Sometimes geothermal hot spots are obvious, marked by geysers and hot springs on the planet’s surface. But in other places, they’re obscured thousands of feet underground. Now AI could help uncover these hidden pockets of potential power. A startup company called Zanskar announced today that it’s used AI and other advanced computational methods to uncover a blind geothermal system—meaning there aren’t signs of it on the surface—in the western Nevada desert. The company says it’s the first blind system that’s been identified and confirmed to be a commercial prospect in over 30 years. Historically, finding new sites for geothermal power was a matter of brute force. Companies spent a lot of time and money drilling deep wells, looking for places where it made sense to build a plant. Zanskar’s approach is more precise. With advancements in AI, the company aims to “solve this problem that had been unsolvable for decades, and go and finally find those resources and prove that they’re way bigger than previously thought,” says Carl Hoiland, the company’s cofounder and CEO.
To support a successful geothermal power plant, a site needs high temperatures at an accessible depth and space for fluid to move through the rock and deliver heat. In the case of the new site, which the company calls Big Blind, the prize is a reservoir that reaches 250 °F at about 2,700 feet below the surface. As electricity demand rises around the world, geothermal systems like this one could provide a source of constant power without emitting the greenhouse gases that cause climate change.
