In the present paer, a thermal study was conducted for the grinding of granite with diamond tools. Three types of grinding-straight surface grinding, deep grinding(circular sawing), and vertical spindle grinding-were studied. Some surface grinding tests were also conducted using a CBN(cubic boron nitride) wheel. Temperature distributions on the workpiece surface were measured using a foil thermocouple and the energy partition to the workpiece was estimated using a temperature matching method. The temperature for CBN surface grinding was found to be much higher than for diamond grinding. Energy partitions to the granite were 30%～36% for CBN surface grinding, 25%～32% for diamond surface grinding, about 53% for vertical spindle grinding, and 5.5%～9% for diamond deep grinding. The low energy partition value in deep grinding also suggested that more of the heat generated by grinding in this case can be conducted to the grinding tool and promote tool wear.