Breakthrough Energy

Australia's push towards renewable hydrogen is facing a reality check, as detailed in a recent Cipher News article by Bill Spindle. The article explores how Andrew Forrest, an advocate for green hydrogen, has scaled back Fortescue's aggressive hydrogen production goals. This shift underscores the challenges of producing clean hydrogen at scale, even in countries like Australia with abundant renewable resources. Read more in Cipher: https://nt-z.ro/4fWfZu2

Scaling a nascent industry like Direct Air Capture feels like solving a big puzzle. You need to make all the pieces (customers, investors, suppliers, etc.) fit together to achieve the ambitious growth required for net zero.    As we‘re looking to deploy Project Dawn with a capacity of 20,000 tCO2/year in 2026, we really see the need for true pioneers as partners.    That’s why we were excited to welcome the Breakthrough Energy team around Ashley and Francisco to our facilities in Ismaning this week.    The Breakthrough Catalyst program (link in comments) is one of the few initiatives taking the lead on FOAK financing. They support the most promising technologies in this crucial step of scaling up from pilot stage to commercial readiness.    We gave them a tour around our lab and showcased our Hydrolyzer stacks and absorber modules – the heart and lung of our DAC system. And we talked about the challenges and opportunities of this next step in scaling our technology to an impactful scale.    Thanks to UnternehmerTUM Philipp Gerbert, Lars Eiermann, for making this valuable exchange possible.   Phlair. Enabling a carbon-negative future.

Great way to kick off la rentrée: Strategizing about a clean technology that’s ready for prime time at COP29 How wonderful that my first meeting after the summer holiday was with Bruce Douglas, CEO of the Global Renewables Alliance and one of the key architects of the ‘Tripling Renewables’ target launched at #cop28. Luckily, it is now dawning on Leaders across the globe that such a target needs to be complemented with sizeable increases in #energystorage. This is not a ‘nice to have’ but one of the foundational pillars for achieving a fully renewable power grid, and therefore a successful #energytransition. That is why Bruce and many others are now working towards a global energy storage target to be launched at #cop29. What’s genuinely puzzling is that the EU lacks a dedicated #storage strategy - this despite making renewables the backbone of its energy transition. Has it not occurred to anyone that the wind may not always blow and the sun not always shine? Knowing that for many observers ‘storage tech’ is a broad, indiscriminate bucket, it’s important to realize that there are different approaches, all of which deserve policy attention, funding, demand and offtake. Using some of the Breakthrough Energy Ventures portfolio companies as examples, here is an overview:   ➡️ Mechanical Storage: Quidnet Energy is advancing geomechanical pumped storage, which stores energy in underground reservoirs, offering scalable solutions for diverse locations.   ➡️ Electrochemical Storage: Form Energy is pioneering iron-air batteries that provide 100 hours of electricity, enhancing grid resilience. ESS, Inc. is developing flow batteries with long-duration capabilities, while Our Next Energy (ONE) is pushing the boundaries of lithium-ion batteries, vital for short-term, rapid-response storage.   ➡️ Thermal Storage: Malta Inc. is revolutionizing energy storage with molten salt technology, converting heat back into electricity on demand. Rondo Energy, Antora Energy, and Fourth Power are leading with high-temperature heat storage solutions for industrial use.   ➡️ Chemical Storage: Chemical storage technologies convert surplus renewable energy into chemical forms, like hydrogen or synthetic gas, for long-term storage and flexible use, playing a critical role in balancing the energy grid. At COP 28, the EU was instrumental in driving the ‘tripling renewables target’. For COP29, there’s talk of calling for a six-fold (!) increase in global storage capacity. Given that these technologies are more nascent and less widely deployed, there's a lot of catching up to do. Even in the absence of a storage strategy of its own, the EU should embrace this target wholeheartedly. The benefits will extend beyond #climate because new, sizeable #markets will be built, #resilience be strengthened and #innovation be powered. Sounds to me like the perfect hallmark for the forthcoming Clean Industrial Deal? 🤔

