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Houston methane leak detection startup gets green light from Chevron

ready to grow

Currently, methane leak detection requires human evaluation. With this innovative new company's tech, this process can be automated. Photo via Getty Images

A Houston startup that is developing a technology to detect methane leaks has moved on to phase two in Chevron's unique business accelerator.

Aquanta Vision Technologies, a Houston-based climate-tech startup, was selected to participate in the scale-up phase of Chevron Studio, a Houston program that matches entrepreneurs with technologies to turn them into businesses. Aquanta's computer vision software completely automates the identification of methane in optical gas imaging, or OGI. The technology originated from Colorado State University and CSU STRATA Technology Transfer.

Babur Ozden, a tech startup entrepreneur, along with Marcus Martinez, the lead inventor and Dan Zimmerle, co-inventor and director of METEC at CSU Energy Institute, came up with the technology to identify the presence and motion of methane in live video streams. Currently, this process of identifying methane requires a human camera operator to interpret the images. This can often be unreliable in the collection of emissions data.

Aquanta’s technology requires no human intervention and is universally compatible with all OGI cameras. Currently, only about 10 percent of the 20.5 million surveys done worldwide use this type of technology as it is extremely expensive to produce. Ozden said he hopes Aquanta will change that model.

“What we are doing — we are democratizing this feature, this capability, independent of the camera make and model,” Ozden tells EnergyCapital.

Aquanta’s software will be downloadable from App stores to the technician’s computers or phones.

“Our goal is to eliminate the absolute reliance of human interpretation and to give operators a chance to make detections faster and more accurately,” Ozden says.

“Our ultimate ambition is to reduce our footprint.” he continues. “Companies like Chevron and other leading players in the oil and gas industry are becoming much more committed (to reducing emissions)."

Babur Ozden is the founder of Aquanta Vision. Photo via LinkedIn

Aquanta will now test its software under various scenarios and develop an early commercial version of the product. In the next and final phase of the program, the company will begin marketing the technology for commercial use.

The goal of Chevron Studio is to take innovative new technologies out of the labs at universities and to scale them up to commercial ventures. The company takes the intellectual property developed at these labs and provides a platform to match entrepreneurs with the technology. The program provides funding to take the technologies from the very beginning to pilot and field trials. The National Renewable Energy Laboratory, or NREL, manages Chevron Studio and works closely with the entrepreneurs to guide them through the program.

Gautam Phanse, the strategic relations manager for Chevron Technology Ventures says he was impressed with Ozden’s background as an entrepreneur and in the technology he brought to the table.

“We are looking at experienced entrepreneurs. People who can take an idea and stand on their own and develop it into a business,” he tells EnergyCapital.

Earlier this year, Phanse spoke to InnovationMap about Chevron Studio and its mission to match entrepreneurs with promising technologies coming out of universities and labs. He said the current focus areas for Chevron Studio are: carbon utilization, hydrogen and renewable energy, energy storage systems and solutions for circular economy.

Gautam Phanse of Chevron Technology Ventures answers questions about this unique program. Photo courtesy

Q&A: Chevron's unique clean energy studio role in Houston entrepreneur community

matchmaking innovation

A new program from Houston-based Chevron Technology Ventures is rethinking how best to commercialize research-based technology.

This spring, Chevron Studio announced its second cohort of its program that matches entrepreneurs with promising technologies coming out of universities and labs. The overall goal of the studio — a collaboration between Chevron and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, or NREL — is to scale up and commercialize early-stage technologies that have the potential to impact the future of energy.

Once selected, there are three phases of the program. After the entrepreneur applications closed in March, the first step was matching the selected entrepreneurs with the inventors of the selected intellectual properties, which will occurs over three to four months. The next phase includes scaling up the product — something that will take one to two years, depending on the tech. The last step would be a trial or a pilot program that includes rolling out a minimum viable product at commercial scale at Chevron or an affiliate. The next cohort application period will open next month.

Gautam Phanse is the strategic relationship manager for Chevron Technology Ventures. He joins InnovationMap for a Q&A to explain more about the opportunity.

What types of technologies is Chevron looking to bring into commercialization through this program? How is the program different from existing accelerators/incubators/etc.?

