Justin Joseph
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Khosla-funded Calera turns CO2 to cement
Claire Cain Miller, NYT News Service,
Mar 23, 2010, 06.00am IST
It seems like alchemy: a Silicon Valley start-up says it has found a way to capture the carbon dioxide emissions from coal and gas power plants and lock them into cement. If it works on a mass scale, the company, Calera, could turn that carbon into gold.
With this technology, coal can be cleaner than solar and wind, because they can only be carbon-neutral, said Vinod Khosla, the Silicon Valley billionaire. His venture capital firm, Khosla Ventures, has invested about $50 million in Calera. On Monday, Calera is set to announce that Peabody Energy, the worlds biggest coal company, has invested $15 million.
Some climate scientists and cement experts are dubious that Calera can produce large quantities of cement that is durable and benign for the environment.
People have been looking for ways to do this for 15 years, said Ken Caldeira, an expert on the carbon cycle who is a senior scientist with the Carnegie Institution for Science at Stanford. The idea that theyre going to come up with something thats both economic and scalable? Im highly sceptical.
Major carbon emitters and green technology companies have been trying to figure out ways to capture and store carbon, such as injecting it into the ground, in case Congress begins to regulate carbon emissions.
Calera says that by turning carbon into a building material, it will make carbon reduction economically attractive even in places where there are no government subsidies or carbon taxes. In this case, its actually a profit center, said Brent Constantz, Caleras founder and CEO.
Constantz, who is a consulting professor at the Stanford School of Earth Sciences, has spent his career studying and creating different kinds of cement. As a graduate student, he studied how corals in the Caribbean use carbon dioxide to make their skeletons. He started two companies, Norian and Skeletal Kinetics.
Khosla-funded Calera turns CO2 to cement - International Business - Biz - The Times of India
Claire Cain Miller, NYT News Service,
Mar 23, 2010, 06.00am IST
It seems like alchemy: a Silicon Valley start-up says it has found a way to capture the carbon dioxide emissions from coal and gas power plants and lock them into cement. If it works on a mass scale, the company, Calera, could turn that carbon into gold.
With this technology, coal can be cleaner than solar and wind, because they can only be carbon-neutral, said Vinod Khosla, the Silicon Valley billionaire. His venture capital firm, Khosla Ventures, has invested about $50 million in Calera. On Monday, Calera is set to announce that Peabody Energy, the worlds biggest coal company, has invested $15 million.
Some climate scientists and cement experts are dubious that Calera can produce large quantities of cement that is durable and benign for the environment.
People have been looking for ways to do this for 15 years, said Ken Caldeira, an expert on the carbon cycle who is a senior scientist with the Carnegie Institution for Science at Stanford. The idea that theyre going to come up with something thats both economic and scalable? Im highly sceptical.
Major carbon emitters and green technology companies have been trying to figure out ways to capture and store carbon, such as injecting it into the ground, in case Congress begins to regulate carbon emissions.
Calera says that by turning carbon into a building material, it will make carbon reduction economically attractive even in places where there are no government subsidies or carbon taxes. In this case, its actually a profit center, said Brent Constantz, Caleras founder and CEO.
Constantz, who is a consulting professor at the Stanford School of Earth Sciences, has spent his career studying and creating different kinds of cement. As a graduate student, he studied how corals in the Caribbean use carbon dioxide to make their skeletons. He started two companies, Norian and Skeletal Kinetics.
Khosla-funded Calera turns CO2 to cement - International Business - Biz - The Times of India
