Sacramento clean energy technology company Infinium has raised a new $69 million round of venture investment for its electric-derived replacement for petroleum-based transportation fuel.
Lead investors in the new round include NextEra Energy Resources LLC, the world’s largest renewable energy company, and Amazon’s Climate Pledge Fund.
“We’re super excited going forward with new partners,” CEO Robert Schuetzle told the Business Journal. “The level of interest in decarbonization is significant and increasing.”
NextEra, based in Juno Beach, Florida, is a new investor. Amazon.com Inc. (Nasdaq: AMZN) invested in an initial round into the startup company in January.
That first investment round, the amount of which was not disclosed, also included investments from Tokyo-based Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd., London-based venture capital firm AP Ventures LLP, Aachen, Germany-based industrial pump manufacturer Neuman & Esser Group and the Boston-based Grantham Environmental Trust.
Mitsubishi and AP Ventures also invested in the new round, as well as new investors 8090 Partners LLC, based in New York, and Singapore-based VC fund Pavilion Capital.
Infinium is commercializing a process that uses renewable electricity to release hydrogen from water, and mix the hydrogen with waste carbon dioxide to make synthetic gas.
The fuel made in the company's process can be used as a drop-in replacement for diesel fuel in existing trucks and ships, as well as for jet fuel.
Amazon sees the “electrofuel” as a way to meet its own internal goal to be net-carbon-zero by 2040, Schuetzle said. The Seattle-based e-commerce giant is using many strategies to meet its goal, including electric truck fleets. The electrofuel is seen as a replacement for the fuel used in cargo planes.
“We built Infinium to bring ultra-low carbon fuels known as electrofuels to the transportation sector as quickly as possible,” Schuetzle said in a news release. “The confidence our investment partners have placed in us reinforces the urgency we all feel to help mitigate the potentially catastrophic effects of climate change, and we are incredibly excited to bring electrofuels to market.”
The new funding will be used primarily to complete the development of large-scale facilities in Europe that can each generate nearly 40 million gallons of fuel annually for commercial transportation. Schuetzle said Infinium will be announcing details of its first plants later this year. He said the company will also need to raise more money to continue deploying its technology on a larger scale.
Schuetzle is also CEO of Greyrock Energy in Sacramento, which has developed and deployed technology to convert oil field flare gas into a stable diesel fuel.
Infinium launched in November last year to commercialize a similar technology to make transportation fuel at the source of electricity and waste carbon dioxide.
The company is starting with sites in Europe, which have ready access to renewable electricity and waste carbon dioxide, often from industrial facilities.
“Amazon sees significant opportunity in Infinium’s Electrofuels technology, which has the potential to help decarbonize some of the key forms of transportation we use, including air, freight and heavy trucks,” said Kara Hurst, Amazon vice president and head of worldwide sustainability, in a news release.
“We’re excited about the potential to leverage renewable energy to produce low-carbon electrofuels that will help drive decarbonization of the transportation sector,” NextEra Energy CEO John Ketchum said. “This investment is consistent with our strategy to help lead the decarbonization of the transportation, electricity and industrial sectors in the U.S.”
Infinium is one of a cluster of clean energy companies that have been developing green technologies for over a decade in the Sacramento area.
