US-headquartered climate tech company Spiritus has secured $30m in Series A funding to expand its carbon removal technology. The round was led by Aramco Ventures with participation from Khosla Ventures, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries America, and TDK Ventures. The fresh capital will be deployed to advance Spiritus’ plans to develop large-scale carbon capture facilities in the US and abroad.
Spiritus is advancing three projects aimed at demonstrating large-scale DAC. These include its New Mexico pilot facility, which is a 1,000-tonne DAC site that looks set to begin operations this year.
Another project, Orchard One in Wyoming, will be a full-scale DAC facility with a planned capacity of two megatonnes of CO2 per year.
Through its partnership with Aramco, Spiritus will also roll out its DAC technology for deployment in Saudi Arabia.
Like others, the company is working to reduce DAC costs from an industry average of $1,000 per tonne to $100 per tonne. The target seen as essential for large-scale adoption.
“DAC has the potential to play an important role in decarbonising hard-to-abate sectors of the economy, but until now it has been too expensive to be meaningful,” said Bruce Niven, Executive Managing Director of Strategic Venturing at Aramco Ventures.
Spiritus CEO and co-founder Charles Cadieu highlighted the urgency of deploying cost-effective solutions. “We’re seeing soaring demand for data centres and heavy industries, yet we can’t ignore the carbon that comes with it.”
The rapid expansion of data centres, driven by the increasing use of AI and digital services, has led to a significant rise in energy consumption. According to a 2024 Goldman Sachs Research Paper, data centres’ share of US power consumption is projected to increase from 3% in 2022 to 8% by 2030.
Companies like Microsoft and Amazon are investing in DAC initiatives to fit with their sustainability goals. Microsoft has committed to purchasing 500,000 tonnes of carbon removal credits from Oxy Low Carbon Ventures over six years, while Amazon plans to buy 250,000 tonnes over a decade.
