Unearthing geothermal’s potential for heating and cooling

Dan Yates co-founded Opower in 2007, based on the belief that consumers want to use less energy—and that their utilities could actually help them do it. He was right. Opower took off, and Oracle bought the customer engagement platform in 2016. A year later, Dan became interested in another startup focused on residential energy: Dandelion Energy. Spun out of GoogleX, Dandelion developed a system for using geothermal energy to heat and cool buildings. 

Electrifying buildings is a major tenant of decarbonizing the power sector, but air-source heat pumps can be expensive. Installation costs are even higher with geothermal heat pumps, but they offer energy efficiency advantages. Dan is a big fan. After investing in Dandelion and serving on its board, he became CEO in 2023.

This week on With Great Power, Dan talks about the potential for residential geothermal heating and cooling, why it could be the clean energy that gains instead of loses federal support in the near term, and the role he thinks utilities can play in the technology’s deployment.

With Great Power is a co-production of GridX and Latitude Studios.  

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Credits: Hosted by Brad Langley. Produced by Erin Hardick and Mary Catherine O’Connor. Edited by Anne Bailey. Original music and engineering by Sean Marquand. Stephen Lacey is executive editor. Sean Marquand composed the original theme song and mixed the show. The Grid X production team includes Jenni Barber, Samantha McCabe, and Brad Langley.