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2 Houston energy leaders bet on carbon capture with recent acquisitions

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Recently, two HETI members announced acquisition and investment into carbon capture businesses. Photo via htxenergytransition.org

CCUS will play a pivotal role in the global energy transition by decarbonizing carbon-intensive industries, including energy, chemicals, cement, and steel. CCUS is one of the few proven technologies to significantly lower net emissions. However, the unique nature of decarbonization presents many complex challenges. With greater funding and growing policy support, the widespread adoption of CCUS technologies is becoming more technically feasible and economically viable than ever before.

Houston, with its existing CCUS infrastructure, large concentration of CCUS expertise, and high storage capacity, is the ideal location to deploy and derisk CCUS projects at unprecedented speed and scale. Recently, two HETI members announced acquisition and investment into carbon capture businesses.

SLB + Aker Carbon Capture (ACC)

SLB, a pioneer in carbon capture technologies, announced an agreement to acquire major ownership in Aker Carbon Capture (ACC), a pure-play carbon capture company. The move combines SLB’s established CCUS business with ACC’s innovative CCUS technology to support accelerated industrial decarbonization at scale.

“For CCUS to have the expected impact on supporting global net-zero ambitions, it will need to scale up 100-200 times in less than three decades,” said Olivier Le Peuch, chief executive officer, SLB. “Crucial to this scale-up is the ability to lower capture costs, which often represent as much as 50-70% of the total spend of a CCUS project. We are excited to create this business with ACC to accelerate the deployment of carbon capture technologies that will shift the economics of carbon capture across high-emitting industrial sectors.”

Chevron New Energies + ION Clean Energy

Chevron New Energies, a division of Chevron U.S.A. Inc., announced a lead investment in ION Clean Energy (ION), which provides post-combustion point-source capture technology through its third-generation ICE-31 liquid amine system. This investment expands and complements Chevron’s growing portfolio of CCUS technologies.

“ION’s solvent technology, combined with Chevron’s assets and capabilities, has the potential to reach numerous emitters and support our ambitions of a lower carbon future,” said Chris Powers, vice president of CCUS & Emerging, Chevron New Energies. “We believe collaborations like this are essential to our efforts to grow carbon capture on a global scale.”

“This investment from Chevron is a huge testament to the hard work of our team and the potential of our technology,” said ION founder and executive chairman Buz Brown. “We appreciate their collaboration and with their investment we expect to accelerate commercial deployment of our technology so that we can realize the kind of wide-ranging commercial and environmental impact we’ve long envisioned.”

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This article originally ran on the Greater Houston Partnership's Houston Energy Transition Initiative blog. HETI exists to support Houston's future as an energy leader. For more information about the Houston Energy Transition Initiative, EnergyCapitalHTX's presenting sponsor, visit htxenergytransition.org.

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Energy Transition and Digital Transformation collide at next week's Can't Miss energy event. Image via Shutterstock.

Can't Miss: Reuter's Data-Driven Oil and Gas Conference

DIGITAL SUSTAINABILITY

June 20-21 | Reuter’s Data-Driven Oil and Gas Conference

Energy Transition and Digital Transformation collide at next week’s Data-Driven Oil and Gas USA 2023 conference from Reuter’s Events. Join leaders in technology as they discuss digital best practices in upstream energy and how to balance going beyond Industry 4.0 with goals for energy sustainability.

“Reuters Events: Data Driven Oil & Gas 2023 will be the space for decision makers to get together to take their business to the next level by overcoming cultural blockers, breaking down silos and exploring innovative technologies to improve the bottom line and maximize output,” says Lee Cibis, global project director for oil and gas at Reuters Events.

With a robust speaker lineup, attendees can expect to hear insightful case studies, lessons learned, and visions for a lower-carbon energy future enabled by digitalization and innovative technologies. Be sure to catch a multi-operator perspective at the Tuesday panel, “One Common Goal,” which appears to echo sentiments from OTC about the importance of partnering, with emphasis on the data interoperability needed from and between vendors and operators alike.

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ExxonMobil pauses plans for $7B hydrogen plant in Baytown

project on pause

As anticipated, Spring-based oil and gas giant ExxonMobil has paused plans to build a low-hydrogen plant in Baytown, Chairman and CEO Darren Woods told Reuters.

“The suspension of the project, which had already experienced delays, reflects a wider slowdown in efforts by traditional oil and gas firms to transition to cleaner energy sources as many of the initiatives struggle to turn a profit,” Reuters reported.

Woods signaled during ExxonMobil’s second-quarter earnings call that the company was weighing whether it would move forward with the proposed $7 billion plant.

The Biden-era Inflation Reduction Act established a 10-year incentive, the 45V tax credit, for production of clean hydrogen. But under President Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act, the period for beginning construction of low-carbon hydrogen projects that qualify for the tax credit has been compressed. The Inflation Reduction Act called for construction to begin by 2033. The Big Beautiful Bill changed the construction start time to early 2028.

“While our project can meet this timeline, we’re concerned about the development of a broader market, which is critical to transition from government incentives,” Woods said during the earnings call.

Woods had said ExxonMobil was figuring out whether a combination of the 45Q tax credit for carbon capture projects and the revised 45V tax credit would enable a broader market for low-carbon hydrogen.

