New Technology of 2013-Flame Drills

Flame Drills

A man named Jared Potter has recently developed a pair of flame drills that operate at temperatures of 3200 and 7200 degrees, respectively. That's hot enough to pretty well burn through anything, but rather than mounting them on the front of a spike-treaded tank and driving it into the UN to deliver his list of demands, Potter has instead opted to turn the fury of his psycho-drills on the very planet itself. At such high temperatures, the drills are capable of boring through the Earth's crust without ever actually touching the rock itself, thus eliminating the need for replacement drill bits, equipment maintenance and rock cooties.

How This Will Change the World:

If we're able to cheaply and efficiently burrow deeper into the Earth's crust than ever before, we can tap past the earth's crust to the chewy center, where a sea of molten rock lies waiting to power the flying cars of the future. The chief downside to using all that glowing hot earth juice as an energy source has always been location: If you don't live in a Dr. Evil style volcano base, it just doesn't do you much good. But with these new flame drills, geothermal shafts can be dug anywhere, just like tapping a well. A spurting well of unceasing Hellfire, sure, but a well nonetheless. This could cleanly solve all the world's energy needs and, what's better, we could look fucking hardcore while doing it.

"Just harvesting some fuel."

How This Will End The World:

What part of superheated hydrogen drill boring into the Earth's core didn't set off an alarm with you? The whole idea reeks of barely veiled supervillainy, but even assuming that Potter has the best of intentions and is not, in fact, hiding a Cobra Commander mask in his back pocket, tapping a geothermal well where there is not already a natural vent brings a few risks along with it: volcanic eruptions, searing magma, earthquakes and crustal instability, to name a few. A volcano's only job is to provide an avenue for magma to exit through - but dramatic eruptions are only caused when that vent is blocked long enough to build up significant pressure. So if anything blocks, interrupts or otherwise interferes with the vent, then you have all the criteria for a volcano. Where's the nearest power plant to your house? Two miles? Five? Now, where's the nearest volcano? Yeah, well, pretty soon you're only going to need to know the one answer.