Tenerife is known worldwide for its volcanic landscape. Mount Teide, Spain’s highest peak, rises from the centre of the island as a visible reminder of the geological forces that formed the Canary Islands.

Tenerife’s volcanic geology makes it a natural candidate for geothermal exploration. However, volcanoes alone don’t guarantee a viable geothermal resource. The heat must be close enough to the surface to be reached economically, and the underground rock must allow water or steam to circulate. Until now, the key question has been whether Tenerife’s volcanic subsurface can meet these requirements in practice.

Tenerife’s geothermal potential has long remained largely unexplored. Unlike Iceland, where geothermal energy plays a clear role in heating homes and buildings, the Canary Islands have had less need for space heating. Their energy challenge, however, is very real. Island grids require stable, local, and renewable electricity sources, and the Canaries have historically relied heavily on imported fossil fuels for power generation.

From volcanic promise to exploration

Now, Tenerife is taking a more concrete step towards understanding what lies beneath the island. In early 2026, geothermal exploration drilling began in Vilaflor, on the southern side of the Teide. The aim is to investigate whether the area can support future geothermal energy production.

The project is being developed by Reykjavík Geothermal and DISA, a Canary Islands-based energy company, with EU support for drilling activities. The first drilling work in Vilaflor was carried out by Marriott Drilling Group, a UK-based drilling specialist with a long track record of deep, technically demanding onshore projects.

Marriott’s first phase in Tenerife began in early 2026. The task was to install the so-called upper conductor sections for two future boreholes: one for extraction and one for reinjection.

In geothermal drilling, these conductor sections serve as the large-diameter, steel-cased starting points for the wells. They stabilise the top of the borehole, protect the surrounding ground, and provide a foundation for continued deeper drilling.

The conditions were far from uniform. “We had some challenges,” says Marcin Kurmaniak, Drilling Engineer at Marriott. “We encountered hard but weathered cracked rock, frequent driller’s breaks, formation change to clay, and then from around 45 metres a sudden change to very hard rock.”

Large-diameter Robit tools in action

For the conductor installation, Marriott used Robit’s large-diameter Down the Hole drilling tools, including a Robit® Hyper 241 hammer and a Robit® DTH Prime 762 mm XXXL casing system. The conductor casing was installed to a depth of around 40–60 metres below ground level and cemented to the surface.

Marriott’s confidence in the Robit system was based on earlier experience. “We used Robit hammers and casing systems in 2022 for a deep exploration well project in Albania, drilling large-diameter conductor sections through challenging limestone karst”, says Marcin. “Their performance convinced us of their suitability for demanding conductor installation work.”

In Tenerife, the Robit system performed flawlessly on the first well. On the second, drilling was stopped at 60 metres after a component in the drilling assembly failed. The damaged part was returned to Robit UK for repair.

For Marriott, the geothermal project in Tenerife is continuing, using standard oilfield drilling techniques for the deeper sections. The plans include several wells with target depths of 2,500 and 3,000 meters.

If the explorations prove successful, geothermal energy could eventually provide Tenerife and the wider Canary Islands with a powerful, stable domestic renewable energy source, independent of imported fuel. The first wells in Vilaflor will help show whether Tenerife’s geothermal promise can move from exploration to energy production.

Kauno Määttä was a familiar name to Finnish wrestling fans in the 1960s and 70s: he won the Finnish Greco-Roman wrestling championship in his weight class several times. In his day job, however, Kauno did not make the headlines despite being a respected professional: he drilled wells.

Kauno’s career as a driller continued into retirement and was passed on to the next generations. In the late 1980s, Kauno’s primary school-age grandsons, Sami and Simo Manninen, got the spark when they got invited as helpers for a well-drilling job.

The spark ignited a lasting passion, and as a result, the brothers’ own company, Oulun Porakaivot, was finally born in 2012. It operates throughout Finland, and its core business is drilling geothermal energy fields for large properties. Oulun Porakaivot also handles the design and permitting of the energy fields and has a wide range of customers from the public sector to commercial properties and housing cooperatives. They also drill individual geothermal and water wells for detached houses and other small properties.

Oulun Porakaivot operates six drilling rigs and has long been Robit’s contract customer, using Robit products for all key consumables such as rods, ring bits, drill bits, and pilots. Panu Haulos, Design Engineer at Oulun Porakaivot, has noticed a welcome improvement in the quality of drilling tools.

“Reliability of consumables is critical in this sector. The wells are getting deeper – up to 450 meters – and the plots of land are often small: if the first hole falls short, there may not be enough room to drill a new one. In consumables, we have to look at the cost of a drill meter from an overall economic perspective: performance, drilling speed and fuel consumption. Robit’s products have been consistently reliable and have performed excellently in deep wells. And today’s hammers and bits are more durable than before,” says Panu.

For about a year, Robit has been developing a new four-inch DTH hammer, branded Robit H4, for well drilling. Testing in cooperation with customers is an integral part of product development. The H4 hammer was optimized and finalized as per customer feedback. Robit’s Sales Director Kimmo Kangas approached Oulun Porakaivot and offered them an opportunity to test the new hammer. A suitable test site was found in Helsinki, at a housing cooperative’s future energy field, where 23 wells will be drilled to a depth of 390 metres. Kimmo has followed the development of the H4 hammer from the beginning and has seen its potential.

“The functionality, reliability and penetration rate of the H4 are outstanding. However, the most significant improvement is fuel consumption, which is significantly lower than the competition. Typically, for example, in a 200-meter well, the compressor consumes about two litres of fuel per meter. On the H4 hammer, the consumption has been as low as one and a half litres. That’s a crucial difference,” says Kimmo.

Low fuel consumption is one of the key assets of the H4 hammer.

Panu Haulos confirms that the H4 has achieved very low fuel consumption figures at the drilling test site. The two companies have been in close cooperation for years.

“Robit’s domestic production is definitely a plus for us: we can get parts with a fast response time. They react quickly to our needs, around the clock if necessary. Robit has also been able to help in special cases where off-the-shelf products have not been available. For example, we had a project where the hole we were to drill had to be absolutely straight. Robit tailor-made us a special guiding rod that did the job,” says Panu.

In many sectors of the economy, growth indicators have recently taken a downward turn. This is not the case in the thermal well market, at least not for Oulun Porakaivot.

“The trend is upward, and demand is constantly growing and diversifying. Of course, this is partly due to technological advances that allow us to drill deeper wells. In Finland, the city of Helsinki, in particular, is a strong driver of progress in this field. The city, striving to move away from fossil-based district heating, has streamlined the permitting process for geothermal heat”, Panu says.

Picture from left: Ville Alanko, Simo Manninen, CEO Sami Manninen, Panu Haulos (Oulun Porakaivot); on the right Kimmo Kangas (Robit).