Spiritus | Spiritus Announces the First “Carbon Orchard” for Direct Air Capture, will Sequester 2 Megatons of Carbon Annually in Wyoming

Spiritus Announces the First “Carbon Orchard” for Direct Air Capture, will Sequester 2 Megatons of Carbon Annually in Wyoming

LOS ALAMOS, N.M.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--In a significant development for climate action, Spiritus, the leading climate tech company designing solutions for market accessible carbon removal using direct air capture (DAC), has announced today that it will establish its first “Carbon Orchard” direct air capture and sequestration site in Central Wyoming. The facility, known as Orchard One, will be one of the world’s largest direct air capture facilities, capable of capturing and sequestering up to two megatons of carbon from the atmosphere annually. Orchard One will bring hundreds of jobs to Wyoming, and will begin carbon removal in 2026.

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"We’re moving to reduce the cost of direct air capture to under $100 per ton. This tenfold reduction in cost, compared to previous methods, marks an inflection point in the field."

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Spiritus is pioneering a new offering for direct air capture, the gold standard for high-quality carbon dioxide removal (CDR), that makes direct air capture accessible within all net-zero portfolios by driving a tenfold reduction in cost from current standards. Increasing accessibility means bringing the cost of direct air capture and geologic sequestration under $100 a ton, a tenfold cost reduction, enabling stakeholders to achieve more carbon removal value for their high-quality CDR investments. Stakeholders can now include top-quality direct air capture from Orchard One in their portfolios, overcoming a major concern with alternative lower-quality lower-permanence carbon credits and offsets.

Orchard One will exclusively use geologic sequestration to store captured carbon on-site. Often referred to as the gold standard of carbon storage, geologic sequestration prevents carbon from re-entering the atmosphere by trapping it in naturally occurring rock formations deep underground. Once operational, Orchard One will result in the removal of the airline emissions from approximately three million Americans, or 340,000 pickup trucks annually, demonstrating that direct air capture is a scalable solution to net-zero.

Additional benefits of Orchard One include verifiable and transparent traceability of stored carbon, support of the local community through engagement, job creation, and contributing a portion of profits to the areas of largest community need. Spiritus is committed to bringing good-paying jobs to Wyoming for existing residents, with plans to partner with local universities and other organizations to ensure adequate training is made available in the region.

Orchard One has already gained commercial interest with the first carbon removal services allocated to Frontier (founded by Stripe, Alphabet, Shopify, Meta and McKinsey), Watershed, and Terraset who are among Orchard One’s carbon pre-purchase customers. These purchases followed Spiritus’ de-stealth in September 2023, where it revealed funding led by Khosla Ventures. Additional carbon removal from Orchard One is available directly from Spiritus, as well as through our founding partners, Watershed, Cloverly, and Terraset.

Execution of Orchard One will be overseen by Mindy Ren, Spiritus’ recently hired Head of Carbon Removal Infrastructure, whose previous work in infrastructure management includes leadership roles at ExxonMobil, Tesla, and Meta.

“Wyoming is a leader in the responsible certification of geological storage, making it an ideal location for us to establish our first Carbon Orchard,” said Ren. “Today’s announcement marks an important milestone in cleaning the air for future generations, and paves the way for further deployments of this scale.”

“Establishing Orchard One in the state of Wyoming marks a major advancement in our global journey towards net-zero,” said Charles Cadieu, co-founder and Chief Executive Officer at Spiritus. “Our approach, a first in the industry, brings high-efficiency carbon removal within the economic reach of broader markets. Leveraging our proprietary sorbent technology and achieving substantial reductions in energy consumption, we’re moving to reduce the cost of direct air capture to under $100 per ton. This tenfold reduction in cost, compared to previous methods, marks an inflection point in the field. We’re excited to break ground in Wyoming to set a new precedent, not only for Spiritus but for the broader field of carbon removal, driving positive change in environmental stewardship.”

To learn more about how Spiritus is pioneering a feasible, scalable, and cost-effective approach to carbon removal, visit spiritus.com.

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About Spiritus

Spiritus is a climate tech company at the forefront of Direct Air Capture (DAC) technology. With a dedication to innovation and sustainable stewardship of our environment, Spiritus has crafted a unique solution that achieves rapid sorption and desorption rates at a fraction of the sorbent cost versus state-of-the-art sorbents under passive DAC conditions. The company's approach combines the Spiritus Sorbent and the Spiritus Carbon Orchard, offering a scalable and modular system for low-cost DAC and sequestration (DAC+S). Spiritus is committed to making carbon removal an accessible and practical tool in the global fight against climate change. For more information, visit Spiritus.com.

