Almost all geothermal startups to date have been inconsequential in affecting the energy picture in the US. We need impact at tens or hundreds of GW scale. Hardcore technology development for superhot temperature drilling at any depth and creating artificial reservoirs where none exist is critical to making geothermal energy at relevant scale.
Mazama Energy, a company incubated by Khosla Ventures and backed by us and Gates Frontier, today announced a technologically significant leap for clean energy: the creation of the world’s hottest Enhanced Geothermal System (EGS) at its pilot site in Newberry, Oregon – at an unprecedented bottomhole temperature of 629 °F (331 °C). They expect to reach 750 °F (400 °C) in 2026 which could produce many GWs of clean electricity from this one location. Harnessing these superhot resources will allow Mazama to extract up to 10x more power density, use 75% less water, and drill 80% fewer wells than current approaches.
The technology is globally applicable at any depth and up to 750 °F. This breakthrough sets a new global benchmark for geothermal technology and marks a critical step towards delivering electricity that’s competitive with natural gas, carbon-free baseload power at terawatt scale targeting less than 5 cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh). Creating superhot reservoirs dramatically increases the scale of geothermal energy production – hundreds of gigawatts can be produced this way in the United States alone, and even more globally, and much faster than building nuclear reactors given the urgent need for electricity.
Located within the Cascade Range, Newberry is one of the largest geothermal reservoirs in the United States. At its demonstration site, Mazama’s engineers first completed and stimulated a legacy well which serves as the water injector in the EGS. Mazama then successfully drilled, completed, and stimulated a new, 10,200-foot deviated producer well, within six feet of its planned trajectory, achieving optimal alignment with the injector. Initial circulation tests and diagnostics confirm the creation of a geothermal reservoir with excellent connectivity between the injector and producer wells.
As Dr. John McLennan, Reservoir Management Lead at Utah FORGE, said, “This is a validation of an integrated development program that has successfully interconnected two slightly deviated wells and circulated a representative working fluid – a fulfilment of a vision from nearly fifty years ago to create a full scale EGS reservoir which was initiated by Los Alamos National Laboratory at Fenton Hill, New Mexico. This proof of concept opens the door to deeper and hotter opportunities at Newberry and beyond.”
A New Era for Data Center Energy: Always-On, Anywhere, Carbon-Free
As data centers and AI workloads surge, the world faces an unprecedented demand for continuous, high-density baseload power. Traditional renewables such as solar and wind are intermittent, while natural gas and coal are carbon intensive and limited to locations where fuel can be cost effectively supplied. By developing resources at temperatures of 300-450 °C, Mazama can deliver uninterrupted, 24/7 power from many many locations across the world, allowing siting of datacenters at these locations, regardless of weather or time of day or grid capacity availability. This makes Mazama’s geothermal platform the ideal solution for hyperscale data centers and industrial electrification.
“With geothermal, you get global, round-the-clock energy that is carbon-free, cost-stable, and grid-independent,” said Sriram Vasantharajan, CEO of Mazama Energy. “Our team’s accomplishments expand the frontiers of geothermal power into significantly hotter and more heterogeneous rock regimes than ever before. This milestone paves the way for EGS with much more power per well and true cost parity with fossil fuels.”
Mazama’s team successfully deployed a spectrum of innovative technologies – including directional drilling, high-temperature well construction, and proprietary stimulation – to deliver performance under conditions far beyond traditional oil and gas industry limits. The team operated year-round at a remote, high-altitude site, with zero lost-time incidents.
During the technical demonstration, Mazama achieved:
- Peak drill penetration rates of 100 feet/hour
- Average 76 feet/hour across diverse rock types: granite, basalt, and granodiorite
- Record-breaking bit runs up to 2,760 feet through volcanic formations
- Zero downhole failures of motors or measurement tools
- Well integrity and cement stability at ultra-high temperatures
Thermal Lattice™: Unlocking Superhot Geothermal
At the heart of this success is Mazama’s proprietary Thermal Lattice™ stimulation, which is a patented process, purpose-built for creating geothermal reservoirs at sites previously unavailable for energy production. Building on conventional hydraulic fracturing, Thermal Lattice™ enables complex fracture creation and improved connectivity. The Newberry project also demonstrated the successful use of crosslinked fracturing fluid systems, sliding sleeves, chemical and nano tracers, and fiber-optic diagnostics for real-time fracture mapping and temperature monitoring. This technology can be used to create reservoirs where none existed for lack of permeability, thus dramatically expanding the scope of geothermal energy.
SuperHot 750 °F (400 °C) Wells: The Key Towards Terawatt-Scale Clean Energy
Mazama will next advance to commercial projects with horizontal wells, beginning with a 15 MW pilot and scaling to a 200 MW development project at Newberry. The company will also extend its drilling into the SuperHot Rock regime, leveraging proprietary high-temperature materials, cooling solutions, and stimulation technologies.
Today’s milestone is a blueprint for unlocking baseload, multi-hundred gigawatt-scale carbon-free energy from the Earth’s crust worldwide, essential for what the next generation of AI and cloud infrastructure needs. I could not be more excited for what lies ahead.