millimeter-wave-drilling
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Carlos Araque
Carlos Araque is the co-founder, president and CEO of Quaise Energy, a Houston- and Cambridge-based startup trying to drill the deepest holes in human history to tap superhot geothermal heat. A Medellin-born mechanical engineer with two MIT degrees, he spent 15 years at oilfield-services giant Schlumberger, then ran technology at MIT's venture platform The Engine, where he met the plasma physicist whose millimeter-wave drilling idea became Quaise. His pitch: vaporize rock instead of grinding it, reach depths where water turns supercritical, and use the resulting heat to run the same turbines and power plants fossil fuels use today.
Quaise Energy
Quaise Energy is an MIT spinout commercializing millimeter wave drilling, a technique that uses powerful gyrotrons to vaporize rock and bore holes up to 20 km deep - far deeper than conventional bits can reach. The goal is to tap superhot geothermal heat (up to ~500 C) almost anywhere on Earth, turning geothermal into a scalable, carbon-free baseload power source that can be delivered through existing power plant infrastructure.