Climeworks

Climeworks AG is a Swiss company specializing in direct air capture (DAC) technology. The company filters directly from the ambient air through an adsorption-desorption process. At its first commercial direct air capture and storage plant, Orca, in Hellisheidi, Iceland, the air-captured CO2 is handed over to storage partner Carbfix, who injects it deep underground where it mineralizes and turns into stone. Climeworks's machines are powered by renewable energy or energy-from-waste, with a carbon dioxide re-emission rate of less than 10%.

The company was founded in 2009 by mechanical engineers Dr. Christoph Gebald and Dr. Jan Wurzbacher, who lead the company as co-CEOs. Climeworks has put more than 15 direct air capture plants into operation all over Europe. In Iceland, Climeworks operates a large-scale direct air capture and storage plant named 'Orca,' which is designed to remove carbon dioxide from the air permanently. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), carbon removal technologies are necessary to mitigate climate change. The IPCC’s modeled pathways show that to limit global warming to 1.5 °C with no or limited overshoot it would require up to 310 billion tons of direct air capture and storage by 2100.

To contribute to the standardization and scale-up of high-quality, permanent removals, In September 2022, Climeworks and Carbfix introduced a comprehensive methodology dedicated to carbon dioxide removal through direct air capture and underground mineralization storage. This methodology has been validated by the independent quality and assurance leader DNV. It provides the requirements for stringent standards by which measurement and reporting of Climeworks' carbon dioxide removal and Carbfix‘s permanent mineralization can be third-party verified.

History
Climeworks was founded in 2009 by the mechanical engineers Jan Wurzbacher and Christoph Gebald. During their PhDs at the ETH Zurich, the two founders conducted research on direct air capture technology to remove carbon dioxide from the air. Based on that scientific research, Climeworks was founded as a spin-off from ETH Zurich. In 2011, Climeworks received capital from investors for the first time to develop a prototype with a modular structure. The company was able to evolve its technology from laboratory to commercial scale, presenting the first concept of a modular CO2 collector and a working prototype in 2014. Since then, rapid scaling has led to their present modular technology. In September 2021, Climeworks launched a large-scale direct air capture and storage plant named “Orca” in Iceland.

During the company’s development, a partnership was formed with the automaker Audi. Further support was provided by the Swiss Federal Office of Energy, which enabled the accelerated commercialization and scaling of the technology. Climeworks is part of several European research and development projects. This includes the production of synthetic fuels from CO2. In 2018, Climeworks raised $30.8 million in a financing round and in the summer of 2020, the Swiss company raised $110 million. In April 2022, Climeworks secured $650 million in an equity funding round, marking a significant fundraising achievement in the carbon dioxide removal industry. The funding round has classified Climeworks as a 'unicorn' startup, a term used for startups valued at over $1 billion.

On 20 July 2021, the Swiss and Icelandic governments agreed to jointly develop “negative emission technologies” which involve extracting CO2 from the atmosphere and storing it underground using Climeworks and CarbFix (CO2-to-stone) technologies.

The corporate offices of Climeworks AG are in Zürich and a German subsidiary Climeworks Deutschland GmbH opened in Cologne in 2019. As of January 2023, the company has over 300 employees internationally. Climeworks was among Fast Company's "World's Most Innovative Companies of 2024."

Projects
In May 2017, the company opened a commercial direct air capture plant in Hinwil, Switzerland, designed to filter CO2 from ambient air. It consisted of 18 collector containers that together had a nominal capture capacity of 900 tons of CO2 per year. The plant was installed on the roof of a waste incineration facility that provided waste heat to power the machines. The CO2 that the plant captured was sold to a nearby greenhouse operator for use as fertilizer and to Coca-Cola HBC to produce the sparkling water Valser. The Hinwil facility stopped its operations in October 2022, as Climeworks pivoted from selling CO2 to storing the greenhouse gas permanently underground.

In October 2017, the demo project “CarbFix2” followed. As part of the Horizon 2020 research project, the CarbFix2 project at the Hellisheiði Power Station in Iceland filtered CO2 from the air with Climeworks technology, which was then stored underground in Iceland’s basaltic rock, where it mineralizes. The combination of direct air capture and storage of CO2 is a form of carbon dioxide removal, which produces negative emissions.

In September 2021, Climeworks launched “Orca”, a large direct air capture and storage facility, with a nominal capture capacity of up to 4,000 tons of CO2 per year.

Like the pilot project CarbFix2, the operating facility is located near the Hellisheiði Power Station, which provides geothermal energy to run the Orca plant, and the air-captured CO2 is stored underground by Climeworks’ storage partner Carbfix.

In June 2021, Climeworks began the construction of Mammoth, its largest direct air capture and storage facility to date, located in Hellisheioi, Iceland. This plant, which started operations on May 8, 2024, is the 18th project undertaken by Climeworks and its second facility designed for commercial direct air capture and storage. Utilizing direct air capture (DAC) technology and Iceland's geothermal energy, Mammoth has the capacity to capture up to 36,000 tons of CO₂ annually. The construction period for Mammoth was projected to be between 18 and 24 months. The CO₂ captured at this facility is mineralized and stored underground in basalt formations through a collaboration with Carbfix. Although the facility has a substantial capacity, it captures less CO₂ than what is emitted annually by 8,000 average US cars, underscoring the challenges faced in scaling carbon capture technology. Mammoth is part of Climeworks' broader strategy to significantly increase its carbon capture capacity by the 2030s and achieve gigaton capacity by 2050.

Commercialization
Climeworks operates commercial direct air capture facilities and provides carbon dioxide removal services to both companies and individuals. Its carbon dioxide removal service received a 5/5-star rating in the CarbonPlan database.

In June 2021, Climeworks and DNV developed and validated a new methodology focusing on direct air capture, marking a step towards full third-party certification.

Several corporations have already purchased Climeworks’ carbon dioxide removal, including Stripe, Microsoft, Swiss Re, and BCG. As of February 2023, the number of individuals who have subscribed to Climeworks’ carbon dioxide removal service exceeds 18’000. While several companies, including Carbon Engineering and Global Thermostat, are developing direct air capture systems, Climeworks has made significant progress in commercialization.

The cost of carbon dioxide removal via direct air capture and storage as offered by Climeworks is relatively high (around $1000 per ton of CO2 for small quantities). However, as more governments and companies invest in direct air capture, the technology can be scaled up which will lead to a reduction in the costs, a development pattern similar to photovoltaics.