Climate tech is often called “Tough Tech” — and it’s tough for a reason. Putting cement and steel in the ground, watching market cycles move against you, while elbowing your way into entrenched industries, is just tough!! What gives you conviction to go on this 10-15 year journey? 🤔 A thoughtfully built techno-economic model is a relatively inexpensive crystal ball to help understand (and guide!) your economic viability. And as an early-stage team, you need to own these models and build your own intuition -- that was one of my biggest takeaways from my work with Breakthrough Energy Fellows teams. Tomorrow at 2:30pm ET, I’m joining Cameron Halliday, Emre Gençer, and Alex Prather to share our perspectives on TEA / LCA and more, but the real work (and the real insight) comes when you dive in yourself! 📅 Sign up here: https://lnkd.in/ekPyhHAV Thanks Newlab for pulling this crew together! 🙌🏼

Please welcome our latest member company to join our Chicago ecosystem, Silicate! Silicate is a terrestrial enhanced weathering company accelerating a natural geological process – the weathering of minerals – to durably sequester atmospheric carbon dioxide and amend soil pH in farmland. The company has been supported by Breakthrough Energy Fellows, and is trialing its carbon removal solution in the Midwest in collaboration with researchers from Northwestern University. The team's pioneering carbon removal work was featured on CBS Saturday Morning (take a look here: https://lnkd.in/gjH96RFv), and they were recently selected as a finalist in the $80m XPRIZE Carbon Removal competition. To learn more about Silicate, visit their website: https://lnkd.in/eyeA9N38

The chemical industry, particularly the ethylene industry, is often overlooked despite being a $200B market. Ethylene, the world’s most used organic chemical, is essential for products like clothing, medical devices, pharmaceuticals, window springs, pipes, and even sustainable aviation fuels. Today, ethylene production primarily involves breaking down fossil fuels—a high-temperature, highly emitting process that releases over 800M tons of CO2 equivalent annually, factoring in both process emissions and potential end-of-life product emissions. Sarah Lamaison, PhD, Co-Founder and CEO of Dioxycle, and her team are revolutionizing this process. Instead of breaking down fossil fuels, Dioxycle builds ethylene from recycled carbon emissions using renewable electricity. At the heart of this innovation is a novel electrolyzer that uses electricity to recycle carbon emissions and water into ethylene. By replacing fossil fuels with Dioxycle's process, the company can abate over 1% of the world’s emissions and reinvent a $200B market. Watch Sarah Lamaison discuss this groundbreaking technology at this year’s Breakthrough Energy Summit. Full video in comments. #besummit #climatetech #climatechange #sustainability #innovation

BEV portfolio company LuxWall, Inc. celebrated the opening of its new facility in Litchfield, MI, earlier this week, marking a significant step in the future of building efficiency. With proven technology, LuxWall's energy-saving windows are already making a difference, offering a solution that reduces energy costs. The factory, which will employ local workers, highlights the impact of historic federal investments in U.S. clean energy. Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer and the Clean Energy for America Education Fund were on hand to commemorate this milestone. Read more: https://nt-z.ro/3T0H2e6

The new largest DAC facility in the United States opens today! Project Bantam will operate at 5000 tons per year, 5X larger than the next largest US DAC facility. Marcus Lima and the team over Heimdal have built a novel process involving low-cost solvents and construction with a total cost for this project at around $3m. For now, the facility will be using the removed CO2 for enhanced oil recovery (EOR), due to delays in permitting for permanent geologic sequestration in Class VI wells. This is a fantastic step forward for Heimdal, for direct air capture, and for climate. Cheers to the entire team! https://lnkd.in/edy63PKU

Congrats to ZeroAvia, Heart Aerospace, LanzaJet, and all 36 recipients of the Federal Aviation Administration's FAST grant program! ✈ The $291 million program will help accelerate production and availability of sustainable aviation fuels (SAF), support infrastructure build out to allow more users to access SAF supplies, and supercharge the development of the next-generation of zero carbon electric, hydrogen, and hybrid aviation technologies in the U.S. These types of federal programs are critical to help develop, pilot, and scale future technologies! Check out the cool work being done by these companies, across 23 states!

We’re thrilled to announce our latest collaboration with ForeFlight, unveiled at the Geneva Business Aviation Show. Together, we’re pioneering a contrail avoidance system that’s a critical step toward mitigating climate change. Read more about our partnership in Aviation Week Network: https://nt-z.ro/3AGEUl6