Subterranean Explorations: The Unfinished Promise of Geothermal Energy in the Chilean Andes

Geological phenomena have a strong visual presence in the landscape of the Chilean Andes. Volcanoes, thermal springs, earthquakes and geysers arise from an active geology. From the start of the 20th century, engineers and geologists have imagined transforming the heat of groundwater reservoirs into electricity. However, its use as electric power at a national scale remains an unfinished promise. Inspired by the anthropology of energy and infrastructures, Martín Fonck delves into the promises of geothermal energy and their abandonment in the Chilean Andes.

Martín Fonck is a postdoctoral researcher and lecturer at
the Department of Science, Technology and Society (STS), TUM School of Social Sciences and Technology. He completed his PhD at the Rachel Carson Center for Environment and Society and the Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology at the Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich. He investigates debates on the futures of environmental technologies from ethnographic and historical perspectives.