Today's guest is Tim Latimer, Co-Founder and CEO of Fervo Energy.

This is the first episode that I've done putting geothermal front and center, and Tim does a great job in this discussion of providing an overview of geothermal technology. I learn why it matters, where it is in its evolution, where it needs to get to and the barriers holding it back. We also talk a bunch about Tim's journey from starting as a drilling engineer, working in the Permian and Eagle Four Basins, to now being laser-focused on thermal technology and the clean energy transition. I really enjoyed this one and I hope you do as well. 

You can find me on twitter @jjacobs22 or @mcjpod and email at [email protected], where I encourage you to share your feedback on episodes and suggestions for future topics or guests.

In today’s episode, we cover:

• What is Fervo and what was its genesis?
• The origins of Tim’s interest in climate change.
• Tim’s early work experience in the fossil fuel industry as an oil-drilling engineer.
• How the vision of energy independence and coal-alternatives enticed him to enter the oil industry.
• The epiphany that prompted him to leave the fossil fuel industry and explore geothermal energy.
• Tim’s realization that the bottleneck for geothermal development is financing not research.
• Tim’s experience at Stanford Graduate School of Business and his decision to go all in on Fervo Energy.
• How geothermal systems work and what has historically hampered development outside of select countries.
• Fervo’s new horizontal-drilling approach and heat-flow distribution technique.
• Fervo Energy’s business model and its services.
• How geothermal offers a carbon-free renewable energy without the challenges of intermittency.
• Goal of developing first operational facility by 2021.
• How lands rights are treated.
• How geothermal can compensate for the night-time intermittency issue that has come with the growth of solar energy.
• The role of storage as it relates to geothermal energy.
• How Tim sees areas of risk for Fervo.
• What success looks like for Fervo.

Links to topics discussed in this episode:

• Fervo Energy: https://www.fervoenergy.com/
• MIT: “The Future of Geothermal Energy”: http://energy.mit.edu/research/future-geothermal-energy/
• TomKat Center at Stanford: https://tomkat.stanford.edu/
• Cyclotron Road: https://www.cyclotronroad.org/
• California’s SB100 Regulation: https://www.energy.ca.gov/sb100
• Geothermal Risk Mitigation Fund For East Africa: https://grmf-eastafrica.org/

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*Editing and post-production work for this episode was provided by The Podcast Consultant