Queens Carbon secures US$14.5m for carbon neutral SCMs

Queens Carbon is developing a technology to eliminate CO₂ emissions from the cement industry. The start-up, based in Pine Brook, USA, was recently awarded US$14.5m in funding from the US Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) as part of its ‘Seeding Critical Advances for Leading Energy Technologies with Untapped Potential’ programme. Queens Carbon will use the funding to inaugurate its new low-temperature, zero-CO₂ technology in partnership with a commercial partner from the cement industry.

ARPA-E Director, Evelyn Wang, announced, “We know that cement manufacturing requires innovative, scalable solutions to overcome the environmental impacts and logistical hurdles of traditional cement production. Queens Carbon is committed to tackling these challenges.” She continued, “Through SCALEUP, Queens Carbon will build on prior work funded by ARPA-E and develop an integrated pilot facility at an existing cement production site to produce carbon-neutral materials in support of decarbonising cement production.”

Queens Carbon is developing an energy-efficient method of manufacturing carbon-neutral supplementary cementitious materials (SCMs) from standard raw materials to facilitate an unlimited SCM supply for global urbanisation trends.

The start-up’s ‘Q-SCMs’ can be used as a substitute for 20-50 per cent of the high-CO₂ binder used to produce cement. This approach aims to satisfy the increasing demand for cement with a reliable stream of SCMs, reducing greenhouse gas emissions while remaining cost-competitive. Queens Carbon plans to inaugurate a pilot plant with the ability to produce 10tpd of SCMs.

The SCALEUP programme supports the scaling of innovative new technologies spanning energy and industrial applications. It aims to ensure that strategic US innovations are well-positioned for investment and deployment in the private sector. Queens Carbon’s project was chosen by ARPA-E from a very competitive pool of applicants to be scaled in order to lower the CO₂ emissions of the cement industry.

“This SCALEUP grant is a tremendous step forward on our path to commercialisation,” said Daniel Kopp, CEO of Queens Carbon. He continued, “Partnering with ARPA-E and a major cement industry player to deploy, operate and optimise our 10tpd pilot plant will put us on an accelerated path to gigatonne-scale CO₂ reductions.”