Carbontech Development Initiative (CDI)

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Program Overview

The Carbontech Development Initiative (CDI) at Columbia Technology Ventures is a first-of-its-kind, large-scale carbontech market transformation grant-seeding and commercialization initiative for carbontech science and technology. CDI aims to position New York State as a global carbontech hub by supporting research and development, facilitating technology transfer, and commercializing innovation. The program funds research and development (R&D) both within Columbia University and the broader carbontech space to create a technical ecosystem that can achieve durable market impacts. By leveraging the deep bench of technical expertise at Columbia University and the entrepreneurial dynamism of New York State, CDI will promote the decarbonization solutions required to address the climate crisis and catalyze economic development. 

With support from the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA), CDI will encourage international participation from entrepreneurs and researchers, work to scale-up the demand-side market (investors, buyers, customers,) and enrich state, federal, and international policy ecosystems. CDI aims to catalyze decades-long carbontech market transformation, locking in an upward trajectory for the sector.

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CDI aims to position New York State as a global carbontech hub, facilitating collaboration between academia, private businesses, and the public sector to create, validate, and launch cutting-edge solutions that capture, transport, and convert different forms of waste carbon into a diverse array of valued products and services in a climate-beneficial way. We are actively soliciting applications for four programs from projects in the following three topic areas:

  • CO2 Capture Technology
  • CO2-to-Building Materials
  • CO2-to-Chemicals, Fuels, & Materials

Applicants whose technology fits CDI’s Technology Scope are encouraged to apply to the program appropriate for their level of development needs and technology readiness level. 

Applications will be evaluated by a scoring committee and competitively awarded. 

CDI’s third application is planning to be released in early 2025.

Please contact [email protected] for further information.

CDI will award grants across three programs, two research programs and one commercialization program. Awards and contract terms vary by program. Details of each program and the application process steps are provided below: 

CDI's research programs will advance the research needed to underpin development of technologies that enable harvesting of carbon from the environment and from waste streams and converting it for use in widely-used products. CDI will focus on accelerating technology from benchtop to commercialization through competitive research programs. 

1. Propel Carbontech (External to Columbia)

Propel Carbontech will award a total up to $500,000 in grant funds annually to between four and eight projects focused on CDIs eligible technologies (see below) at Technology Readiness Levels (TRL) 2-3. Teams must be external to Columbia University.

  • Individual project awards: $50,000 to $150,000.
  • Project Duration: 12 to 18 months. 

2. Carbontech Leap (Columbia University only)

Carbontech Leap will award a total up to $500,000 in grant funds annually to a minimum of two projects that focus on CDIs eligible technologies (see below) and are at Technology Readiness Levels (TRL) 2-3. This program is open to applicants who are core faculty members of the Columbia University Lenfest Center for Sustainable Energy.

  • Individual project awards: Up to $250,000.
  • Project Duration: Up to 24 months.

Bridge Carbontech (Startups only)

CDI's Bridge Carbontech program will support startups at mid-stage (TRL 4-6) and later-stage (TRL 6-9) commercialization focused on CDI's eligible technologies (see below). Successful applicants will receive non-dilutive grant funding that pays for the costs to advance their commercial readiness which, depending on the stage of the company, could include prototypes, in-field testing, marketing, design, accounting, legal and other costs, as well as salary support to add senior personnel. Successful applicants will also go through a rigorous training program consisting of bootcamps and skills labs tailored to support the carbontech focus of the program. Successful applicants will enumerate business and technical milestones corresponding to addressable barriers and will develop a work plan to develop essential tools for ensuring that achieved milestones translate into durable practices. The overall goal of the program is to strengthen New York State as a global carbontech hub by facilitating the creation, validation, and launch of cutting-edge solutions. 

Bridge Carbontech will award a total up to $1,666,666 in grant funding for up to six projects annually. Teams must be external to Columbia University.

  • Individual project awards: $287,500 to $375,000.
  • Project Duration: Up to 24 months. 

Eligibility

Applicants should apply to the appropriate CDI research or commercialization program and conform to the eligibility criteria for the program to which they apply. Applicants may apply to only one program per project.

