Driverless semis traveling from Dallas to Houston — originally expected to launch this year — have been put in park until April. Photo courtesy of Aurora

Autonomous truck company Aurora Innovation says it won't start hauling freight without humans on board until April of next year, a delay from previous statements that commercial service would begin by the end of 2024.

The Pittsburgh company on Wednesday said the April launch of driverless semis traveling from Dallas to Houston — originally announced last year — will be “modestly later” than the company had intended.

The company told investors on its third-quarter earnings conference call that it has made progress toward ensuring its trucks will operate safely.

Remaining obstacles are “primarily in the areas of some elements of surface street driving and some elements of construction that we see on the freeway,” CEO Chris Urmson said. “We want to have extremely high confidence in the system as we as we go forward.”

The company will start with about 10 autonomous tractor-trailers and move to “tens” of trucks by the end of next year, Urmson said.

“This shift to our timeline will have a negligible financial impact and does not affect our scaling efforts on our path to self-funding," Urmson said.

Aurora also intends to haul freight without human drivers from Fort Worth, Texas, to Phoenix later in 2025, Urmson said.

Aurora in August added nearly $500 million to its balance sheet with a capital raise in August, which the company expects to fund the initial phases of its strategy to scale up driverless trucking.

Texas is one step closer to seeing a Houston-to-Dallas driverless truck route on I-45. Photo courtesy of Aurora

Self-driving trucking facility opens in Houston, readies for 2024 launch in Texas

autonomous freight

Houston is emerging as a major player in the evolution of self-driving freight trucks.

In October, Aurora Innovation opened a more than 90,000-square-foot terminal at a Fallbrook Drive logistics hub in northwest Houston to support the launch of its first “lane” for driverless trucks — a Houston-to-Dallas route on I-45. Aurora opened its Dallas-area terminal in April.

Close to half of truck freight in Texas moves along I-45 between Houston and Dallas.

“With this corridor’s launch, we’ve defined, refined, and validated the framework for the expansion of our network with the largest partner ecosystem in the autonomous trucking industry,” Sterling Anderson, co-founder and chief product officer at Pittsburgh-based Aurora, says in a news release.

Aurora produces software that controls autonomous vehicles. The software is installed in trucks from Paccar, whose brands include Kenworth and Peterbilt, and Volvo.

Anderson says its Houston and Dallas terminals came online well ahead of its scheduled launch of driverless trucks between the two cities. The terminals house, maintain, and inspect autonomous trucks.

Aurora currently hauls more than 75 loads per week (under the supervision of vehicle operators) from Houston to Dallas and Fort Worth to El Paso. The company’s customers in its pilot project include FedEx, Uber Freight, and Werner.

“We are on track to launch commercial operations at the end of 2024, with Dallas to Houston serving as our first commercial route,” the company says.

In July, Aurora said it raised $820 million in capital to fuel its growth — growth that’s being accompanied by scrutiny. Self-driving taxi service, Cruise, which recently launched in Houston, has put it in park for the time being.

In light of recent controversies surrounding self-driving vehicles, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, whose union members include over-the-road truckers, recently sent a letter to Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick calling for a ban on autonomous vehicles in Texas.

“The Teamsters believe that a human operator is needed in every vehicle — and that goes beyond partisan politics,” the letter states. “State legislators have a solemn duty in this matter to keep dangerous autonomous vehicles off our streets and keep Texans safe. Autonomous vehicles are not ready for prime time, and we urge you to act before someone in our community gets killed.”

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Texas energy startup closes $200M round to fund first factory in the state

fresh funding

Base Power, an Austin-based startup that provides battery-powered home energy services and just entered the Houston market, has raised $200 million in series B funding.

The money will help finance the construction of Base Power’s first factory in Texas. A site for the factory hasn’t been announced. The cash will also go toward the national expansion of Base Power’s services.

Andreessen Horowitz, Lightspeed Venture Partners and Valor Equity Partners co-led the round, with participation from existing investors such as Thrive Capital, Altimeter, Terrain, and Trust.

As part of the fundraising, Lee Fixel of Addition and Antonio Gracias of Valor Equity Partners are joining Base Power’s board of directors.

Last year, the startup landed $68 million in a series A funding round.

Base Power, founded in 2023, specializes in developing battery storage for energy that it provides to residential customers. Its partners include homebuilder Lennar and the Bandera Electric Cooperative, which supplies power to customers in seven Hill Country counties. Earlier this year it began serving the Houston-area territory serviced by CenterPoint Energy.

