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Applied Carbon Raises $21.5 Million to Deploy Groundbreaking Biochar Technology that Increases Soil Health and Sequesters Carbon
Applied Carbon, a technology company designing automated biochar production machines that convert in-field agricultural crop waste into biochar, today announced it has raised a $21.5 million Series A. The funding round was led by TO VC, with participation from Congruent Ventures, Grantham Foundation, Microsoft Climate Innovation Fund, S2G Ventures, Overture.vc, Wireframe Ventures, Autodesk Foundation, Anglo American, Susquehanna Foundation, US Endowment for Forestry and Communities, TELUS Pollinator Fund for Good, and Elemental Excelerator. The funding will be used to deploy a fleet of biochar machines across Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Louisiana, delivering high durability carbon removal and agricultural services. The company was also recently named as a top-20 global finalist in the XPRIZE Carbon Removal competition and as a semifinalist in the Department of Energy’s (DOE) CO2 Removal Purchase Pilot Prize.
Applied Carbon’s technology utilizes a high-tech, fully self-contained trailer pulled behind a tractor that collects crop residue, processes it into biochar via high temperature pyrolysis before quenching it with water and supplementing it with nutrients and microbes as desired by the farmer. The final biochar product exits the machine and is spread directly onto the field, eliminating bulk material transport and drastically reducing its cost per ton. The machine can also operate in an efficient edge-of-field configuration for added flexibility to address diverse crop wastes all year long.