Climeworks will remove 80,000 tons of carbon dioxide for BCG

Swiss direct air capture company Climeworks said today it has signed a 15-year partnership agreement with Boston Consulting Group.

The 80,000 metric ton offtake deal will make BCG Climeworks’ largest ever corporate buyer, the companies said in a statement, and will provide a guaranteed buyer as Climeworks continues to build removal and storage plants on a global scale.

In its announcement, Climeworks drew comparisons to the early days of the solar industry, during which long-term contracts offered planning security and support for financing efforts.

“Long-term commitments defined the success of the solar energy transition and will undoubtedly become more frequent in our industry,” said Climeworks chief commercial officer Jan Huckfeldt. “It sets a precedent for other climate leaders understanding that carbon removal is a necessity and securing their share of supply early in this future trillion-dollar market.”

The deal also includes an agreement for BCG to provide consulting services to Climeworks. That’s a similar structure to the pair’s 2021 agreement, which marked BCG’s first DAC investment but didn’t specify removal amounts.

The announcement comes at the tail end of a big year for Climeworks. In August the Department of Energy awarded funding for all three of Climeworks’ DAC hub applications: Project Cypress in Louisiana, Prairie Compass in North Dakota, and an unnamed California hub. (Those applications were co-submitted with other companies.).

Then, in September, Climeworks said it was exploring the development of large-scale projects in Kenya, in partnership with project development venture Great Carbon Valley. And in late November, the company announced its expansion to Canada in partnership with DAC developer Deep Sky, with the goal of getting a DAC plus storage plant up and running there by 2030.

It’s not just Climeworks that’s been attracting larger-scale interest this year — there’s been a flurry of investment across carbon dioxide removal offerings, from both the public and the private sectors. That’s despite the ongoing struggle to bring down cost per ton, and the potential that cheaper, faster methods could get the U.S. most of the way to its 2050 net-zero goal.

Editor’s note: This piece was corrected on Dec. 15, 2023. The original piece misstated the amount of carbon dioxide removal included in the deal, which was 80,000 tons, not 800,000 tons.