The world’s first large-scale, commercial direct-air capture (DAC) plants are coming online – or are about to. How soon will we see a boom in high-quality, durable DAC supply? 

In this episode, Shayle talks to Andreas Aepli, chief financial officer of Climeworks, the world’s largest provider of DAC. They talk about Climeworks’ challenges with its two commercial plants – the kinds of challenges Andreas argues the industry needs to be transparent about in order to earn the trust of skeptical buyers. Shayle and Andreas also cover topics like:

• The real-world challenges of building a DAC plant, like extreme weather, supply-chain quality issues, CO2 purity, and more
• Why Andreas advocates a step-by-step scale-up of progressively larger deployments
• How to set pricing and and structure a carbon removal contract
• How to build a capital stack for a carbon removal plant
• Why Andreas believes the market will become even more supply-constrained in the next few years

Recommended resources

Latitude Media: Google says it's the first to purchase direct air capture for $100 per ton

Latitude Media: Can a new generation of DAC companies overcome the tech’s big challenges?

Latitude Media: Climeworks begins to offer “PPAs” for carbon removal

Catalyst: Fixing the messy voluntary carbon market

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On December 3 in Washington, DC, Latitude Media is bringing together a range of experts for Transition-AI 2024, a one-day, in-person event addressing both sides of the AI-energy nexus: the challenges AI poses to the grid, and the opportunities. Our podcast listeners get a 10% discount on this year’s conference using the code LMPODS10. Register today here!