Gautam Phanse: Chevron Technology Ventures brings external innovation to Chevron. Key focus areas for CTV are industrial decarbonization, emerging mobility, energy decentralization, and the growing circular carbon economy. Chevron Studio is one of the tools to achieve this goal. The current focus areas for Chevron Studio are: carbon utilization, hydrogen and renewable energy, energy storage systems, and solutions for circular economy. These focus areas will be reviewed every year and additional areas could be brought into the mix.

The goal of Chevron Studio is to scale up and commercialize technology developed in the Universities and National Labs. We curate the intellectual property developed at universities and national labs and provide a platform to match entrepreneurs with the IP. The program provides seed funding and a pathway through incubation, pilot and field trials to scale up the technologies. The uniqueness of this program is its target and the breadth of its scope — all the way from incubation to field trials.

How does Chevron Technology Ventures and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory collaborate on this project? What role does each entity play?

GP: CTV has a long history of supporting innovation and the startup community. And over the years we’ve seen the consistent gaps and the struggles that the startup companies have in scaling up technologies. We also have a long history of working with national labs and universities and have seen the challenges in getting these technologies out of the labs. The idea for Chevron Studio grew out of these challenges.

NREL’s Innovation and Entrepreneurship Center manages Chevron Studio, working closing with entrepreneurs and guiding them through the program while leveraging capabilities at the lab and activating the IEC’s network of cleantech startups, investors, foundations, and industry partners.

What are you looking for from the entrepreneur applicants? Who should apply?

GP: We are looking for entrepreneurs who are seeking their next opportunity. They should have a passion in lower carbon solutions and the patience to work on early-stage technologies to see them through scale up and commercialization. Aspiring entrepreneurs with demonstrated passion are also welcome to apply. The entrepreneurs are expected to build a team, raise funds and grow the business providing competitive solutions to the industry.

Tell me about cohort 1. How did it go and what were the participants able to accomplish?

GP: We were really excited about the response we got from both the entrepreneur community and the universities and national labs. We had a strong pool of entrepreneurs and a great mix of IP and frankly had a tough time making the selection. The first cohort had four entrepreneurs in the initial discovery phase. Some of them have now graduated, and we will be announcing the participants in the next phase — for scaling up — shortly.

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This conversation has been edited for brevity and clarity. This article originally ran on InnovationMap.

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Houston scientists develop 'recharge-to-recycle' reactor for lithium-ion batteries

reduce, recharge, recycle

Engineers at Rice University have developed a cleaner, innovative process to turn end-of-life lithium-ion battery waste into new lithium feedstock.

The findings, recently published in the journal Joule, demonstrate how the team’s new “recharge-to-recycle” reactor recharges the battery’s waste cathode materials to coax out lithium ions into water. The team was then able to form high-purity lithium hydroxide, which was clean enough to feed directly back into battery manufacturing.

The study has major implications for the electric vehicle sector, which significantly contributes to the waste stream from end-of-life battery packs. Additionally, lithium tends to be expensive to mine and refine, and current recycling methods are energy- and chemical-intensive.

“Directly producing high-purity lithium hydroxide shortens the path back into new batteries,” Haotian Wang, associate professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering, co-corresponding author of the study and co-founder of Solidec, said in a news release. “That means fewer processing steps, lower waste and a more resilient supply chain.”

Sibani Lisa Biswal, chair of Rice’s Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering and the William M. McCardell Professor in Chemical Engineering, also served as co-corresponding author on the study.

“We asked a basic question: If charging a battery pulls lithium out of a cathode, why not use that same reaction to recycle?” Biswal added in the release. “By pairing that chemistry with a compact electrochemical reactor, we can separate lithium cleanly and produce the exact salt manufacturers want.”

The new process also showed scalability, according to Rice. The engineers scaled the device to 20 square centimeters, then ran a 1,000-hour stability test and processed 57 grams of industrial black mass supplied by industry partner Houston-based TotalEnergies. The results produced lithium hydroxide that was more than 99 percent pure. It also maintained an average lithium recovery rate of nearly 90 percent over the 1,000-hour test, showing its durability. The process also worked across multiple battery chemistries, including lithium iron phosphate, lithium manganese oxide and nickel-manganese-cobalt variants.

Looking ahead, the team plans to scale the process and consider ways it can sustain high efficiency for greater lithium hydroxide concentrations.

“We’ve made lithium extraction cleaner and simpler,” Biswal added in the release. “Now we see the next bottleneck clearly. Tackle concentration, and you unlock even better sustainability.

