A Houston company using biotechnology processes to convert carbon dioxide into usable products hit a landmark milestone with the opening of a pilot plant for its technology.
Cemvita said April 12 it opened its eCO2 Process Innovation Center, or EPIC, in Houston. The plant is producing the company’s eCO2 Oil, an alternative to soybean oil that is being shipped to plastics manufacturers and renewable fuels companies. Cemvita CEO Moji Karimi, who co-founded the company with his sister, Tara, said the plant was the most cost-effective way to produce chemical feedstocks.
“It’s an ambitious first step in providing heavy industry customers with climate-positive alternatives,” Karimi said in a statement. “We’re making it possible for our partners to take part in the energy transition and reach decarbonization goals — without cutting into margin.”
The plant is located at Cemvita's corporate offices in the Texas Technology Park at 9350 Kirby Drive. The facility boasts a production capacity of 55,000 liters and is about 600 square feet.
The eCO2 platform, which is capable of operating in existing petrochemical plants, uses engineered microbes that absorb carbon dioxide and convert the gas into finished products. Lab tests showed the carbon dioxide products were competitive with existing hydrocarbon-sourced ethylene processes. Cemvita’s processes are based on research by Tara Karimi, and the pilot plant will cycle through several different test technologies to see which are viable for commercial scaling.
According to Cemvita officials, the plant can capture carbon dioxide emissions either at a point-source level, such as flue gas from a refinery, or at a bulk-source level from a pipeline. Cemvita has a laboratory with a library of microbes that can be tailored to create specific offtake products for customers.
In 2021, Cemvita and Oxy Low Carbon Ventures — the venture arm of Houston-based Occidental Petroleum Corp. (NYSE: OXY) — announced their intent to build a facility as part of Oxy’s plans to expand into carbon management. However, Cemvita clarified the pilot plant opening April 12 was separate from Oxy's venture, which will involve bioethylene.
While the pilot plant was under development, Cemvita hit several other milestones. The company’s carbon dioxide technologies earned Cemvita a spot in the 2021 Carbon to Value Initiative, an accelerator focused on carbon tech. Cemvita was also named as an inaugural cohort member of Somerville, Massachusetts-based Greentown Labs’ Houston location, which also opened in 2021.
Cemvita also has made progress with airline companies exploring sustainable airline fuel technologies. United Airlines Ventures, the venture arm of Chicago-based United Airlines (NYSE: UAL), invested an initial $5 million into Cemvita’s technology in March 2022.
Other applications of Cemvita’s microbes include mining and hydrogen production. The company opened a Denver-area lab to develop organisms that can separate minerals and materials from mined rock. Cemvita also completed a field study in October 2022 that produced carbon-neutral hydrogen from a depleted Permian Basin well at $1 per kilogram.
A 2022 report by the International Energy Agency found the use of vegetable oil for biofuel production is already rising, with a projected increase of 46%, or 54 million tonnes, from 2022 to 2027. Biofuels are especially targeted for marine, aviation and heavy trucking applications because few alternatives currently exist, the Paris-based intergovernmental agency's report said.
