March was a busy month for Green Molecules™ and for the ECV team.
In addition to CERAWeek, which we highlighted in our prior newsletter, we have been to the RICE Alliance Energy Venture Day in Houston, to the mHub Hardtech Summit in Chicago (where our own Managing Partner Vic Pascucci was a panelist) and to the Arpa-e Summit in Washington, DC. We met with hundreds of innovators from hundreds and hundreds of startups, working hard to build the future that we will soon all live in.
The future is clear: sustainability is at the center of every conversation around energy and more and more emphasis is placed on Green Molecules™ as a way to reach a cleaner, sustainable and affordable energy future.
Green Molecules™ are becoming mainstream and capturing everybody’s attention, from Renewable Natural Gas and e-Gas (created from electricity, water and captured or biogenic CO2) to clean Hydrogen everywhere for energy generation, chemical synthesis and long duration energy storage applications, to “Carbon Dioxide Management” in CO2 capture, sequestration and utilization. As US Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm (pictured above) quoted, we need “everything, everywhere, and all at once”. This is a big shift that calls for a more inclusive energy transition that brings Green Molecules™ at the forefront.
As an example of the traction around Green Molecules™, the DOE received 79 (!!) applications for the development of large scale Hydrogen Hubs, with demand outstripping the available funding by more than an order of magnitude. The program will make 6-10 awards (33 applicants were encouraged to submit full responses) and up to $8B in funding to develop a “network of clean hydrogen producers, potential clean hydrogen consumers, and connective infrastructure located in close proximity.” The development of Hydrogen Hubs (H2Hubs) is intended to be the first step toward the creation of a national network of clean hydrogen producers and customers that could facilitate the emergence of a clean hydrogen economy.
So, out of the hundreds of March Energy Madness contestants, who were the finalists? It’s hard to pick winners out of such an amazing field, but below is a wrap up of a busy March month for energy and for the Green Molecule™ revolution.
Ernst Moniz, former US Energy Secretary and physics faculty at MIT, stressed how it is now widely understood that there are three components to the future of the energy industry:
At the event we met with hundreds of startups that are looking for investments to accelerate their commercialization efforts. They were all very interesting, but below are some that caught our attention and that are advancing the Green Molecule™ revolution.
Blue Sky Measurements
BlueSky was founded in 2020 and is based in Houston, TX. They received an Arpa-e grant to develop a passive infrared camera for the continuous detection of fugitive methane emissions.
What it means for natural gas: according to the IEA, more than 60% of methane emissions from the oil and gas sector could be mitigated at no net cost, given that the recovery of natural gas has economic value. The challenge is in identifying the leaks and there are now new technologies that allow us to do just that. Blue Sky has developed a completely passive system that is 2-3X less expensive than competitive systems, bringing continuous site monitoring closer to reality. Based on the technology developments that we see today, we believe that in a matter of 3-5 years low-cost, continuous methane leak detection will be the new norm across the natural gas value chain.
DexMat
Fresh from a $3M Seed capital infusion, DexMat is introducing sustainable carbon-based materials that can replace steel, aluminum and copper in a variety of applications. Their materials can be woven to make wire shapes, sheet / foils or combined to make carbon-fiber type materials.
What it means for natural gas: DexMat uses pyrolysis of natural gas to obtain carbon negative materials that have characteristics superior to that of incumbent materials. Their market is massive as their materials have unique properties such as being lighter but stronger than steel, and as conductive as copper and aluminum for electricity and heat applications.
Frost Methane
Frost Methane developed a small scale flare that can destroy both naturally occurring and man-made methane sources, from abandoned mines, melting permafrost, small manure lagoons and small landfills.
What it means for natural gas: fugitive methane has come under intense scrutiny lately and this is a simple, cost-effective solution for methane sources coming from capped wells and other parts of the natural gas value chain where it is difficult to economically recover and transport the gas (most often just because of their remote location). For manure lagoons that are too small for RNG applications, Frost Methane can combust the animal / manure-generated methane and earn renewable energy credits that they share with farmers in a shared credits business model that is offered at no CapEx to the farmer.
Scanalytics
Scanalytics has developed a “smart flooring solution”, effectively embedding a sensor in floor tiles for commercial properties and enabling better control of the built environment.
What it means for natural gas: energy efficiency is one of the key drivers of a sustainable energy future, and one in which utilities are already investing heavily and where they have achieved very significant success. Scanalytics offers a new generation of sensors that provides ultra granular occupancy data, allowing a greater degree of control on heating and air conditioning systems and thus leading to energy savings.
Rice Alliance is the premier forum for energy innovation in Houston, and consequently nationally as Houston takes a greater role in the new energy economy. We love Rice Alliance and we love Houston, where Green Molecules™ are always center stage.
Jupiter Oxygen
Jupiter Oxygen has developed an oxy-combustion technology for carbon sequestration at industrial scale. They are currently at TRL-7 and looking to build a full scale demo, co-developed with the US DOE.
What it means for natural gas: oxy-fuel combustion is one of the key pathways to sustainable natural gas consumption at industrial scale. By purifying air into an air separation unit (ASU), pure Oxygen is combusted with natural gas to obtain a pure stream of CO2, which is simple to sequester and inject in pipelines or stored underground. These kind of technologies can achieve large scale sustainable development while delivering the same type of reliable, uninterrupted energy we have come to be used to.
Cnergreen
This is a Canadian company that stands for clean and efficient hydrocarbon production. Their technology is called ArmorFoam and enables a larger quantity of CO2 to be stored in the same amount of volume, thanks to their proprietary nanoparticle that acts like a sponge and effectively increases the CO2 absorption capacity of existing reservoirs.
What it means for natural gas: Cnergreen ArmorFoam can be used in EOR applications or in other carbon sequestration applications and improves the productivity of existing wells. For a Class VI permitted well, it means the ability to store more CO2 and therefore to earn more carbon capture and sequestration credits. For EOR, it means effectively generating more carbon negative barrels of oil from existing wells.
CanaGas
CanaGas is developing a small scale, low cost LNG liquefaction technology that leverages a combination of pressure and temperature to achieve a more cost-effective liquefaction, with the goal of becoming 10X less expensive than traditional liquefaction plants at a fraction of the scale.
What it means for natural gas: LNG is a staple of the global energy industry, but it is energy intensive and can work only at very large scales. In miniaturizing the liquefaction process, applications for biogas and others can be leveraged to cost effectively move RNG from the point of origination to an injection point and into the gas grid, enabling a higher fraction of carbon negative or carbon neutral gas into the natural gas transmission and distribution networks.
We might be biased, but there is no place like home. Our own Vic Pascucci, pictured above, was a panelist and is a mentor at the Chicago-based mHub Hardtech summit. Building technology is hard, and building hardware is well, even harder. We are committed to supporting and helping entrepreneurs in the Green Molecules™ ecosystem and beyond. If you are working hard to build the future of the energy system, we would like to hear from you.
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