superhot-rock
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Hephae Energy Technology makes a case for hotter drilling
Geothermal developers want hotter rock. Hephae is building the electronics that can follow them there - and turning a 210°C field milestone into a business.
Mazama Energy
Mazama Energy is a Frisco, Texas geothermal developer building Enhanced Geothermal Systems that tap superhot rock (SHR) - underground formations above 374 C - to deliver low-cost, round-the-clock, carbon-free electricity. Incubated by Khosla Ventures and backed by Gates Frontier, the company reached a world-record 629 F (331 C) bottomhole temperature at its Newberry Volcano pilot in Oregon and aims to produce power at under 5 cents per kWh, with 10x the power density, 75% less water, and 80% fewer wells than conventional geothermal.
Sriram Vasantharajan
Sriram Vasantharajan is the President and CEO of Mazama Energy, a Khosla Ventures and Gates Frontier-backed startup drilling into Oregon's Newberry Volcano to prove that superhot rock geothermal can deliver round-the-clock, carbon-free power at fossil-fuel prices. A former ExxonMobil engineer and CEO of oilfield services firm Blade Energy Partners, he is now applying decades of drilling and well-stimulation know-how from the oil patch to the geothermal industry, chasing rock hot enough to make a volcano's flank into a power plant.
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.