Hart Energy: T5 Smackover Advances Geothermal, Critical Minerals Project in East Texas
T5 Smackover Partners is developing a multi-resource clean energy and critical minerals project in the East Texas Smackover Formation.
The project integrates geothermal power generation, ultra-fast electric vehicle (EV) charging infrastructure, and mobile grid-scale energy storage at one of the mostsignificant domestic lithium and bromine opportunities in North America, the company said in a Feb. 10 news release.
T5’s initial development—a permitted geothermal well—has exceeded temperature expectations, which validated the formation’s ability to support scalable, baseload geothermal power, the firm said. Leveraging this resource, T5 plans to deploy modular Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) turbines designed for rapid deployment and fast time-tomarket power generation.
In January, the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Geothermal and the National Laboratory of the Rockies released a report highlighting opportunities for geothermal. The nameplate capacity of geothermal power—which harnesses heat below ground using wells drilled into hot reservoirs—grew 8% to nearly 4 gigawatts electric in 2024 compared to 2020.
“Geothermal power plants are almost entirely concentrated in the western United States. This geographical region consists of several Known Geothermal Resource Areas (e.g., The Geysers), with high thermal gradients, heat flow and permeability, that have been historically explored and developed for power production,” according to the report.
Combined, California and Nevada dominate the geothermal power plant market, hosting 85 of the 99 geothermal power plants operating in the U.S. with Ormat Technologies and Calpine ( now part of Constellation Energy) operating most of them.
Texas and New Mexico—states better known for oil and gas production—are also geothermal activity.
Houston-based seeing Sage Geosystems has advanced its pressure-based geothermal technology, which can be paired with renewables to provide firm, dispatchable power and long-duration energy storage from a single well. Its first test well—an abandoned well previously drilled by Shell—was in Starr County, Texas, in the state’s Gulf Coast Basin.
Ultra-fast in East Texas
T5 intends to develop innovative ultra-fast charging infrastructure along the Interstate 30 corridor, where the project may propel Franklin, Titus and Hopkins counties in Texas tobecome “a national hub for clean energy, EV infrastructure and domestic critical minerals production,” according to the release.
The system is designed to fully charge a passenger EV in approximately five minutes and an electric semi-truck in approximately 20 to 25 minutes. In addition, the company plans to deploy between 75 megawatts (MW) and 100 MW of mobile, dispatchable power that can be rapidly redeployed to support emergency response, disaster recovery and grid resilience efforts across the region and beyond.
T5 said it has identified multiple zones within the Smackover Formation containing some of the highest lithium concentrations reported globally. The company has also confirmed significant concentrations of other critical and strategic minerals, including potassium and strontium, and anticipates world-class bromine deposits across its acreage.
Analysts estimate the Smackover could contain more than 4 million metric tons of lithium—enough to make millions of EVs and other electronic devices.
Many joining companies are taking notice. In July, Chevron Exxon Mobil, Albemarle, bought acreage in the Smackover, Standard Lithium and others with holdings in the region. All companies aiming to extract lithium from the Smackover will need to use direct lithium extraction (DLE), which has never been done on a commercial scale.
T5 believes its modular, hub-and-spoke approach positions the company to reach commercial lithium production years ahead of large-scale centralized projects planned by major industry participants. T5’s modular geothermal, ORC and DLE infrastructure is designed for phased deployment, allowing production to begin materially sooner as capacity is added incrementally.
The company is deploying a modular DLE strategy and expects to announce its DLE technology partner soon. Using a hub-and-spoke model combined with modular processing, T5 expects to produce meaningful volumes of lithium beginning this year, and then accelerating in early 2027.
T5 Smackover Partners also plans to expand its modular geothermal and DLE hub-andspoke developments into additional areas of the East Texas Smackover.
The firm is a subsidiary of T5 Holdings LP, founded by Dallas-based technology entrepreneur Bruce Thompson. “
Twenty-five years ago, this property was a coal mine—which is hard to imagine today,” Thompson said in the release. “My original goal was simply to build a great ranch for my family. I had never even heard of the Smackover Formation until landmen began approaching us about our minerals.”