All projects must either be located within New York State or have a demonstrated benefit to New York State. A demonstrated benefit to New York State means the project involves business or related activity that teams are involved with in New York State. Examples of activities that represent a demonstrated benefit to New York State include:

  • Having some portion of an organization’s workforce (beyond at least one employee), such as research and development, manufacturing, and/or sales, based in New York State; and/or
  • Benefiting supply chain partners, vendors, investors, and/or service providers in New York State; and/or
  • Having an addressable market of current or future customers within New York State.

The following table outlines eligibility criteria:

Eligibility Criteria

Eligible Technologies 

CDI will fund projects that fall within defined topic scopes, organized around three technology areas, representing the carbontech areas most likely to stimulate a nation-leading carbontech innovation and commercialization ecosystem in New York State.

Research and commercialization efforts in this topic area aim to improve the efficiency, economics and overall value of carbon capture and sequestration for key end-uses, such as enabling key New York State industries to decarbonize using feedstocks from current waste streams (e.g., waste-to-energy (WTE), biomass to energy, and cement plants). Point source CO2 capture technologies targeting fossil fuel combustion however, are excluded.

Technology Area 1 efforts may fall under any of the following subtopics:

Direct air capture (DAC)
  • Integration of DAC and CO2 conversion
  • Minimizing energy required, systems with low pressure drop
  • Materials with long-term stability, tolerance to harsh environments
Point Source CO2 capture
  • Effects of varied CO2 concentration and impurities on CO2 capture materials and systems
  • Integration of CO2 capture with resource recovery and CO2 utilization, to minimize need for storage and transportation
  • Integration of CO2 capture with biomass, waste-to-energy, renewable fuel based power, or industrial systems
  • Fuel cells with integrated carbon capture
  • Approaches to enable cleaner operation (low to zero on-site emissions) and economics for biomass gasification/pyrolysis/thermochemical conversion to produce heat, electric power or fuel with potential for net negative emissions through use of sequestered biochar/solid carbon
Cross-cutting solutions to enable carbon capture (direct air and point source) and utilization
  • The innovative use of renewable energy for sorbent regeneration (e.g., targeted heating using microwave, RF heating, etc.), solutions require less heat and overall resource use
  • Novel reactor design
  • Co-location of carbon capture with existing waste heat sources, e.g. data centers or industrial facilities
  • New use cases for proven algorithms and AI-tools to streamline co-siting, design, integration and optimization of carbon capture systems with renewables, industrial processes, etc.
  • Ability to operate dynamically in response to grid conditions with high levels of renewables (such as wind and solar), or other machinery or processes occurring at the sited location

Construction materials, particularly for buildings and infrastructure, represent an important market for CO2 utilization and reduction, since the built environment can store large amounts of carbon at climate relevant scales. This TA will investigate the conversion of different feedstocks (e.g., WTE ash and construction wastes, etc. relevant to New York State) to building materials with reduced carbon intensity and improved performance to drive a scalable and sustainable construction industry in New York State.

TA 2 efforts may fall under any of the following subtopics:

Carbon mineralization of waste

Materials such as WTE plant ash, waste concrete, mine tailings, etc. to produce solid carbonates and other solid by-products as sustainable building materials with lower carbon intensity

CO2 curing of concretes

Efforts to reduce the overall energy requirement to incorporate CO2 into building materials

Low carbon replacement materials

Carbon sink materials to replace existing construction materials, particularly to substitute for products with high embodied carbon. This includes novel uses of bio-based feedstocks CO2 construction (e.g., wood, bio-composites, etc.)

As renewable energy becomes more prevalent, chemical industries that can harness renewable energy (particularly intermittently when excess energy on the grid may be curtailed) and convert CO2 rather than fossil carbon to produce chemicals, fuels, and materials. CO2 conversion technologies require focused and sustained R&D in areas such as catalysis, novel materials, and separations as well as their effective integration.

