Spiritus and Aramco Collaborate on 100-Ton Low-Cost DAC Pilot Plant

en.Wedoany.com Reported - Spiritus has signed a joint development agreement with Aramco's Research and Development Center (R&DC) to jointly advance the development and deployment of next-generation direct air capture (DAC) technology.

Under the agreement, the two parties will jointly work on the engineering and development of a 100-ton-per-year DAC pilot plant. The project combines Spiritus's proprietary high-capacity sorbent DAC technology with Aramco's advanced process engineering and thermal integration capabilities.

The pilot plant is positioned as a cornerstone for low-cost carbon dioxide removal (CDR) solutions, aiming to explore pathways to reduce DAC costs to $100 per ton. Spiritus stated that companies developing low-cost, modular DAC solutions will provide decarbonization infrastructure for the hardest-to-decarbonize industries on Earth, rather than merely supplying carbon credits to sustainability teams.

This joint development agreement builds on an existing partnership dating back to 2023. That year, Aramco Ventures made an equity investment in Spiritus. In 2024, the two parties signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to collaborate on optimizing Spiritus's novel sorbent technology and explore potential pilot and scale-up deployments within Saudi Arabia.

Spiritus is developing a scalable and modular low-cost DAC and storage (DAC+S) system. The company currently operates two projects: its flagship "Orchard One" project in Casper, Wyoming, USA, and the Pueblo of Nambé project in New Mexico.

Through the collaboration with Aramco's R&DC, Spiritus will focus on developing DAC solutions to address residual carbon dioxide emissions from heavy-polluting industries, with the goal of making the service affordable to a broader customer base. Aramco expressed pride in supporting Spiritus at this stage to advance practical and scalable carbon capture technology.