One weird trick to get unlimited clean energy - Unexplainable

Summary

Podcast Summary: Unexplainable – "One Weird Trick to Get Unlimited Clean Energy"

Release Date: July 23, 2025

Introduction

In this episode of Unexplainable, hosts Noam Hassenfeld and Dylan Matthews delve into the fascinating world of geothermal energy, exploring its immense potential as a limitless source of clean power. They examine the current state of geothermal technology, the challenges it faces, recent advancements, and the optimistic outlook for its future in combating climate change.

The Potential of Geothermal Energy

Noam opens the discussion by sharing his experience at Iceland's Blue Lagoon, a geothermal spa renowned for its mineral-rich blue waters. He emphasizes the significance of geothermal energy in Iceland, where "two-thirds of Iceland's energy is geothermal," highlighting its role as a sustainable alternative to fossil fuels.

Noam Hassenfeld [00:46]: "By far the biggest contributor to global warming is fossil fuels. But geothermal energy barely has any emissions."

Dylan Matthews elaborates on the vast energy stored beneath the Earth's surface, describing it as a "big mass of hot rocks just a few miles beneath us," which theoretically holds more energy than humanity could ever consume.

Dylan Matthews [04:12]: "It's really tantalizing that we are sitting on this big mass of hot rocks just a few miles beneath us, and it's so hot that in theory, it's more energy than we could ever need if we could maybe get at it."

Current Challenges in Harnessing Geothermal Energy

Despite its promise, accessing geothermal energy is fraught with challenges. The primary hurdles include:

Deep Drilling Requirements: Extracting heat from deep beneath the Earth's surface necessitates drilling kilometers down, which is both technically demanding and costly.
Technical Limitations: The development of effective drill bits capable of withstanding extreme conditions remains a significant obstacle.
Seismic Risks: Injecting liquids into the Earth can trigger seismic activity, as evidenced by a South Korean geothermal project that inadvertently caused a magnitude 5.5 earthquake.

Dylan Matthews [05:32]: "The biggest barrier that I've heard from people is just that getting that deep into the earth is really tough. It's really expensive."

Innovations and Recent Progress

Despite these challenges, 2025 has seen substantial advancements in geothermal technology:

Enhanced Drilling Techniques: A Utah-based company successfully drilled 15,000 feet to reach temperatures exceeding 500°F, nearing the supercritical stage necessary for efficient energy extraction.
Closed-Loop Systems: Innovations in closed-loop geothermal systems prevent liquid leakage by maintaining circulation within underground pipes, enhancing safety and efficiency.
Rock Vaporization: Pioneering methods involve using millimeter waves to vaporize rock, enabling access to higher energy states needed for optimal power generation.

Noam Hassenfeld [13:43]: "This year, geothermal has been everywhere that geothermal so hot right now. In the first few months of 2025, there's been almost as much geothermal investment as there was all of last year."

Political and Economic Considerations

The progression of geothermal energy is heavily influenced by political support and economic investments. The episode highlights:

Government Support: Consistent political backing and subsidies are crucial for the development of geothermal infrastructure. The current administration, led by Energy Secretary Chris Wright, has shown favorable support despite broader cuts to renewable investments.
Impact of Fracking Technology: Advances in drilling from the fracking industry have inadvertently benefited geothermal projects by providing skilled labor and improved drilling technologies.
Bipartisan Appeal: Geothermal energy's reliance on drilling aligns it with interests traditionally associated with oil and gas industries, fostering bipartisan support.

Noam Hassenfeld [14:46]: "It's just an enormous, abundant energy resource below everyone's feet. Geothermal energy crosses partisan lines."

Future Outlook and Optimism

Looking ahead, the hosts discuss the transformative potential of fully harnessed geothermal energy:

Energy Abundance: With unlimited clean energy, possibilities such as vertical farming, widespread desalination, and decentralized power grids become feasible.
Economic Transformation: Transitioning to geothermal energy could provide new job opportunities for those currently in the oil and gas sectors, ensuring a just transition.
Competitive Advantage: If geothermal energy becomes cost-effective, it could rival and even surpass other renewable sources like solar and wind in reliability and efficiency.