TA 3 efforts may fall under any of the following subtopics:

Electrochemical conversion of CO2
  • Catalyst development
  • Novel electrolyte design for combined CO2 capture and conversion
  • Effects of varied CO2 concentration and impurities
  • Integration of electrochemical CO2 conversion with downstream bioconversion reactor
  • Dynamic operation that can ramp processes up and down to respond to needs of the electric grid as an additional value stream
Dual-functional materials

Materials that host both CO2 capture and conversion via tandem reactions (e.g., thermochemical, electrochemical, carbon mineralization reactions)  

Awarded Projects

Corrosion-Resistant Reinforced Reactive Magnesia Cement

  • Institution: Columbia University
  • Team Lead(s): Prof. Shiho Kawashima and Prof. Aaron Moment

This team will develop novel Ready-Mix concrete formulations which will be capable of capturing 20% by weight CO2. They will concurrently develop intensive methods of supplying continuous CO2 during curing. These solutions will be economically deployable at large-scale construction sites and provide long-term CO2 sequestration.


Integrated CO2 Capture and Conversion to Value-added Chemicals

  • Institution: Columbia University
  • Team Lead: Prof. Jingguang Chen (Columbia)

This team will integrate the processes of CO2 capture and CO2 conversion in order to improve the energy-efficiency and CO2 impact of CO2 conversion into value-added chemicals. Their electrochemical materials will simultaneously capture CO2 and convert it to formic acid, which may eventually enable the carbon-neutral or net-negative production of chemicals.


To Mitigate Cement Carbon Emissions through Integration of Capture Sorbents and Electrocatalytic Conversion

  • Institution: Columbia University
  • Team Lead: Oscar Nordness, Assistant Professor of Earth and Environmental Engineering

The objective of this project is to develop an integrated process for the capture and conversion of CO2 produced from cement manufacturing by leveraging novel absorbents and electrode materials to produce syngas (CO/H2). To accomplish this objective, this team will pursue two parallel research activities: 1) CO2 capture via the design of new porous liquid absorbent materials and 2) the electrochemical conversion of CO2 to syngas. Following the successful completion of these efforts, they will combine and optimize these systems into an integrated CO2 capture and conversion process.

carbontech leap

To harvest reusable carbonation seeds by aqueous carbonation of brucite into magnesium carbonates

  • Institution: Columbia University
  • Team Lead: Jacob Fish, Professor and Chair of Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics,

The primary objective of the project is to create diverse magnesium carbonate forms as carbonation seeds via aqueous carbonation and explore their seeding efficacy in varying binder systems like hydrated magnesium carbonates (HMC), magnesium silicate hydrates (MSH), and magnesium oxychloride cement (MOC). The significance of the project stems from using novel seed materials in magnesium carbonate production, which includes carbon mineralization, utilization, and storage, marking a promising transition from waste to resources. This initiative builds on creating low-carbon magnesium-based cement from waste such as desalination brine.


To make CCS efficient: novel adsorbent regeneration by targeted photodesorption

  • Institution: Columbia University
  • Team Lead: Prof. Arvind Narayanaswamy 

This team will improve the energy efficiency of CCS across a range of potential CCS applications, including cement production and ethanol production. Prof. Narayanaswamy will identify and test novel materials which reduce the amount of heat energy required to release CO2 from the substance to which it binds in the CCS process.


Waste-derived “Goldilocks” cement microstructures for co-enhancement of CO2 mineralization and composite strength

  • Institution: Columbia University
  • Team Lead: Shaina Kelly, Assistant Professor of Earth and Environmental Engineering, Columbia University

This project aims to sequester CO2 via mineralization in the built environment which will benefit New York State’s environmental and carbontech market development goals. The proposed “Goldilocks” cements project will identify the physical-chemical properties of waste-derived cement microstructures towards enhancing post-cure CO2 mineralization capacity while maintaining or enhancing concrete strength and durability. We will focus on varied fractions of WTE bottom and fly ash (combined ash). The co-PIs have found that WTE fly ash can be stabilized in cement-based systems, but that increasing cement replacement with WTE ash beyond 20% has led to decreases in compressive strength.

Active Learning Algorithms for Autonomous Operation of CO2 Electrolyzers at Optimal Conditions

  • Institution: NYU
  • Team Leads: Prof. Miguel Modestino

This team will develop and demonstrate a machine learning algorithm which can overcome challenges associated with CO2 conversion using electrolyzers. Electrolyzers are a low-carbon alternative to traditional methods of chemical production from CO2, but they are complex to operate. This algorithm will control and operate electrolyzers autonomously, optimizing conditions like temperature and pressure while adjusting to different CO2 feedstocks and changes in the device performance over time.


