Spiritus | Spiritus secures New Mexico facility on Nambé Pueblo land

Spiritus secures New Mexico facility on Nambé Pueblo land

New Mexico direct air capture (DAC) technology company Spiritus announced its first pilot facility Dec. 13. Once it reaches full operational capacity, the facility located on Nambé Pueblo tribal land will be capable of delivering 1,000 tons of gross carbon removal capability.

This follows the company’s recent announcement of Garden One, the company’s first manufacturing site in Lee’s Summit, Missouri.

The New Mexico facility, yet to receive a name, will test the company’s technologies and demonstrate prototypical operation of Spiritus’ full-scale Carbon Orchards.

The company’s flagship Orchard One project, with geological sequestration in Wyoming, will demonstrate the scalability and commercialization of the company’s technology and approach to carbon removal, according to a release.

Spiritus is looking toward scaling up the facilities, like its Wyoming project Orchard One, while potentially pursuing future large-scale projects in New Mexico and beyond, according to Spiritus co-founder and CEO Charles Cadieu.

According to Cadieu, the company needed a facility that could support the next stage of scale, which includes the creation of this pilot of our Carbon Orchard, a prototypical operation that will look and behave like a future full-scale operation.

To achieve a 1,000 ton per year capacity for the orchard, the company needed substantial energy inputs and a facility of the right size, which they could move forward quickly and responsibly.

‍

How the company landed on its new space

The company looked for a space that could support the project for quite some time as their technical team is based in New Mexico.

With the help of the company’s Nambé contacts they found a facility that would be a good fit with the right utilities to achieve the scale the company aspires to.

Following meetings with officials, Nambé officials helped the company move in within a number of weeks, which Cadieu described as “kind of a shocking and amazing thing.”

According to Carlos O. Vigil, Nambé Pueblo Development Corporation president and CEO, the board of directors for the Development Corporation approved the lease agreement, with Spiritus, and it was furthersanctioned by the Nambe Pueblo Tribal Council.

Vigil confirmed the lease terms are $850,000 over six years for warehouse space measuring approximately 10,300 square feet. It sits on an acre of Nambé Pueblo land granted to the Development Corporation, he added.

Cozette Hansen, broker with Santa Fe-based Barker Realty, represented Spiritus in the deal.

Spiritus, according to Cadieu, has 10 individuals working there today, to be scaled in the short term to 20 and in the long term to a headcount of 30 workers, all of which will support operations of the current pilot and future generations of the technology.

From technicians who will run the pilot, to highly experienced engineers and skilled labor and practitioners, many new jobs will contribute to putting the facility in place.

‍

How the technology works, who the customers are

The technology is comprised of a Carbon Orchard on which there are artificial fruit that look a little bit like spheres that sit in the open air collecting CO2.

The company then moves them to desorb, taking CO2 off of the spheres for sequestration, a process where CO2 is put underground.

This is done off-site, but spheres are then readded to it and the process is repeated.

The company has already announced some of the customers they have signed, including Stripe and Shopify, as part of the large Frontier buying conglomerate according to Cadieu, pointing to Google, Meta and JP Morgan Chase Co. as examples

“In fact, we've been with those contracts sold out now for our the first couple years of operation from the Nambé facility. [It’s] nice to have a position where we're already sold out of the production quantities for the next few years,” he said.

The company’s deal with Stripe and Shopify is for about 700 tons, accounting for the majority of the company’s 1,000 tons of gross carbon removal capability in its initial year of operation.

Spiritus has more deals stacking up, accounting for the next year as well, providing needed capital up front to deliver the company’s technology into the future, according to Cadieu.

The company was recently awarded a $50,000 Science and Technology Business Startup Grant from the New Mexico Economic Development Department’s Office of Strategy, Science and Technology (OSST), and $207,636 from New Mexico’s Job Training Incentives Program, or JTIP for four trainees.

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

Carboniferous sinks bundles of leftover sugarcane fiber and corn stover into deep, salty, oxygenless basins in the Gulf of Mexico. The lack of oxygen in these environments–and therefore absence of animals and most microbes–slows the breakdown of biomass so it is efficiently preserved and stored durably in ocean sediments. The team will conduct experiments to determine the functional stability of sunken biomass as well as the interaction with ocean biogeochemistry.

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

Direct air capture

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

Holocene captures CO₂ from air using organic molecules that can be produced at low cost. In the first step of their process, CO₂ is captured from air when it comes into contact with a liquid solution. In the second step, a chemical reaction crystallizes the material as a solid. That solid is heated up to release the CO₂, minimizing energy wasted in heating water. Holocene’s process runs at lower temperatures, further reducing the energy required, increasing energy flexibility, and lowering overall cost.

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

CarbonRun enhances the natural ability of river currents to weather abundant, low-cost limestone and reduce river acidity levels. This benefits river ecosystems locally and enhances the rivers’ ability to capture CO₂ from the atmosphere. Rivers, which are natural carbon transport systems, then deliver CO₂ to the ocean for permanent storage in the form of bicarbonate.

CarbonBlue

Direct ocean removal

Haifa, Israel

400 tons

CarbonBlue uses calcium in a closed-loop cycle to mineralize, separate, and remove dissolved CO₂ from water. This results in a pure stream of CO₂ that can be durably sequestered. Their approach can operate in freshwater or saltwater and can rely on waste heat for the regeneration process. The team plans to integrate with desalination plants and other water-withdrawing industries, reducing energy usage and costs.

Carbon Atlantis

Direct air capture

Munich, Germany

275 tons

Carbon Atlantis is using a process known as electrochemical pH-swing. Their system uses a solvent to capture CO₂ and an acid to release it. This approach is inspired by recent innovation in Proton Exchange Membrane fuel cells and electrolyzers, making the process both cost-effective and energy-efficient. The CO₂ is then run through

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

Alkali Earth uses alkaline byproducts from industrial processes as carbon-removing gravel to apply to roads. These minerals act as a sink for atmospheric CO₂, storing it permanently while cementing road surfaces. The formation of CO₂-containing minerals within the gravel can be directly measured, leading to high-confidence in resulting removals.

Airhive

Direct air capture

London, UK

943 tons

Airhive is building a geochemical direct air capture system using a sorbent that can be made out of cheap and abundant minerals. This sorbent reacts rapidly with atmospheric CO₂ when mixed with air in Airhive’s fluidized bed reactor. Coupled with a regeneration process that’s powered by electricity to release the CO₂ for geologic storage, this provides a promising approach to low-cost DAC.