“Our rapid expansion has allowed us to power up thousands of Texans in just a few months, while driving their energy costs down and power reliability up,” Zach Dell, co-founder and CEO of Base Power, says in a news release. “With this investment, we will continue to innovate on new grid solutions, establish our domestic manufacturing capabilities, and accelerate adoption nationally.”

Dell’s father is Austin tech billionaire Michael Dell. He founded the company with Justin Lopas.

Houston cleantech company expands into China with hydrogen energy pilot

going global

Hydrogen-based clean energy technology company HNO International has announced its first foray into the Chinese market.

The company, which is building a state-of-the-art hydrogen production and refueling facility in Katy, has entered into an agreement with renewable energy company Zhuhai Topower New Energy Co., according to a release. This initiative includes a pilot deployment of HNOI’s Scalable Hydrogen Energy Platform, or SHEP, in China.

“Partnering with Zhuhai Topower represents a significant milestone in our mission to expand the global reach of our hydrogen production and refueling solutions,” Don Owens, Chairman and CEO of HNO International, said in the news release.

The collaboration plans to use HNO’s innovative SHEP technology to install hundreds of low-cost modular hydrogen production and refueling infrastructure projects, according to the company. HNO’s SHEP hydrogen energy system is known to require less than 3,000 square feet of space to operate while producing 5,000 kilograms of hydrogen per day.

Both companies plan to set a precedent for scalable and sustainable energy solutions in China.

Zhuhai Topower has investments totaling $340.63 million in new energy holdings for power generation, including a 100-megawatt wind power project and a 50-megawatt photovoltaic power generation project.

“This collaboration not only underscores the versatility of our SHEP technology, but also aligns with our commitment to supporting sustainable energy initiatives worldwide,” Owens added in the news release.

Rice University and UH labs team up to improve emerging carbon capture technique

new findings

A team of researchers led by professors from two Houston universities has discovered new methods that help stabilize an emerging technique known as carbon dioxide reduction reaction, or CO2RR, that is used for carbon capture and utilization processes.

The team led by Rice University’s Haotian Wang, associate professor in chemical and biomolecular engineering, and Xiaonan Shan, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at University of Houston, published its findings in a recent edition of the journal Nature Energy.

CO2RR is an emerging carbon capture and utilization technique where electricity and chemical catalysts are used to convert carbon dioxide gas into carbon-containing compounds like alcohols, ethylene, formic acids or carbon monoxide, according to a news release from Rice. The result can be used as fuels, chemicals or as starting materials to produce other compounds.

The technology is used in commercial membrane electrode assembly (MEA) electrolyzers to convert carbon dioxide into valuable compounds, but the technology isn’t perfected. A significant challenge in CO2RR technology has been the accumulation of bicarbonate salt crystals on the backside of the cathode gas diffusion electrode and within the gas flow channels. The salt precipitates block the flow of carbon dioxide gas through the cathode chamber, which reduce the performance and can cause a failure of the electrolyzers.

The goal in the study was to understand why and how bicarbonate salts form during this reaction. The Rice and UH teams worked together using operando Raman spectroscopy, which is a technique that allows researchers to study the structure of materials and any precipitates that adhere to them while the device is functioning.

“By utilizing operando Raman spectroscopy and optical microscopy, we successfully tracked the movement of bicarbonate-containing droplets and identified their migration pattern,” Shan said in the release. “This provided us the information to develop an effective strategy to manage these droplets without interrupting system stability.”

Next, the team worked to prevent the salt crystals from forming. First, they tested lowering the concentration of cations, like sodium or potassium, in the electrolyte to slow down the salt formation. This method proved to be effective.

They also coated the cathode with parylene, a synthetic polymer that repels water, like Teflon, which also notably improved the stability of the electrolyzer and prevented salt accumulation.

“Inspired by the waxy surface of the lotus leaf which causes water droplets to bead up and roll off, carrying off any dirt particles with it and leaving the leaf’s surface clean, we wondered if coating the gas flow channel with a nonstick substance will prevent salt-laden droplets from staying on the surface of the electrodes for too long and, therefore, reduce salt buildup.” Wang said in the release.

According to Wang, these relatively simple discoveries can extend the operational lifespan of CO2RR systems from a few hundred hours to over 1,000 hours.

The findings also have major implications for commercial applications, Shan added.

“This advancement paves the way for longer-lasting and more reliable (CO2RR) systems, making the technology more practical for large-scale chemical manufacturing,” Shan said in the release. “The improvements we developed are crucial for transitioning CO2 electrolysis from laboratory setups to commercial applications for producing sustainable fuels and chemicals.”