With a market size of $180 billion, ethylene is the world’s most consumed organic chemical, used in the production of textiles, plastics, furniture, and construction materials. However, it has a hefty carbon footprint. By removing fossil fuels from the production of ethylene, French-American carbon transformation startup Dioxycle has the potential to slash CO2 emissions by 800 million tons every year, representing over 2% of the global total.
Dioxycle has recently snapped $17 million in a Series A funding round. The investment was co-led by renowned climate tech investors Lowercarbon Capital (which backed Isometric, Noya and Uncommon) and Breakthrough Energy Ventures, with participation from Gigascale Capital.
The fresh funds propel Dioxycle into an exciting new phase of development towards a first-of-its-kind industrial-emission-busting demonstrator. The company seeks to expand its team, currently composed mostly of PhDs from world-leading institutions, in both Europe and the US.
Dioxycle will also focus on hiring profiles with extensive industrial experience in electrolyzer scale-up and process integration towards the first on-site demonstration of Dioxycle’s technology. Having scaled from lab trials to first electrolyser stacks in 2022, the funding now enable the company to move to first on-site demonstrators and an industrial prototype before preliminary commercialisation within the next five years.
“Given how much our society runs on carbon, CO2 emissions could be considered an incredible resource, but only with a highly efficient CO2-conversion technology to take advantage of them. To this end, we continually asked ourselves how we can push this device to the maximum energy efficiency possible. Now, two and a half years later, we are ready to build an electrolyzer with the carbon-converting capabilities of about 20,000 trees, focused on the production of sustainable ethylene,” said co-founder and CTO David Wakerley.
“Our vision is to become the INTEL Inside of the CCUS industry (Carbon Capture, Utilisation and Storage), the trusted technology provider empowering chemical manufacturers to reinvent chemical processes based on emission recycling rather than fossil fuel extraction. To reach our climate goals, we must disrupt the processes of incumbents instead of re-building the industry from the ground up. Leveraging existing industrial assets will allow us to scale sustainable technologies at the required speed,” added co-founder and CEO, Sarah Lamaison.
Turns CO2 emissions into ethylene
Launched in early 2021 by Sarah Lamaison and David Wakerley, Dioxycle develops an electrolyzer to make a green discount possible. It combines decarbonisation with profitability and aims to trigger fast adoption even in regions with limited carbon reduction incentives.
Dioxycle’s technology holds great appeal as it offers integration into carbon-emitting factories that rely on ethylene as a source material. This unique integration presents a dual advantage for the factory in improving its carbon footprint. Firstly, it facilitates a significant reduction in carbon emissions. Secondly, it reduces the factory’s dependence on third-party suppliers for ethylene, which is conventionally produced using fossil fuels like petroleum derivatives.
Furthermore, besides addressing the carbon footprint associated with the ethylene source material, Dioxycle’s technology also addresses the environmental impact of the typical transformation process.