Houston grid's $2.9 billion upgrade tops energy news to know

Trending Topics

Editor's note: It's time to look back at the top energy transition news in recent weeks. Here are the five most-read EnergyCapitalHTX stories from November 16-30:

1. CenterPoint gets go-ahead for $2.9B upgrade of Houston grid

CenterPoint customers in the Houston area will pay an extra $1 a month to cover costs of the recently approved $2.9 billion resiliency plan starting next year. Photo via centerpointenergy.com

Texas utility regulators have given the green light for Houston-based CenterPoint Energy to spend $2.9 billion on strengthening its Houston-area electric grid to better withstand extreme weather. The cost of the plan is nearly $3 billion below what CenterPoint initially proposed to the Public Utility Commission of Texas. Continue reading.

2. Houston company wins contract to operate South Texas wind farm

Houston-based CAMS will operate the Mesteño Wind Project, which is home to one of the tallest wind turbine installations in the U.S. Photo via Unsplash.

Houston-based Consolidated Asset Management Services (CAMS), which provides services for owners of energy infrastructure, has added the owner of a South Texas wind power project to its customer list. The new customer, InfraRed Capital Partners, owns the 202-megawatt Mesteño Wind Project in the Rio Grande Valley. Continue reading.

3. Google's $40B investment in Texas data centers includes energy infrastructure

Google is investing in Texas. Courtesy of Google

Google is investing a huge chunk of money in Texas: According to a release, the company will invest $40 billion on cloud and artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure, with the development of new data centers in Armstrong and Haskell counties. The company announced its intentions at a meeting on November 14 attended by federal, state, and local leaders including Gov. Greg Abbott who called it "a Texas-sized investment." Continue reading.

4. Chevron and ExxonMobil feed the need for gas-powered data centers

Chevron plans to launch its first AI data center power project in West Texas in 2027. Photo via Chevron.com

Two of the Houston area’s oil and gas goliaths, Chevron and ExxonMobil, are duking it out in the emerging market for natural gas-powered data centers—centers that would ease the burden on electric grids. Chevron said it’s negotiating with an unnamed company to supply natural gas-generated power for the data center industry, whose energy consumption is soaring mostly due to AI. Continue reading.

5. Solidec partners with Australian company for clean hydrogen peroxide pilot​

Houston-based Solidec has partnered with Lynas Rare Earth on a clean hydrogen peroxide production pilot in Australia. Photo courtesy Greentown Labs.

Solidec has partnered with Australia-based Lynas Rare Earth, an environmentally responsible producer of rare earth oxides and materials, to reduce emissions from hydrogen peroxide production. The partnership marks a milestone for the Houston-based clean chemical manufacturing startup, as it would allow the company to accelerate the commercialization of its hydrogen peroxide generation technology. Continue reading.

DOE taps Texas companies for $56M in Strategic Petroleum Reserve deliveries

reserve refill

Two companies with ties to the Houston area have been awarded federal contracts totaling nearly $55.8 million to supply about 1 million barrels of crude oil for the nation’s depleted Strategic Petroleum Reserve.

Houston-based Trafigura Trading will provide two-thirds of the oil, and Dallas-based Energy Transfer Crude Marketing will provide the remaining one-third. Energy Transfer, the parent company of Energy Transfer Crude Marketing, operates a 330-acre oil terminal at the Houston Ship Channel.

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), which awarded the contracts, said Trafigura and Energy Transfer will deliver the crude oil from Dec. 1 through Jan. 31 to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve’s Bryan Mound storage site near Freeport.

The Strategic Petroleum Reserve, the world’s largest emergency supply of crude oil, can hold up to 714 million barrels of crude oil across 61 underground salt caverns at four sites along the Gulf Coast. The reserve currently contains 410 million barrels of crude oil. During the pandemic, the Biden administration ordered a 180 million-barrel drawdown from the reserve to help combat high gas prices triggered by Russia’s war with Ukraine.

The four strategic reserve sites are connected to 24 Gulf Coast refineries, and another six refineries in Kentucky, Michigan and Ohio.

“Awarding these contracts marks another step in the important process of refilling this national security asset,” U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright said.

In March, Wright estimated it would take $20 billion and many years to fill the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to its maximum capacity, according to Reuters

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