A Camarillo, California-based biofuel startup that is making hydrocarbon fuel from cellulosic plant matter—and then returning the excess carbon to the soil for sequestration— has attracted interest from major industry players in a C round of investment.
Cool Planet BioFuels, Inc. announced on December 29 that BP Technology Ventures has made an investment in the company's C Round, along with follow-on capital infusions by the company's current investors, General Electric, Google Ventures, ConocoPhillips, NRG Energy, and North Bridge Venture Partners. The C Round was led by Shea Ventures of Walnut, California. The amount of funding was not disclosedCool Planet BioFuels is developing bio based renewable, reduced-carbon gasoline that is chemically indistinguishable from a crude-oil-derived product—and that that can be blended with conventional gasoline and used in today's vehicles.
The biofuel company expects to deploy hundreds of relatively low-cost modular plants nationwide in the United States in the next few years, to make effective use of available biomass without incurring high transportation costs. Cool Planet's Energy Systems Division plans to mass produce these plants on a production line basis.
Cool Planet says it develops “revolutionary negative-carbon N100 fuel” by using a proprietary biomass fractionator technology that extracts useful hydrocarbons from biomass, leaving behind the excess carbon as a high-purity solid.
The process generates activated carbon with a very high surface area, which will allow it to be used as a soil enhancer similar to "terra preta"— a type of very dark, fertile anthropogenic soil found in the Amazon Basin. By burying this carbon in an appropriate manner, Cool Planet claims that it “can greatly enhance soil fertility, while sequestering carbon for hundreds of years.” The clean coal strategy to inject CO2 underground simply puts back the carbon released by burning coal.
In contrast, the company notes, normal plant decomposition occurs in just a few years, releasing the plant's carbon as CO2 and even more harmful methane gas.
Cool Planet touts the advantages of its biofuel over solar, wind, and hydro power, which do not contribute any new carbon to—but also don’t remove any carbon from—the atmosphere. What’s more, it trumps traditional ethanol and biodiesel, which emit most of their excess carbon to the atmosphere, making those fuels carbon neutral, at best.
In addition to BP and ConocoPhillips, the company says several other energy players are in the process of testing and evaluating Cool Planet's fuel, with very good results to date. The company expects to announce strategic relationships with more firms throughout 2012.
The company completed its B Round financing in the spring of 2011 and has pulled in its C Round a year ahead of schedule, in order to accelerate the development of its modular fuel production plants. The terms of the B round also were not disclosed, but Cool Planet had raised $8 million in 2010 from GE and North Bridge.
Cheryl Kaften is an accomplished communicator who has written for consumer and corporate audiences. She has worked extensively for MasterCard (News - Alert) Worldwide, Philip Morris USA (Altria), and KPMG, and has consulted for Estee Lauder and the Philadelphia Inquirer Newspapers. To read more of her articles, please visit her columnist page.Edited by
Rich Steeves