Cornell Center for Carbon Capture and Conversion (C5): New Chemical Pathways for Energy-Efficient Capture of CO2 from Air

  • Institution: Cornell University
  • Team Leads: Prof. Phillip Milner, Prof. Tristan Lambert and Prof. Brett Fors

This team will identify new DAC technologies which overcome some of the key limitations of traditional DAC technologies. They will explore and test the potential of four approaches which use novel materials or processes  to improve the rate and volume of CO2 capture and release, and to reduce the energy and costs associated with operating DAC systems.


Development of Efficient Dual Functional Materials for CO2 Capture and Conversion

  • Institution: University of Rochester
  • Team Leads: Prof. Marc Porosoff and Prof. Andrea Pickel

This team will tune the energy efficiency of dual functional materials (DFMs) by integrating CO2 capture and conversion with microthermometry. A key operating principle of DFMs is the exotherm of CO2 hydrogenation provides sufficient heat to drive endothermic CO2 desorption. The problem with this approach is that the temperature profile of the DFM is poorly characterized, wasting energy on heating the system’s surroundings. We will improve DFMs by understanding how to efficiently use the heat from exothermic CO2 hydrogenation to drive endothermic CO2 desorption, thereby lowering the energy requirements of converting CO2 into value-added products, e.g. aviation fuel.


Direct Air Capture and Conversion of CO2 using Moisture-Activated, Oxidatively Stable Porous Mixed-Metal Hydroxides

  • Institution: University of Houston
  • Team Lead: Praveen Bollini, Assistant Professor of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering

The goal of this project is to demonstrate, for the first time, direct air capture (and conversion) under ambient conditions using high-performing solid sorbents that are purely inorganic in composition. The project will seek to demonstrate the synthesis, characterization, and temperature swing adsorption performance of highly porous mixed metal hydroxides on which carbonate species are stabilized through solvation by hydration layers that are formed under conditions typically encountered during DAC applications.


Green and Low-Cost Membrane Adsorbents for Direct Air Capture

  • Institution: SUNY Buffalo
  • Team Leads: Prof. Haiqing Lin and Prof. Shenqiang Ren

This team will develop a novel CO2 capture material which will lower the cost of DAC by maximizing the rate and volume of CO2 capture. This material will rely on structurally similar components, enabling its production process to be simple, low-cost, and scalable.


Integrating CO2 Mineralization and Mining for the Recovery of Construction Materials and Energy-Relevant Elements from Waste

  • Institution: Clarkson University
  • Team Leads: Prof. Simona Liguori and Prof. Valentina Priggiobe

This team will create an integrated process for mining energy-relevant elements (EREs) and CO2 mineralization for carbon storage.  Once extracted from mine tailings, elements will be separated through nanofiltration to recover EREs and calcium (Ca) and magnesium (Mg). EREs can then be re-used in renewable energy systems while Ca and Mg will undergo reactions with CO2 to form carbonates that can be re-used in the construction of buildings and infrastructure.


To Produce an Electrochemically-driven CO2 Capture Device Using Nickel Hydroxide Batteries and a Flow-through Membrane

  • Institution: University of Delaware
  • Team Lead: James Buchen, PhD Candidate

This team is developing a Ni(OH)2 based electrochemical DAC device using a flow-through membrane. The flow-through design unlocks the ability to use traditional battery technologies with known supply chains while also eliminating energy inefficiencies associated with a traditional membrane design. The research will focus on characterizing the flow-through membranes and modeling their performance.


To Produce Carbon Negative Oxalic Acid from Carbon Dioxide, Water and Renewable Energy for Circular Economy Products and Durable Sequestration

  • Company Name: Arrow Carbon
  • Team Lead: Ben West, Founder & CEO

This team creates oxalic acid (OA) from carbon dioxide using renewable energy and water to enable circular economies and sequestration. Arrow Carbon designed a new process to make OA from CO2, moving away from petrochemical oxidation production with nitric acid utilized today. The process only requires electrical energy, enabling carbon negative production with renewable energy sources

propel carbontech

 

Moisture-Swing Direct Air Capture of CO2 by Oxides

 

  • Company: Arbon Corporation
  • Team Lead: Xiaoyang Shi, Founder & CEO

Arbon has developed a new DAC technology that uses water rather than heat to regenerate their CO2 capture material, greatly reducing the energy and costs associated with DAC. Their research has demonstrated that this material does not easily degrade and can be re-used thousands of times. Arbon will pilot a DAC device that captures half a ton of CO2 per day, with the eventual aim of manufacturing and deploying millions of devices that each capture 1 ton per day, achieving gigaton-scale DAC.


