Mantel Capture, a US-based carbon capture technology start-up, has raised $30m in a Series A funding round co-led by the venture capital arms of European oil and gas majors Shell and Eni.
The funding round also saw participation from other investors including Arosa Ventures, bp Ventures, Engine Ventures, Hartree, New Climate Ventures, Newlab, the MCJ Collective and Vale Ventures.
Founded in 2022 by Cameron Halliday, Danielle Rapson and Sean Robertson, Mantel Capture is a spin-out from the Hatton Research Group at MIT's Department of Chemical Engineering.
Following a $2m seed round and participation in the Breakthrough Energy Fellows programme, Mantel has been developing a molten salt-based carbon capture technology.
This is designed to function at the high temperatures of boilers, kilns and furnaces to enable more efficient carbon capture than was previously unattainable.
Carbon capture is a process that involves the collection of CO₂ emissions from large sources such as power plants and industrial facilities.
The CO₂ is then compressed, transported and either utilised in various applications or stored underground, which helps prevent its release into the atmosphere.
The International Energy Agency has estimated that the carbon capture capacities projected for 2030 will only meet 40% of the 2050 Net Zero Emissions target, which aims to capture and store one gigatonne of CO₂ annually.
The Series A funding for Mantel Capture will facilitate the implementation of a demonstration project at an industrial site, a critical step towards the commercial deployment of the company’s high-temperature carbon capture systems.
Mantel's technology has already proven capable of capturing 0.5 tonnes (t) of CO₂ per day at a laboratory scale.
The upcoming industrial project aims to scale this up, with the potential to capture approximately 1,800t of CO₂ emissions per year.
Mantel co-founder and CEO Cameron Halliday said: “With support from both investors and industry leaders, we are eager to showcase the effectiveness of Mantel’s technology across industrial applications and demonstrate its potential to be the lowest-cost pathway to net-zero emissions for our industrial customers.”
Shell Ventures principal Hector MacQuarrie said: “We believe carbon capture and storage offers a way to reduce emissions, especially for hard-to-abate sectors. However, for widespread adoption of carbon capture to be feasible, it must be cost effective.
“Mantel’s innovative solution has the potential to significantly lower carbon capture costs and can be applied across diverse sectors including natural gas power plants and hard-to-abate industries like cement, steel and chemicals.”
Earlier this week, Eni and its partner, the Italian gas grid operator Snam, launched the Ravenna carbon capture, transport and storage project in Italy, marking the beginning of CO₂ injection activities.
