30 U.S.C. § 1511 : US Code - Section 1511: Loans for geothermal reservoir confirmation

Search 30 U.S.C. § 1511 : US Code - Section 1511: Loans for geothermal reservoir confirmation

(a) Authorization; purposes
The Secretary of Energy (hereafter in this chapter referred to as
the "Secretary") is authorized to make a loan to any person, from
funds appropriated (pursuant to this subchapter) to the Geothermal
Resources Development Fund established under section 1144 of this
title, to assist such person in undertaking and carrying out a
project which (1) is designed to explore for or determine the
economic viability of a geothermal reservoir and (2) consists of
surface exploration and the drilling of one or more exploratory
wells.
(b) Repayment rates
Subject to subsection (c) of this section and to section 1513(b)
of this title, any loan under subsection (a) of this section shall
be repayable out of revenue from production of the geothermal
energy reservoir with respect to which the loan was made, at a
rate, in any year, not to exceed 20 per centum of the gross revenue
from the reservoir in that year; except that if any disposition of
the geothermal rights to the reservoir is made to one or more other
persons by the borrower, the full amount of the loan balance
outstanding, or so much of the loan balance outstanding as is equal
to the full amount of the compensation realized by the borrower
upon such disposition, whichever is less, shall be repaid
immediately. In any case where the reservoir is confirmed (as
determined by the Secretary), the Secretary may impute a reasonable
revenue for purposes of determining repayment if -
(1) reasonable efforts are not made to put such reservoir in
commercial operation,
(2) the borrower (or any such other person) utilizes the
resources of the reservoir without a sale of the energy or
geothermal energy resources therefrom, or
(3) a sale of energy or geothermal energy resources from the
reservoir is made for an unreasonably low price;
except that no such imputation of revenue shall be made during the
three-year period immediately following such reservoir
confirmation. In the event of failure to begin production of
revenue (or, where no sale of energy or geothermal energy resources
is made, to begin production of energy for commercial use) within
five years after the date of such reservoir confirmation, the
Secretary may take action to recover the value, not to exceed the
amount of the unpaid balance of the loan plus any accrued interest
thereon, of any assets of the project in question, including
resource rights.
(c) Cancellation of unpaid balance and accrued interest
The Secretary may at any time cancel the unpaid balance and any
accrued interest on any loan made under this section if he
determines, on the basis of evidence presented by the loan
recipient or otherwise, that the geothermal energy reservoir with
respect to which the loan was made has characteristics which make
that reservoir economically or technically unacceptable for
commercial development.
(d) "Person" defined
As used in this subchapter, the term "person" includes
municipalities, electric cooperatives, industrial development
agencies, nonprofit organizations, and Indian tribes, as well as
the entities included within such term under section 1 of title 1.