us About the Future of Closed-Loop Geothermal By Alphaxioms Geothermal Insights | May 13, 2026 For years, Eavor Technologies was the geothermal sector's most talked-about enigma. The company raised hundreds of millions of dollars, attracted backing from heavyweights including BP , Chevron , Helmerich & Payne , and Temasek , and made bold promises about a proprietary closed-loop technology that would quietly revolutionise how humanity extracts heat from the earth. But it rarely said much in public. The secrecy was, to many observers in the geothermal community, a feature rather than a bug — protecting intellectual property, managing competitive intelligence, buying time. Now, Eavor is talking. And what it is saying is worth listening to very carefully. In an exclusive interview published on May 13, 2026, by GeoExpro editor Henk Kombrink, Eavor's new president and CEO Mark Fitzgerald — who took the role in October 2025 ...

Globeleq’s 35MW Delay Deepens Kenya Power Rationing Crisis

Globeleq Delays Power Supply: Kenya's Energy Crunch Worsens By Robert Buluma Published: May 29, 2026 There is an uncomfortable truth settling over Kenya’s electricity sector this week. Just as the country’s industrialists were beginning to breathe a sigh of relief that the worst of the power rationing might be over, a new storm has appeared on the horizon. The British independent power producer, Globeleq, has officially delayed the connection of its 35-megawatt geothermal plant to the national grid. For the average Kenyan who has grown accustomed to the lights flickering off precisely at 6:30 PM, this might sound like just another technical footnote in a long list of energy sector woes. But for those who watch the numbers closely, this is a significant blow. It is a delay that threatens to prolong the agony of scheduled blackouts, pressure Kenya Power’s already strained finances, and expose the fragility of a national grid that is struggling to keep pace with a growing economy....

The New Language of Geothermal Drilling: Why the IADC Well Classification Is Reshaping Project Development

The New Language of Geothermal Drilling: What Every Developer Must Know About the IADC Well Classification By Alphaxioms | Geothermal Intelligence For decades, geothermal energy has suffered from a problem that had nothing to do with geology, temperature, or capital. It suffered from a language problem. Developers, drillers, financiers, and policymakers have long struggled to speak the same language when describing geothermal wells — what they are, how complex they are, what they cost to build, and what risks they carry. That problem has quietly persisted in boardrooms, DFI credit committees, and project development offices across the world, slowing financing, distorting risk assessments, and creating a fog of ambiguity that has cost the sector dearly. In February 2025, the International Association of Drilling Contractors (IADC) published its Geothermal Well Classification — Issue 1.0. It is thirty pages long. It is methodical, technically precise, and deceptively significant. For ...

Taiwan’s Deep Geothermal Revolution: The High-Stakes Race to Unlock Endless Clean Energy Beneath the Island Nation

Taiwan’s Deep Geothermal Gamble: Why the Island Nation Is Turning to the Earth’s Heat to Secure Its Energy Future By: Robert Buluma Taiwan is entering a defining moment in its energy transition. Faced with rising electricity demand, land scarcity, grid pressure, and ambitious renewable energy targets, the island nation is increasingly looking beneath its surface for answers. Deep geothermal energy — once considered a niche or experimental technology — is now emerging as a strategic pillar in Taiwan’s long-term energy security strategy. The shift is not happening in isolation. Across the world, governments are beginning to recognize that renewable energy systems cannot rely solely on solar and wind power. While these technologies have transformed global electricity markets, they also come with structural limitations: intermittency, land-use competition, weather dependency, and grid balancing challenges. For Taiwan, these limitations are becoming increasingly visible. The Minist...

ALPHAXIOMS Geothermal News & Energy Research

Search This Blog

Just In

T5 Smackover Partners Signs Geothermal Lithium Offtake Deal with Glencore in East Texas