Aether Fuels raised $30.4 million in a $34.3 million round, in keeping with SEC filings.
The e-fuels startup is working on producing fuel for aviation and shipping using carbon dioxide and other waste carbon streams. The latest round would significantly strengthen the company’s checking account; Ether fuels previously raised $8.5 million via convertible notes in late 2023.
The startup was born out of Xora Innovation, an early-stage high-tech incubator run by Temaska. An organization spokesman didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment.
Since then, Aether Fuels has been working to enhance its technology. The company says its technology can use carbon from a number of waste streams, including industrial pollution, methane from landfills and plant residues from farms.
Little is known publicly about exactly how Ether Fuels convert carbon dioxide into fuels, although: Patent Application submitted in January suggest that the company is exploring one of the possibilities of using natural gas. The process gasifies solid waste, mixes it with natural gas, and then converts the mixture into liquid fuel (capturing any waste carbon dioxide along the way).
In February this announced a deal that gave it access to a gas-to-liquids program began by GTI Energy, a nonprofit natural gas company.
Airlines and shipping corporations are seeking to bio-based sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) and e-fuels as a strategy to decarbonize their energy-intensive industries. However, these efforts have been initial at best. For example, the amount of JPK produced today is only approx lower than 0.1% total consumption, and SAF is a much more mature industry than e-fuels.