Superman is the first and probably greatest costumed superhero of them all. He's been around for over 80 years and in that time has inspired generations of fans, whether they read about him in comics, watched him in movies or TV, or played with his toys and video games. Superman is the modern version of ancient myths.

RELATED: Superman: 5 Pairings That Make A Lot Of Sense (& 5 That Would Be Awful)

His repertoire of superpowers is vast and he can pretty much do anything. Add to that super intelligence and he's one of the most versatile heroes around. However, there are some things that he could be using his powers for but doesn't. This list is going to look at some of those things.

10 Deep-Sea Exploration

While the Justice League already has one member who knows everything about the sea, Aquaman has a lot to do with being the king of Atlantis. Superman, with his incalculable strength and durability, can easily survive underwater unaided. All he would need is some breathing equipment.

His vision powers would allow him to see underwater perfectly no matter the depth. He has a perfect memory so even if he couldn't bring recording equipment with him, he could still describe exactly what he saw down there and his x-ray vision would allow him to look at the inside of new creatures he encountered.

9 Exploring Gas Giants

Saturn and Jupiter are gas giants, planets made up of bands of gas held together by intense gravity. They are extremely hard to explore because of those intense gravitic stresses and the gas currents of the planets. Scientists would kill to get a closer look at them.

RELATED: 10 DC Villains We Can't Believe Superman Never Fought

And Superman could easily give that closer look. His invulnerability would allow him to survive in the gas giant's atmosphere and he could fly around, making observations and using his photographic memory to remember them. His super senses would allow him to make all kinds of observations.

8 Asteroid Mining

In our solar system, there is an asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. Asteroids are sometimes full of all kinds of ores, but finding the ones that contain any would be very hard. It would be costly and labor-intensive sending a crew up, surveying which asteroids have what on them, landing, and mining.

However, Superman could use his x-ray vision to scan an asteroid and see if it contained anything worthwhile. He could then take that asteroid and bring it closer to Earth, where it would be easier for to mine. Best of all, he would do it free of charge for the benefit of mankind.

7 Refreezing The Polar Icecaps

Superman freeze breath Cropped

This is sort of a stop-gap measure, but here it is- the polar ice caps are melting because of rising temperatures. While it would take a lot of work to actually fix the problem, Superman could very easily use his freeze breeze to freeze the icebergs again.

RELATED: 5 Reasons Superman Is Perfect For Wonder Woman (& 5 It's Steve Trevor)

This would buy the rest of the world time to actually solve the problem of too much carbon in the atmosphere and also save a lot of Arctic wildlife that is in danger of losing their home, which is definitely something that Superman would get behind. Saving lives, even the lives of animals, is Superman's thing, after all.

6 Actually Helping Solve The Problem Of Climate Change

Climate change is a huge problem and so far, it looks like some countries don't even believe in it. The release of carbon into the atmosphere is getting to a catastrophic point, causing the planet to retain heat and playing havoc with the weather systems of the Earth.

Superman is super smart. If there was anyone who could figure out a way to remove carbon from the atmosphere, it would be him. He could study the problem and use his super-intelligence to come up with a solution and build a machine that could do the job.

5 New Energy Sources

This is another one that Superman's super-intelligence would help with. Eventually, humans are going to run out of oil. Everyone knows this, but because people make money off it still, no one is doing too much to get ready for it. This is going to be a big problem and it's one that Superman can solve.

RELATED: 10 Most Romantic Moments Between Superman & Lois Lane

Superman already has access to amazing alien technology, but adapting it to work on a global scale would take a lot of thinking. Superman could easily figure out a way to do so, plus people would be more likely to trust it if it came from Superman.

4 Building Demolition

There are lots of dangerous, condemned buildings in major cities. They present a hazard to residents and a lot of time, municipal governments can't afford to have them taken down. This looks like a job for.... you guessed it... Superman.

Superman can very easily do this sort of thing. With powers like his, demolishing a building would be very easy. Plus, he could do it safely. A man who can move at superspeed could keep any debris from leaving the area around the building, protecting residents and viable properties.

3 Missing Persons Cases

Superman hugging Regan in All-Star Superman

Superman does a lot, but he can always do more. Take missing person cases. Finding people is very hard for the police, but they only have the senses and resources of normal human beings. Imagine if they had x-ray vision or supersenses or could canvas large areas by air where they could use those advantages.

RELATED: DC Comics: 10 Best Superman Storylines Of All Time

Superman has all of those things. Police around the world could get in touch with him on the hardest to crack cases, give him their leads, and he could use his vast repertoire of powers to find them.

2 Helping Cure Diseases

DC Comics' Superman smiling and flying forward

Superman's super-intelligence and ability to learn anything quickly would be a lot of help to the medical profession. Superman has a built-in x-ray machine in his eyes, allowing to see all kinds of growth and malignancies. He can study up on things and use his perfect memory to diagnose ailments.

Superman could use many of his powers in concert to help the medical profession immensely. He can read every medical textbook ever written in a matter of hours and have perfect retention of all the info. His super intelligence would make it so he wasn't just parroting out what he read, as well. He would be able to think critically about what he learned and use it.

1 Infrastructure Work

A lot of buildings, bridges, and other parts of the world's infrastructure are very old. Sure, they get refurbished sometimes, but problems can still occur. Wouldn't it be great if someone could look at all of them using x-rays and microscopes to identify any faults in them that couldn't be detected normally? Someone can - Superman.

Superman can use his vision powers to look at all kinds of structures and find the parts of them that are breaking down, identifying them for construction crews to fix. If things are really bad, he can use his heat vision to shore things up if there are faults in the metal long enough to the structure in question to be closed and repaired. Especially in America, infrastructure investments by the government and private corporations are at an all-time low. Superman would do a lot of the work for free.

NEXT: 5 Reasons Superman Revealing His Identity Is Great (& 5 It's Terrible)