Transforming CO2 Emissions into Building Materials

  • Company: Carbix Corporation
  • Team Lead: Johann "Quincy" Sammy, Founder & CEO

Carbix will pilot an industrial-scale reactor which rapidly transforms CO2 into building materials. Carbix’s prototype technology has successfully produced batch samples for concrete mixes, paints, and coatings. This pilot will be co-located with an industrial facility in New York State, recovering water along with 20% of the CO2 from that facility's flue gas. It will mineralize that CO2 to form carbonates, which are key inputs to cement and other construction materials. The success of this pilot could enable the decarbonization of energy- and emissions-intensive manufacturing industries such as steel and cement production in New York State.

 


Energy Critical Metal Recovery Integrated with Carbon Capture and Durable Storage for Sustainable Steel and Aluminum Manufacturing in NY State

  • Company: Carbon To Stone
  • Team Lead: Greeshma Gadikota, Founder and Associate Professor of Civil and Environmental

Carbon To Stone has developed a technology that reduces the CO2 emissions associated with steel and metals manufacturing by 8-10% while also producing critical metals which are necessary for the buildout of clean energy technologies. They will combine an energy- and material-efficient resource recovery technology which can process 10 kg of solid waste per day with an integrated CO2 capture and mineralization technology. They will pilot this approach in New York State while also investigating its scale-up potential.


Conversion of CO2 to Methanol in Wastewater Treatment Facilities

  • Company: Hago Energetics
  • Team Lead: Wilson Hago, Founder & CEO

Hago Energetics Benefit Corporation will build a field prototype of a system that converts CO2 to methanol on a dairy farm in New York. Unlike traditional methanol production from natural gas, this innovative process will produce net-negative CO2 emissions while also reducing the emissions produced from animal waste or biogas flaring at dairy facilities. A trailer-sized unit will capture the biogas produced by the farm and produce saleable methanol.


To Prototype an Intermittent, Swarm-Automated Off-Grid Power-to-Methanol Facility

  • Company Name: Aircela
  • Team Lead: Kristian Tuszynski, CTO

This team has developed a standalone, ultra-modular system capturing CO2 from environmental air and converting it into carbon-neutral e-fuels. Each system, when deployed, will capture 3 tons of CO2 per year and replace 400 gallons of fossil gasoline or 2 tons of fossil methanol. Their goal is to be capturing millions of tons per year and replacing millions of fossil gallons/tons by the end of this decade, selling fuel at fossil price parity. They want to build a digital and physical prototype of thousands of Aircela systems working together, modeled at the subcomponent scale, and powered intermittently.

 


Upgrading Biogas Emissions by Modular Pulsed Electrochemical CO2 Reduction

  • Institution Name: Cornell University
  • Team Lead: Tobias Hanrath, Professor of Engineering, Cornell University

This team aims to transition a novel CO2 electrolyzer technology from lab-to-market by demonstrating the operation of a prototype system to upgrade biogas generated by anaerobic digesters of dairy farms and landfills. The technological value proposition and core innovative claim derive from recent advances in pulse-modulated electrolysis to control and optimize the electrochemical reduction of CO2 to value-added products. This advance, coupled with inputs from an artificial neural network optimization algorithm, enables robust and extended electrolyzer operation and dynamic response to changes in the input gas composition. The electrolyzer technology at the heart of the proposed project can be integrated as a retrofit to existing anaerobic digesters (ADs) as well as direct integration with new systems to upgrade biogas to renewable natural gas (RNG).