Dylan Matthews [18:53]: "If you had abundant geothermal, you could have skyscraper farms, you could have desalination plants that sort of obviate the need for these huge aqueduct systems in places like California."

However, the path to this future requires overcoming technical hurdles, securing sustained investment, and ensuring regulatory frameworks support safe and efficient deployment.

Dylan Matthews [20:40]: "I think there's still totally a world where this is a cool idea that gets some adoption but does not take the world by storm. But there's also a world where it works better than we thought it would and it kind of surprises everybody."

Conclusion

The episode concludes with a balanced perspective on geothermal energy's role in the future energy landscape. While significant challenges remain, ongoing innovations and growing investments offer a cautiously optimistic outlook. Geothermal energy stands as a promising contender in the quest for sustainable, unlimited clean energy, potentially reshaping how we power our world.

Notable Quotes:

Noam Hassenfeld [00:46]: "Geothermal energy barely has any emissions."
Dylan Matthews [04:12]: "More energy than we could ever need if we could maybe get at it."
Dylan Matthews [05:32]: "Getting that deep into the earth is really tough. It's really expensive."
Noam Hassenfeld [13:43]: "In the first few months of 2025, there's been almost as much geothermal investment as there was all of last year."
Dylan Matthews [18:53]: "You could have skyscraper farms, you could have desalination plants."

This summary captures the essence of the episode, focusing on the exploration of geothermal energy as a viable solution for unlimited clean energy, the technical and political challenges it faces, recent advancements, and the hopeful possibilities it holds for the future.

Transcript

Sponsor Voice (0:00)

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Dylan Matthews (0:27)

The McDonald's Snack Wrap is back.

Noam Hassenfeld (0:29)

You brought it back. Ranch snack wrap.

Dylan Matthews (0:32)

Spicy snack wrap. You broke the Internet for a snack? Snack wrap is back.

Noam Hassenfeld (0:46)

All right, so I'm at the Blue Lagoon in Iceland, which is this hundred degree, almost fell into the polygon a while back. I went to Iceland and I decided to check out this dreamy hot spring. It's kind of like in Pirates of the Caribbean, where Jack Sparrow is like kind of slowly going through the fog. I actually got lost for 15 minutes a couple minutes ago trying to find my way through this place because you can't see more than 5 or 10ft in front of you because it's so misty. The whole place is filled with this mineral rich blue water. It's this weird kind of thing where you can see your hand when it's at the top of the water and then you move it away and you basically can't see it at all because there's so much stuff in the water here. It's also filled with tons of tourists like me just hanging out, drinking cocktails, getting massages. And then there's just all this steam in the distance, I guess, like from the power plant. The power plant. And I am bathing in power plant wastewater at the moment. This is not what I expected to be swimming in on vacation. But this is a power plant that's so incredibly clean, even its wastewater is a spa. And tourists like me, we love it. National Geographic even picked it as one of the 25 wonders of the world. But I gotta say, I think National Geographic slept on the real wonder here, what that wastewater does before it gets to the tourists. The water bubbles up from deep underground. It gets converted into steam, spins a turbine, generates power, and then after that whole process, that's when it settles into this eerie blue pool, the Blue Lagoon. The reason I think this is the real wonder here is because of what this means for climate change. By far the biggest contributor to global warming is fossil fuels. But geothermal energy barely has any emissions. In a lot of ways, it's even better than solar wind, because the inside of the earth doesn't turn off at night or stop making power when there's no breeze. And these plants are all over Iceland. A ridiculous sounding Two thirds of Iceland's energy is geothermal. The country basically runs off power from the earth itself, which makes sense. It's on a fault line. So all this hot water is just bubbling up to the surface all the time. But the fact is, no matter where you are on Earth, there's just tons of potential clean energy buried underneath you. We all just need to figure out how to get at it. I'm Noam Hassenfeld, and today on Unexplain, why getting at all that unlimited energy is such a tough problem and how we might just be on the verge of cracking it.