Commercial, Energy Efficiency, GHG Emissions  -  August 15, 2023

DOE Funds Study for California Direct Air Capture Project

The U.S. Department of Energy announced it funded a feasibility study for a regional direct air capture (DAC) hub at the Belridge oil field in Kern County, California. 

The DOE chose Aera Federal LLC to begin award negotiations worth $4.5 million.

The feasibility study will be funded mostly by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and partly by Aera Federal LLC, a subsidiary of Aera Energy LLC, a federal government contractor in the renewable energy space. 

“The announcement marks a significant milestone,” said Aera Energy President and CEO Erik Bartsch in a statement. “By integrating technologies like DAC with existing assets on the ground and other decarbonizing facilities to come, we can make real progress toward achieving California’s carbon neutrality goals while creating new jobs and opportunities in Kern County.”

Aera Federal will serve as the lead on the Aera DAC Hub – Kern project. Battelle will act as a key partner due to their emerging decarbonization and climate resilience programs and its program in commercial deployment of Carbon Capture and Storage. The two entities, along with partners Mosaic Materials and Carbon Capture, will work with the Department of Energy to bring the proposed DAC hub closer to being operational.

The Aera DAC Hub – Kern project will capture carbon emissions from the atmosphere and transport and store them at Aera’s sequestration site. 

The feasibility study will help establish the viability of DAC as a business and technology for large-scale California decarbonization, as well as identify optimal pathways, technologies, and partners to scale DAC to help meet California and global climate goals.

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