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Contacts

spiritus@consortpartners.com

Rewind.earth

Biomass carbon removal and storage

Tel Aviv, Israel

R&D

Rewind.earth uses cranes off of boats to sink agricultural and forest residues to the oxygenless bottom of the Black Sea, the largest anoxic body of water on Earth. Oxygenless water dramatically slows biomass decomposition. The lack of living organisms in the Black Sea limits any potential ecosystem risks. This process allows for affordable and environmentally safe carbon removal.

Carboniferous

Biomass carbon removal and storage

Houston, TX, US

R&D

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Vycarb

Ocean alkalinity enhancement

Brooklyn, NY, US

58 tons

Vycarb uses a reactor to add limestone alkalinity to coastal ocean water, resulting in the drawdown and storage of atmospheric CO₂. Their dissolution system has a novel sensing apparatus that base tests water, dissolves calcium carbonate, and doses alkalinity into the water at a controlled amount safe for dispersion. Their closed system makes it easier to measure the amount of dissolved alkalinity added and CO₂ removed.

Arbon

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New York, NY, US

173 tons

Arbon uses a 'humidity-swing' process to capture CO₂ from the air. The sorbent binds CO₂ when dry and releases it when wet. This process uses less energy than approaches that rely on changing temperature and pressure to release CO₂. The sorbent’s ability to bind CO₂ has been shown to remain stable over thousands of cycles. Both of these innovations could reduce the cost of DAC.

Vaulted

Biomass carbon removal and storage

Houston, TX, US

1,666 tons

Vaulted injects organic waste into durable wells, where the carbon in the waste is sequestered as it decomposes. Using a specialized slurry injection technology, their process can handle a wide range of organic carbon sources with minimal energy and upfront processing. Their system has the potential to be deployed quickly at large scales.

Spiritus

Direct air capture

Los Alamos, NM

713 tons

Spiritus uses a sorbent made from commercially-available materials and a passive air contactor that requires little energy to capture CO₂. The CO₂-saturated sorbent is then regenerated using a novel desorption process, capturing the CO₂ and allowing the sorbent to be reused with less energy than a higher-heat vacuum chamber typically used in direct air capture approaches. The high-performance, inexpensive sorbent and lower regeneration energy provide a path to low cost.

Planetary

Ocean alkalinity enhancement

Nova Scotia, Canada

937 tons

Planetary harnesses the ocean for scalable removal. They introduce alkaline materials to existing ocean outfalls like wastewater plants and power station cooling loops. This speeds up the sequestration of CO₂ safely and permanently as bicarbonate ions in the ocean. Planetary then verifies the removal through advanced measurement and modeling techniques.

Mati

Enhanced weathering

US and India

1,513 tons

Mati applies silicate rock powders to agricultural fields, starting with rice paddy farms in India. These rocks react with water and CO₂ to produce dissolved inorganic carbon that is subsequently stored in the local watershed and eventually in the ocean. Mati relies on rice field flooding and higher subtropical temperatures to accelerate weathering, and extensive sampling and soil and river modeling to measure removal and deliver co-benefits to smallholder farmers.

Holocene

Direct air capture

Knoxville, TN, US

332 tons

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EDAC Labs

Enhanced weathering

Baltimore, MD, US

317 tons

EDAC Labs uses an electrochemical process to produce acid and base. The acid is used to start the recovery of valuable metals from mining waste, and the base is used to capture CO₂ from air. The acid and base streams are then combined to produce metals that can be sold for applications such as batteries, and solid carbonates, which permanently store CO₂.

CarbonRun

Ocean alkalinity enhancement

Nova Scotia, CA

1,291 tons

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CarbonBlue

Direct ocean removal

Haifa, Israel

400 tons

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Carbon Atlantis

Direct air capture

Munich, Germany

275 tons

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Banyu Carbon

Direct ocean removal

Seattle, WA, US

360 tons

Banyu Carbon uses sunlight to capture CO₂ from seawater. A reusable, light-activated molecule that becomes acidic when exposed to light causes carbon dissolved in seawater to degas as CO₂, which is then stored permanently. Because only a small portion of the visible light spectrum is needed to trigger the reaction, this is a highly energy-efficient approach to direct ocean removal.

Alkali Earth

Enhanced weathering

Northfield, MN, US

1,351 tons

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Airhive

Direct air capture

London, UK

943 tons

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