Comment by idontwantthis
8 hours ago
Do they have a conventional drill or does this involve some new technology? They aren’t using the microwave thing are they?
8 hours ago
Do they have a conventional drill or does this involve some new technology? They aren’t using the microwave thing are they?
Fervo was previously discussed on hn a couple months ago when they were hyping up this project: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47903945
Some good info about what's different in there.
The new thing is using new-ish fracking drilling techniques to create a geothermal resource. Conventional geothermal relies on finding very specific geology which is why its so rare. Enhanced geothermal can (in theory) work in many more places since it can create the geology needed to produce electricity.
They’re using tech invented for fracking, so very conventional. The application for geothermal is what’s new.