To Develop a 100% Bio-Based Thermal Insulation Foam That Incorporates Biochar as a Carbon Sequestering Additive

  • Company Name: ECHO Building Systems
  • Team Lead: Erin Ruby, Founder & Principal, Interior & Product Design

This team innovates biochar-enhanced insulation materials that sequester carbon and reduce fossil fuel dependency. Their objective targets the built environment as a leading generator (40%) of global CO2 emissions. Of those total emissions, building operations account for 27% annually, while building materials and construction (embodied carbon) are responsible for an additional 13% annually. They are developing a 100% bio-based 1-to-1 replacement product for foam insulation. Their proprietary chemistry incorporates biochar into the most commonly used foams as a scalable and viable carbon-negative material enhancement.


To Incorporate CO2-to-Building Materials into Kits of Ready-to-Install Interiors, Further Reducing Embodied Carbon in Building Retrofits

  • Company Name: Kit Switch
  • Team Lead: Candice Delamarre, Co-Founder and COO

This team delivers kits from its library of ready-to-install apartment interior products for tenant improvements, retrofits, and conversions. They take the pain and complexity out of interior builds by (1) pulling from their library of interior modules to design faster and (2) leveraging local manufacturing partners to deliver plug-in kits. Manufactured locally, Kit Switch’s first product line, the Kit-Kitchen, is installed on-site in < 1 day, with improved turnaround, predictability, and sustainability.

 


Point Source Carbon Capture from Municipal Waste and Biomass Combustion

  • Company Name: Mitico
  • Team Lead: Clement Cid, CEO & Co-Founder

This team’s technology is based on multi-scale reversible pressure and temperature swing absorption using abundant, cost-effective, and low-impact granular metal carbonate (GMC) sorbent to capture >95% of CO2 in the flue gas from post-combustion point-source emitters. It is applicable across a range of point source emitters that combine water vapor and CO2 in their flue gas. These include waste-to-energy turbines, boilers, wood waste burners, cement, and steel production facilities.

 


To Generate Low Emissions Sorbent Material for Carbon Capture

  • Company Name: Thalo Labs
  • Team Lead: Brendan Hermalyn, CEO & Founder

This team is an NYC-based company with a revolutionary new way to measure, reduce, and capture greenhouse gases (“GHGs”) from the built environment. Thalo has developed high dynamic range, low power, modular, direct mineralization carbon capture systems that are already being deployed across the city. These capture devices include revolutionary measurement, verification, and reporting systems to enable best-in-class verifiability for highly scalable, carbon-negative capture.


Cost-Effective, Carbon-Negative Acrylonitrile: Leveraging Novel Catalysts to Minimize Feedstock Use

  • Company Name: Mars Materials
  • Team Lead: Aaron Fitzgerald, CEO & Founder

This team is a venture- and Breakthrough Energy-backed startup in Houston, TX commercializing a chemical process to sequester CO2 into acrylonitrile (AN), the sole feedstock for polymers and composites such as acrylamide (AMD) and carbon fiber (CF), respectively. The AMD and CF markets are supply-constrained and actively seeking decarbonized, drop-in alternatives to today’s volatile, petrochemical-derived AN supply. Mars’ carbon-negative AN is a drop-in replacement that can be supplied to these markets from local sites with reduced price volatility. At full scale, Mars envisions its carbon negative AN replacing fossil-derived AN, effectively converting this market into a viable carbon sink.

Program Announcements

Invest in CDI

CDI depends on financial support and partnerships to sustain its market transformation strategy.

  • Co-investment. Sponsors may choose a co-investment model to directly fund future CDI cohorts across CDI’s research and commercialization programs.
  • Research grants. Sponsors may provide funds to CDI specifically to advance primary upstream carbontech research by sponsoring future CDI research cohorts.
  • Market transformation gifts. Sponsors may choose a market transformation gift model that provides funds to sustain CDI operations and promote Carbontech thought leadership and policy development.

Potential sponsors are encouraged to contact CDI for information about how to get involved.

Contact Us

Jim Aloise headshot
Jim Aloise
Jim Aloise

Executive Director
Carbontech Development Initiative 
[email protected]

Jack Steele headshot
Jack Steele
Jack Steele

Assistant Director
Carbontech Development Initiative 
[email protected]

Kartik Pilar Headshot
Kartik Pilar

Program Manager
Carbontech Development Initiative 
[email protected]