Zapping Rocks Unlocks Stimulated Geologic Hydrogen

Startup wields subterranean lightning strikes to conjure the gas

Paris Smalls, founder of Eden GeoPower, breaks subterranean rocks with electricity. His precision fracturing technique could be used to stimulate hydrogen production.

In a tranquil Boston suburb , on the far edge of a horse farm, where pasture gives way to woods, a crane lowers an enormous electrode into a borehole. The electrode, a half-meter-long cylinder with copper-tipped arms to ensure good contact with the borehole walls, descends—deeper, deeper—through layers of spongy sandstone to the hard, marbled roots of an ancient mountain range hundreds of meters below ground. Here the rock is tight; there are few cracks for water or gases to flow. But that’s about to change.