Development Minister Akis Tsochadzopoulos has unveiled a draft bill for tapping the country’s geothermal energy potential, useful in a broad variety of applications. He said the known deposits of geothermal energy amount to an annual equivalent of 185,000 tons of oil, and that apart from the two fully explored and ready-for-use fields of Milos and Nisyros whose power production potential equals 170 megawatts, the total likely potential exceeds 500MW. The bill provides for production licenses to private firms with a duration of between five and 30 years.