The Biden administration is keeping mum about who has applied for a $3.5 billion program to vacuum up carbon dioxide at scale, with only two projects confirming that they have submitted applications.

The US Energy Department recently closed applications for the first $1.2 billion of the grant program to commercialize direct air capture, a nascent technology that pulls CO₂ from ambient air. The program, authorized by the bipartisan infrastructure law of 2021, aims to support four regional "hubs" or networks for the capture, transport and storage of CO₂.

The DOE declined to share details about the applications received, but stakeholders in a handful of projects have teased their interest in the bipartisan infrastructure law program.

Oil-rich regions eye new opportunities

One confirmed applicant, Battelle Memorial Institute Inc., plans to deploy renewable-powered direct air capture in southwest Louisiana, with underground CO₂ storage services provided by Gulf Coast Sequestration LLC. The nonprofit said March 16 that it submitted an application for the hub, called Project Cypress, in partnership with technology developers Climeworks AG and Heirloom Carbon Technologies Inc.

Climeworks began operations in 2021 at the world's first commercial direct air capture plant, which runs on geothermal energy in Iceland to fan CO₂ from the air. In November 2022, the Swiss company signed a memorandum of understanding with Gulf Coast Sequestration to bring its technology to Louisiana.

Unlike Climeworks' technology, Heirloom uses limestone to pull CO₂ from the air before breaking the stone down in a kiln, separating the gas from the waste rock.

The tech-led Gulf Coast project is not the only group hoping to deploy direct air capture in a traditionally oil-producing region. In February, a California Resources Corp. subsidiary and the Electric Power Research Institute said they would seek DOE funding to capture and store CO₂ near Bakersfield, Calif., with the support of about three dozen organizations, including the utilities Pacific Gas and Electric Co. and Southern California Gas Co.

And General Electric Co.'s research arm on March 21 said it planned to put more resources into direct air capture in 2024, following the successful demonstration of its first lab prototype. GE confirmed it is seeking funding from the DOE's $3.5 billion program.

"If we do this right, we could have a commercially deployable [direct air capture] solution around the end of this decade," said David Moore, a research team leader with GE.

Other companies have committed their own funds to develop direct air capture in the US.

Occidental Petroleum Corp. is the furthest along, with the construction of a $1.1 billion direct air capture plant underway in the Permian Basin. In a February earnings call, Occidental executives did not rule out that the company was applying for federal funds, but declined to speak in detail.

Another direct air capture plant in the pipeline is CarbonCapture Inc.'s Project Bison in Wyoming, announced in 2022, with plans to capture 5 million metric tons of CO₂ annually. CarbonCapture declined to comment when asked whether the company had applied for the federal funds.

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