“If we can’t see an eventual path to a market-driven business, we won’t move forward with the [Baytown] project,” Woods told Wall Street analysts.

“We knew that helping to establish a brand-new product and a brand-new market initially driven by government policy would not be easy or advance in a straight line,” he added.

ExxonMobil announced in 2022 that it would build the low-carbon hydrogen plant at its refining and petrochemical complex in Baytown. The company had indicated the plant would start initial production in 2027.

ExxonMobil had said the Baytown plant would produce up to 1 billion cubic feet of hydrogen per day made from natural gas, and capture and store more than 98 percent of the associated carbon dioxide. The plant would have been capable of storing as much as 10 million metric tons of CO2 per year.

Greentown and partners name 10 startups to carbontech accelerator

new cohort

The Carbon to Value Initiative (C2V Initiative)—a collaboration between Greentown Labs, NYU Tandon School of Engineering's Urban Future Lab and Fraunhofer USA—has announced 10 startup participants to join the fifth cohort of its carbontech accelerator.

The six-month accelerator aims to help cleantech startups advance their commercialization efforts through access to the C2V Initiative’s Carbontech Leadership Council (CLC). The invitation-only council consists of corporate and nonprofit leaders from organizations like Shell, TotalEnergies, XPRIZE, L’Oréal and others who “foster commercialization opportunities and identify avenues for technology validation, testing, and demonstration,” according to a release from Greentown

“The No. 1 reason startups engage with Greentown is to find customers, grow their businesses, and accelerate impact—and the Carbon to Value Initiative delivers exactly that,” Georgina Campbell Flatter, CEO of Greentown, said in a news release. “It’s a powerful example of how meaningful engagement between entrepreneurs and industry turns innovation into commercial traction.”

The C2V Initiative received more than 100 applications from 33 countries, representing a variety of carbontech innovations. The 10 startups chosen for the 2025 fifth cohort include:

  • Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Sora Fuel, which integrates direct-air capture with direct conversion of the captured carbon into syngas for production of sustainable aviation fuel
  • Brooklyn-based Arbon, which develops a humidity-swing carbon-capture solution by capturing CO₂ from the air or point-source without heat or pressure
  • New York-based Cella Mineral Storage, which works to develop subsurface mineralization technology with integrated software, enabling new ways to sequester CO2 underground
  • Germany-based ICODOS, which helps transform emissions into value through a point-source carbon capture and methanol synthesis process in a single, modularized system
  • Vancouver-based Lite-1, which uses advanced biomanufacturing processes to produce circular colourants for use in textiles, cosmetics and food
  • London-based Mission Zero Technologies, which has developed and deployed an electrified, direct-air carbon capture solution that employs both liquid-adsorption and electrochemical technologies
  • Kenya-based Octavia Carbon, which develops a solid-adsorption-based, direct-air carbon capture solution that utilizes geothermal heat
  • California-based Rushnu, which combines point-source carbon capture with chemical production, turning salt and CO2 into chlorine-based chemicals and minerals
  • Brooklyn-based Turnover Labs, which develops modular electrolyzers that transform raw, industrial CO2 emissions into chemical building blocks, without capture or purification
  • Ontario-based Universal Matter, which develops a Flash Joule Heating process that converts carbon waste such as end-of-life plastics, tires or industrial waste into graphene

The C2V Initiative is based on Greentown Go, Greentown’s open-innovation program. The C2V Initiative has supported 35 startups that have raised over $600 million in follow-on funding.

Read about the 2024 cohort here.

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

grid resiliency

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.

In early 2025, CenterPoint unveiled a $5.75 billion plan to upgrade its Houston-area power system from 2026 through 2028. But the price tag dropped to $2.9 billion as part of a legal settlement between CenterPoint and cities in the utility’s service area.

Sometime after the first quarter of next year, CenterPoint customers in the Houston area will pay an extra $1 a month for the next three years to cover costs of the resiliency plan. CenterPoint serves 2.9 million customers in a 12-county territory anchored by Houston.

CenterPoint says the plan is part of its “commitment to building the most resilient coastal grid in the country.”

A key to improving CenterPoint’s local grid will be stepping up management of high-risk vegetation (namely trees), which ranks as the leading cause of power outages in the Houston area. CenterPoint says it will “go above and beyond standard vegetation management by implementing an industry-leading three-year trim cycle,” clearing vegetation from thousands of miles of power lines.

The utility company says its plan aims to prevent Houston-area power outages in case of hurricanes, floods, extreme temperatures, tornadoes, wildfires, winter storms, and other extreme weather events.

CenterPoint says the plan will:

  • Improve systemwide resilience by 30 percent
  • Expand the grid’s power-generating capacity. The company expects power demand in the Houston area to grow 2 percent per year for the foreseeable future.
  • Save about $50 million per year on storm cleanup costs
  • Avoid outages for more than 500,000 customers in the event of a disaster like last year’s Hurricane Beryl
  • Provide 130,000 stronger, more storm-resilient utility poles
  • Put more than 50 percent of the power system underground
  • Rebuild or upgrade more than 2,200 transmission towers
  • Modernize 34,500 spans of underground cables

In the Energy Capital of the World, residents “expect and deserve an electric system that is safe, reliable, cost-effective, and resilient when they need it most. We’re determined to deliver just that,” Jason Wells, president and CEO of CenterPoint, said in January.

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