Days after receiving billions in ‘Bidenomics’ grants for direct air capture of carbon dioxide, a US oil giant has bought the Canadian company responsible for developing the technology..Houston-based Occidental Petroleum said Tuesday it will pay US$1.1 billion for Vancouver-based Carbon Engineering to develop large-scale direct carbon capture in the US. .The technology partnership also adds new revenue streams in the form of technology licensing and royalties — and Canadian tax subsidies — Oxy CEO Vicki Hollub said in a statement..“We look forward to continuing our collaboration with the Carbon Engineering team, which has been a leader in pioneering and advancing DAC technology,” Hollub said. .“Together, Occidental and Carbon Engineering can accelerate plans to globally deploy DAC technology at a climate-relevant scale and make DAC the preferred solution for businesses seeking to remove their hard-to-abate emissions.”.Upon closing, expected by the end of 2023, Carbon Engineering would become a wholly owned subsidiary of Oxy Low Carbon Ventures. Carbon Engineering’s personnel will continue to drive ongoing technology development efforts and work closely with the Occidental and 1PointFive teams to bring direct air capture solutions to market, it said. .Carbon Engineering’s research and development activities and Innovation Centre will remain in Squamish, BC..The two companies have been partnering pilot facilities in BC and Texas for the past five years..The companies are building Stratos, the world’s largest direct capture plant, which is expected to be commercially operational in mid-2025, in Ector County, Texas..They are also adapting Stratos’ front-end engineering and design study for a second plant to be built at the King Ranch in Kleberg County, which was selected to receive a grant from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations..Said Carbon Engineering CEO Daniel Friedmann: “At the core of this deeper relationship is the commitment to invest in the development of our technology here in Canada, and the global reach to accelerate implementation of DAC-based climate solutions in the U.S. and around the world.”.Carbon Engineering was founded by former University of Calgary engineering professor, David Keith, who resides in Canmore and is presently teaching environmental economics at the University of Chicago. He was previously at Harvard and is a proponent of geo-engineering or ‘terraforming’ Earth’s climate..His stated goal is to use the technology to take Earth’s atmosphere back to ‘pre-industrial’ levels, not to increase oil production..Carbon Engineering boasts Bill Gates and Canadian Natural Resources chairman Murray Edwards as board members and investors..Occidental, meanwhile, is 25% owned by Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway.
