Under the lake's south-east corner lies the most promising geothermal energy field in California.

ECONOMIST: In a ��green�� state, an environmental disaster looms

Simbol Materials, a California-based startup, is piggy-backing on geothermal development in the geothermal-rich Salton Sea field, with plans to extract lithium from geothermal brine for use in innovative battery applications like electric cars.

FORBES: Sleeping Geothermal Giant Stirs

Smith is almost certain to focus on operations inside the philanthropy, particularly the management of engineers producing products like communications tools for disease specialists in the field or Google maps identifying geothermal fields.

FORBES: Magazine Article