IGA UNFC Ad-Hoc Committee

IGA UNFC AD-HOC COMMITTEE

About the UNFC

The lack of worldwide standards, guidelines and codes has hampered consistent and comparable estimation and reporting of geothermal energy potential, leading to ambiguity and limiting the understanding of the viability of geothermal energy projects among potential investors. To overcome this barrier, the International Geothermal Association (IGA) and the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) jointly set out to develop specifications and guidelines for the application of the broader United Nations Framework Classification for Resources (UNFC) to geothermal resources. The UNFC is a resource project-based and principles-based classification system in which the products of a resource project are classified on the basis of the three fundamental criteria of environmental-socio-economic viability, technical feasibility, and degree of confidence in the estimate.

UNFC has been designed to meet the needs of applications pertaining to:

policy formulation based on resource studies;
resources management functions;
corporate business processes; and
financial capital allocation.

About the Committee

On 19 September 2014, a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) and the International Geothermal Association (IGA) was signed, in which IGA agreed to:

Develop Specifications and Guidelines for the application of UNFC-2009 to geothermal energy, hereafter referred to as the Texts.
Maintain evergreen the Texts in a manner consistent with their proper application through regular and periodic review.
Conduct its activities in relation to development and maintenance of the Texts through a transparent governance structure and processes that allows input from all stakeholders.
Select a representative from the UNECE Expert Group on Resource Classification (now Expert Group on Resource Management) to participate in IGA development of the Texts.
Invite a representative from the UNECE Expert Group to be an observer at meetings of the IGA Board of Directors.

Under this MoU, Specifications for Application of UNFC-2009 to Geothermal Energy Resources were jointly developed by IGA and UNECE and became operational on 30 September 2016.

On 30 December 2019, UNECE issued the UNFC Update 2019, prompting the need for an update of the Specifications, as well as of additional Guidance to facilitate implementation and uptake of the Specifications.

At the 74^th meeting of IGA’s Board of Directors on 1^st November 2020, Motion 74-2 was adopted to set up a dedicated UNFC Committee as Ad Hoc Committee, with Professor Gioia Falcone as the Chair. The UNFC Ad Hoc Committee is mandated until May 2023 to carry out concrete, results-oriented activities in the work areas and with the objectives set out in the MoU.

The IGA UNFC Ad-Hoc Committee is consist of the following members: