Latest news with #FervoEnergy
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Bill Gates comes to Utah to help Sen. Curtis in his efforts to preserve clean energy
WASHINGTON — As Sen. John Curtis, R-Utah, pushes to preserve clean energy tax credits and boost domestic energy production, the junior Utah senator is getting an assist from a well-known figure: Bill Gates. Curtis met with Gates in the Beehive State last week as the pair toured Cape Station, a newly developed geothermal site run by energy company Fervo Energy in southwest Utah. The visit came at a crucial time: While Republicans look to enhance energy production, many federal tax credits incentivizing alternative resources are on the chopping block in President Donald Trump's tax bill. 'Utah is at the forefront of energy innovation, and the Cape Station Geothermal project in Beaver is a powerful example of that progress,' Curtis said in a statement. 'I believe America's energy future can be affordable, reliable, and clean—and geothermal will be a critical part of making that vision a reality." Fervo Energy, a green energy supplier based in Houston, is pouring more than $2 billion into the rural Utah site for what is expected to become the world's largest enhanced geothermal project. The undertaking is being backed by Breakthrough Energy, which was founded by Gates in 2015 to boost sustainable energy production. 'Enhanced geothermal is one of the most promising solutions for delivering reliable, low-carbon power, especially as demand for affordable energy grows,' Gates said in a press release. 'Breakthrough Energy Ventures invested in Fervo early because we believed in this vision, and it's exciting to see that potential becoming reality here in Utah.' The geothermal site is expected to become fully operational by 2028 — although that timeline could be delayed if Republicans in Congress vote to repeal clean energy tax credits established by the Biden administration. Without those subsidies, which incentivize clean energy production, completing the geothermal project could be punted to the next decade. 'The difference is, will we bring gigawatts on the grid this decade or will it be next decade?' Tim Lattimer, CEO and co-founder of Fervo Energy, told the Wall Street Journal, which was the first to report on the trip. 'And that's what the tax credits mean.' Gates has long pushed for deeper investments in geothermal energy, arguing federal support is necessary to keep production costs affordable to produce the alternative energy source. Much of that support comes from credits in the Inflation Reduction Act, former President Joe Biden's signature clean energy bill. The IRA created significant tax credits for renewable energy projects such as solar, wind and geothermal. These Investment Tax Credits are meant to incentivize households and businesses to install renewable energy systems by allowing them to deduct a percentage of the cost from federal taxes. Cape Station has benefited from those tax credits, lowering its operational costs over the last two years since its inception. However, some Republicans and conservative organizations argue the federal subsidies actually raise prices while reducing the reliability of power systems. As a result, several Republicans are pushing to repeal the law in full as part of Trump's massive tax reconciliation package making its way through Congress. Curtis is among those pushing to preserve some of those policies, particularly those dealing with nuclear energy, net-zero emissions, battery storage and geothermal. The first-term senator has long centered his climate policies on clean energy solutions, suggesting last week he will push for those changes as the Senate considers the bill. Geothermal energy is a rare renewable energy source that has garnered bipartisan support over the last several years. Unlike wind and solar energy, which Republicans have often criticized as being unreliable, geothermal energy can generate constant power. Most of the resources necessary to produce geothermal energy are located on federal land, prompting Republicans and Democrats to team up on legislation expanding access to those resources. The Senate is set to vote on the reconciliation package in the coming weeks, with Republican leaders pushing to get the bill to Trump's desk before the Fourth of July.
Wall Street Journal
2 days ago
- Business
- Wall Street Journal
Bill Gates Is Backing This Geothermal Company. Will Trump's Republicans?
CAPE STATION, Utah—After a day touring Fervo Energy's geothermal site, Bill Gates reached a conclusion: 'It's pretty mind-blowing.' Whether Senate Republicans agree will largely determine how fast one of the most promising sources of energy is developed. In southern Utah, Houston-based Fervo is spending more than $2 billion to build what it says is the world's largest enhanced geothermal project. The enterprise, backed by Gates's climate-tech venture-capital firm Breakthrough Energy Ventures, harnesses technological advances pioneered by oil and gas drillers to tap in to underground heat.
New York Post
14-05-2025
- Business
- New York Post
Drill, baby, drill — in Brooklyn: Let's tap the energy bonanza beneath our feet
The American energy sector is on the cusp of a tectonic transformation. This week, members of the House Committee on Natural Resources heard testimony on the vast potential of geothermal energy as 'a new era of American energy — built with American innovation, American technology and American workers,' as one witness put it. Chris Wright, President Donald Trump's new energy secretary, has fervently endorsed geothermal as a way to 'energize our country,' and a March study found that geothermal could meet roughly two-thirds of the voracious energy demands of AI data centers by the early 2030s. Advertisement Even right here in New York City, new residential and office developments underway in Greenpoint, Coney Island and Manhattan are being built to rely significantly on this power source. Geothermal has the potential to be the Holy Grail of energy: unlimited and right under our feet. But there's a problem. Geothermal is expensive because it's difficult to access . . . until now. Advertisement Today, American innovators are supercharging the geothermal energy revolution with directional drilling and hydraulic fracturing, the same technologies that delivered the miracle of American shale. 'This isn't a concept or a pilot, it's a full-scale energy project in motion,' Tim Latimer of Fervo Energy told the House committee Monday, as he described the 500-megawatt plant his company is building in Utah. 'We've unlocked geothermal energy in places where it was previously impossible.' Here's how it works. The interior of the Earth is an inferno of hot rock and molten metal, and heat — whether from natural gas, nuclear or something else — is what we need to spin generator turbines to create electricity. Advertisement Shallow geothermal wells for small residential systems can access sufficient heat anywhere from a couple feet to several hundred feet below ground — the city-block-long Greenpoint project, for example, will use a geo-exchange system of 300 bored holes going down nearly 500 feet. But the energy output needed for a power plant demands much deeper wells, sometimes reaching two miles below the surface. Successfully drilling that deep to access this ever-present subterranean heat source has, until now, been extremely difficult. But just like directional drilling opened up the extraction of previously unreachable oil and gas deposits in shale rock formations, the same technologies can unlock geothermal energy — and can do so almost anywhere in the country. Advertisement Drilling sideways into hot rocks far beneath the earth's surface, then injecting high-pressure fluids, creates energy that turns turbines to generate electricity and power our factories, heat our homes, turn on our lights and fuel our vehicles. And geothermal has a 90% capacity factor, meaning it can run at nearly full capacity continually without breaks, meeting round-the-clock energy demands and ensuring grid stability. New York state has made some small-scale geothermal investments, including tax credits for home geothermal systems. But it will take the power of directional drilling to scale this domestic, reliable, carbon-free energy source for broader use. If we seize the chance, the United States will dominate this massive emerging market, pioneering the geothermal tech used not only here but throughout the world. If we don't, we could lose out once again to China. Over recent decades, China has cornered the critical-mineral market — and with it, the renewable-energy technologies that depend on these resources. Advertisement Now, the United States is struggling to catch up in manufacturing products like solar panels and electric vehicles. We can't afford to stumble at the starting block when it comes to geothermal energy. If we exploit our oil and gas know-how to win the geothermal race, we can keep the world running on American tech in this vital sector — while keeping our nation from relying on the Chinese Communist Party. US-made directional drilling has done this once before. Advertisement Directional drilling drove down shale access costs enough to transform energy markets. After it began to be implemented at scale in the early 2000s, US natural-gas production more than doubled. By 2016, this approach accounted for almost 70% of all oil and natural-gas wells. Today, nobody can come close to America's shale dominance. If this method can do for geothermal what it did for shale, the costs of this energy source could plummet 80% by 2035, the International Energy Agency estimates. Advertisement Delivering geothermal at such a cost-value will make the United States the undisputed leader in the world's next big energy market — yet again. No wonder Trump called geothermal heat one of our country's 'amazing national assets' when he established his National Energy Dominance Council. Directional drilling launched the shale revolution, altering history and strengthening our nation. Advertisement It's time to unleash these same tools so America can lead the geothermal revolution, too. Neil Chatterjee served as chairman and a member of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
Yahoo
14-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
It's time to rethink geothermal energy as a key player in renewables
Industrial geothermal energy has been used for nearly two centuries. It's not a new concept, but in the United States, it's taken a backseat to other renewable energy sources like wind and hydropower. One company is trying to change that. Founded in 2017, Texas-based Fervo Energy is making groundbreaking moves in the clean energy landscape, and they're doing it in Utah's desert. 'We were founded with a simple idea that geothermal has been around for a long time, but if you could bring in more innovative drilling practices — like horizontal drilling, hydraulic fracturing, better fiber optic, sensing and data analytics to the field of geothermal,' Tim Latimer, CEO of Fervo Energy, said, 'we could have a differentiated result that took it from being an energy resource that people think of most often as something that you'll only find in Iceland or New Zealand to something that we could do in way more locations.' Below southern Utah's rugged red landscape lies a geothermal gold mine, which Fervo has been exploring since 2023. 'Utah is blessed with beautiful geothermal geology, which is why we're here now. And we can even make this project economic, even though we're really early in our journey,' Latimer said during a tour with U.S. lawmakers of the company's private Cape Station enhanced geothermal systems project located in Beaver County, Utah. Notably a leader in the current geothermal energy landscape, Fervo is working against the clock to make the renewable energy a household phrase — when people turn their light switch on, they'll know the energy source it came from. When people hear the phrase 'geothermal energy,' hot springs and geysers usually come to mind, or virtually anywhere hot, steamy water is present. The dry desert may not be what people visualize when they hear about geothermal energy. But it's what happens hundreds of feet below the surface where Utah's geothermal geology shines. Before breaking ground in Utah, Fervo worked with the federally funded Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory to create the tools and technology needed to withstand the high-temperature environments deep under the Earth. The research set the preliminary work for Fervo's first pilot project, partnered with Google, in 2021. There, engineers discovered that the 'fervo design' of a two-well horizontal drilling for geothermal was successful. 'We drilled a deep horizontal injection well, about 10,000 feet down and 5,000 feet over, (then) hydraulically fractured it to connect it to a parallel deep production well, 10,000 feet down (and) 5,000 feet over,' Latimer said. 'And at the site in Nevada, that was about 350 degrees Fahrenheit.' 'That was the first ever project that showed that horizontal drilling could work to unlock a massive geothermal resource the same way it did for the oil and gas industry.' That project only produced three megawatts of power. One megawatt can power nearly 700 homes in a full year, which is not necessarily an economic success. Project 2, Utah's Cape Station, will produce 500 megawatts in its combined two-phase project. The area in Milford, Utah, consists of both private and public land leased by the Bureau of Land Management, and is surrounded by windmill turbines. The geology, combined with the transmission line from the turbines, established an ideal setting for the project. 'What we found since day one, when we showed up, was people who were very collaborative, wanted to work with us, and so it checked all the boxes,' he added. 'We had great local support, great policy support, hot rocks and good transmission.' The deepest Fervo has drilled reached temperatures up to 440 degrees Fahrenheit and after 'throwing a bunch of new tools and equipment at it' reached 520 degrees. 'We still have to work through a bunch of stuff to make 500 degrees Fahrenheit work,' Latimer said, but the deeper it gets, the hotter it gets, the more efficient energy you get. 'So we've gone from 350 to 440 degrees Fahrenheit just in the last three years. Our goal is within two or three years, we go down to 500 degrees Fahrenheit. We're not there yet. There's still a lot of innovation we need to do to get to those temperatures. ... It's a bit of a race for us,' he said. Twenty wells have been rigged in Phase 1 of the Cape Station project. This phase will produce 100 megawatts of power and is expected to be commissioned next year. Phase 2 will produce 400 megawatts of power and will come online in 2028. '500 megawatts is big enough to make an impact all on its own,' Latimer said. But it's only the beginning. 'What we're doing here is proving that a new kind of geothermal works, and this is basically ground zero for what technology we think is going to transform the energy sector here in the United States and then around the world.' The cost of geothermal drilling previously dampened the aspirations of geothermal energy as an economically sound energy source. Operating the drilling site costs Fervo more than $150,000 per day. The first project in Nevada took 75 days to complete, which Latimer said was great at the time. 'But if that's all we could do from a drilling performance, geothermal would never (make) economic (sense).' The first well drilled in Utah took 43 days. A few months ago, a new record of 17 days was set, which they believe they can surpass. With a background in oil and gas, Latimer said it 'boggled his mind' when he looked into geothermal engineering and realized that no one in the industry was utilizing the latest technology. He said the response he often got was that they couldn't afford the 'fancy rigs.' 'The oil and gas industry isn't paying for high-spec, high-technology rigs because they're charitable or you get a warm and fuzzy feeling. They're paying for it because it delivers a performance that makes it worth it, even though you're paying the expanded technology cost,' Latimer emphasized. So, the company made the investment. It was the first time drilling rig contractor Helmerich & Payne, Inc. had used its modern rigs on a geothermal site. 'The first drilling rig I ever worked on in my career was an HP flex three rig, and it's the exact same stack of rig that we have out here on site,' Latimer said. 'When we started this company, a lot of people told us, 'those guys don't know what they're doing. Look, they're using those expensive rigs on geothermal.'' 'But, you know, we got the last laugh.'
Yahoo
12-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Opinion: Cutting red tape for a geothermal boom
The United States is in the middle of a national energy emergency. It's going to take an all-of-the-above approach to get out of it, and Utah is poised to lead the way in the West. Our state has vast, untapped power beneath our feet including geothermal energy. Harnessing it will help us achieve energy security, create jobs and boost our economy. But to do so, we need to cut bureaucratic red tape. To highlight this need, I brought my colleagues on the House Committee on Natural Resources to southern Utah to tour a cutting-edge geothermal energy facility and hear from local and expert witnesses. Geothermal energy is piquing interest in D.C. and across the country for its unique ability to generate a large amount of baseload power. Here's how it works: steam or hot water is extracted from beneath Earth's surface to power turbines that generate electricity. What sets geothermal apart from other renewable energy sources like wind and solar is its reliability. The reservoirs beneath the surface are consistent and readily available. Utah is an ideal place to advance geothermal energy. It lies on the edge of the Basin and Range Province, a mountain range where the Earth's crust stretches, creates large faults and allows heat to rise to the Earth's surface. We're also home to the Frontier Observatory for Research in Geothermal Energy, a cutting-edge research and development facility, which is key to positioning Utah at the forefront of geothermal energy development. Southern Utah especially has an abundance of geothermal potential, particularly near small, rural towns. Fervo Energy, just outside Milford, Utah, is developing enhanced geothermal systems (EGS), like the one we toured today, that could potentially be a game changer for geothermal energy production. Similar to hydraulic fracturing for oil and gas, EGS uses advanced drilling equipment and the injection of fluids into the subsurface to access geothermal resources that are not naturally located in reservoirs with the characteristics sufficient for conventional hydrothermal energy production. Increased permeability allows fluid to circulate throughout the fractured rock and to transport heat to the surface. EGS has the potential to greatly expand geothermal energy's domestic footprint — enabling development in shallow depth, hot dry rock regions across the U.S. However, bureaucratic red tape continues to stand in the way of a geothermal energy boom. A complex permitting process, particularly on federal lands, creates uncertainty and slows down projects. Permits are required for everything from exploration, land access and leasing, drilling, and production. Developers face years of delay and duplicative federal reviews. This is a major issue in the West, where a majority of our land is owned by the federal government. During the hearing, we will hear from witnesses who will share their experiences with permitting these facilities on federal land. Their testimony will shine light on issues that must be addressed by Congress and the new administration. I've already introduced three bills to address some of the issues facing geothermal energy producers. The FREE Act, to speed up our permitting process through permit-by-rule. The Geothermal Energy Opportunity Act, to expedite the approval process for geothermal drilling projects within 60 days. Finally, I'm co-leading the Streamlining Thermal Energy through Advanced Mechanisms Act to streamline geothermal permitting to mirror that of oil and gas wells. By unleashing geothermal energy, we will create high-skilled jobs in engineering, construction, research and much more. Moreover, a robust geothermal industry can stimulate economic growth through local partnerships, infrastructure development and increased tax revenue, positioning Utah as a leader in renewable energy technology. Utah has the potential to be a leader in renewable energy and be a key player in helping us secure U.S. energy independence. We're ready to tap into more geothermal resources here in the state. Cutting red tape and reforming our outdated permitting process is essential to making that happen.
