So the article doesn't really go into what the innovation is here (from hydraulic fracturing). It's actually just a driling technique invented for fracking called horizontal drilling. Some detail here [1]. A primer on horizontal drilling in fracking is here [2].

Basically, current geothermal designs are built on vertical wells and I believe they are paired (but I'm not 100% sure about this) so you drop water down one, the heated rock boils it into steam and the steam comes out the other to turn a generator and generate electricity.

Detail is light here so I'm speculating that perhaps geothermal hotspots aren't uniform with depth in a lot of places so you can drill horizontally to get more heat generation. Or maybe a geothermal plant can use this to access a wider area of hotspots?

What's not clear to me is how you'd move water (and steam) through horizontal wells. Oil drilling has a whole process for doing this that I don't think applies.

I'm favor of trying whatever this is though. Sure, why not? I still think solar is our future but I'm happy to be wrong.

[1]: https://time.com/6302342/fervo-fracking-technology-geotherma...

[2]: https://oerb.com/environment-innovation/horizontal-drilling-...