Aramco Ventures Leads US$30 Million Investment In Spiritus

Aramco Ventures, the corporate venturing arm of Saudi Arabia's Aramco, the world’s largest oil producer, has led a US$30 million Series A funding round for US-based climate tech startup Spiritus, with participation from California-based Khosla Ventures, Texas-based Mitsubishi Heavy Industries America, and California-based TDK Corporation's subsidiary TDK Ventures.

While the investment will support the company’s development of direct air capture (DAC) technology for carbon removal, it is also collaborating with Aramco to expand its technology to Saudi Arabia. The investment thus reflects Aramco Ventures’ focus on climate tech and efforts to reduce industrial carbon emissions while supporting economic growth. 

Founded in 2021 by Charles Cadieu and Matt Lee, Spiritus is working on three projects, including a 1,000-ton DAC pilot facility in New Mexico and Orchard One in Wyoming, which aims to sequester two megatons of carbon dioxide annually. Spiritus seeks to lower the cost of DAC from $1,000 per ton to $100 per ton. Its modular “carbon orchard” framework combines geological sequestration with scalable carbon removal solutions. 

In a statement, Bruce Niven, executive managing director of strategic venturing at Aramco Ventures, said, “DAC has the potential to play an important role in decarbonizing hard-to-abate sectors of the economy, but until now, it has been too expensive to be meaningful. Breakthrough approaches like Spiritus are needed. We are excited to partner with Spiritus and bring this important technology to market.” 

Ali Al-Meshari, senior vice president of technology, oversight, and coordination at Aramco, added, “Aramco has stated its ambition to achieve net zero scope 1 and scope 2 greenhouse gas emissions across its wholly owned operated assets by 2050 and sees opportunities to build potential lower-carbon new energy business. Innovative technologies deployed at scale can help reduce the costs of reducing carbon emissions, and we are investing in developing these through our research and development, venture capital, and technology deployment programs. We believe direct air capture has the potential to play an important role in reducing carbon emissions from hard-to-abate sectors of the economy, and we see Spiritus’ approach to have the potential to scale globally, and specifically in the Middle East.” 

Cadieu, co-founder ane CEO of Spiritus, commented, “We’re seeing soaring demand for data centers and heavy industries, yet we can’t ignore the carbon that comes with it. Our DAC technology brings large-scale decarbonization within reach. This funding advances our vision of supporting America’s explosive growth while keeping emissions in check.” 

David Delfassy, investment director at TDK Ventures, said, “We are witnessing a pivotal moment in the journey to decarbonize our economies. Spiritus represents a unique fusion of cutting-edge material science and scalable, cost-efficient carbon removal, making it a key enabler of the world's industrial future. This $30 million Series A investment will catalyze the widespread deployment of DAC, ensuring that growth does not come at the expense of our environment.”