Planetary Technologies recently announced it’s signed a deal that will see Frontier – a group launched by Shopify, Stripe, Google parent Alphabet, Meta and McKinsey to purchase carbon credits from high-potential carbon-removal ventures – pay it $31.3 million to remove 115,000 tons of carbon monoxide from the atmosphere between 2026 and 2030.
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An Ottawa-born startup that’s creating a carbon-capture system its founders describe as an “antacid for the ocean” has landed a multimillion-dollar contract from an organization backed by tech titans such as Shopify and Google.
Planetary Technologies recently announced it’s signed a deal that will see Frontier – a group launched by Shopify, Stripe, Google parent Alphabet, Meta and McKinsey to purchase carbon credits from high-potential carbon-removal ventures – pay it $31.3 million to remove 115,000 tons of carbon monoxide from the atmosphere between 2026 and 2030.
The contract will build on a pilot project that Planetary hopes will pave the way for mass adoption of technology that could eventually scrub billions of tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere for less than $100 a ton.
Planetary’s proprietary system “purifies” the mountains of alkaline rock waste left behind by large-scale mining operations, extracting the alkalinity from the rubble and putting it in the ocean – a process known as ocean alkalinity enhancement.
Will Burt, Planetary’s chief ocean scientist, told the Associated Press earlier this year the technology allows the ocean to act “like a vacuum” to absorb more gases from the air.
The firm hatched in Ottawa now does much of its research in Nova Scotia, where it’s using a powdered industrial byproduct called magnesium oxide to accelerate the Earth’s natural carbon cycle, suck up CO2 from the air and store it as a natural component of ocean chemistry for up to 100,000 years.
The process also makes the ocean less acidic. Magnesium oxide has long been used to de-acidify water at treatment plants and industrial facilities.
The firm’s founders say making the ocean less acidic will help boost growth of coral and shellfish such as oysters and lobsters, leading to a healthier ecosystem and a better-functioning food chain.
“It’s like an antacid for the ocean,” Planetary vice-president Jason Vallis told Techopia in a 2022 interview.
Mike Kelland, the firm’s Ottawa-based CEO, said the new deal with Frontier will allow the company “to demonstrate that ocean alkalinity enhancement can safely and effectively remove CO2 beyond small-scale trials.”
“This approach could be the cheapest and most scalable carbon removal solution,” Kelland said in a statement. “We're eager to show how it can be rolled out responsibly.”
In a statement, Frontier head of deployment Hannah Bebbington said Planetary’s system can remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere “extremely cheaply and efficiently.”
Bebbington said expanding the program beyond small-scale trials “calls for ironclad measurement and safety protocols, alongside addressing community concerns,” adding Planetary “is taking on these challenges head on.”
“This is the right project and team to pave the way forward for this promising pathway.”
Among the company’s biggest early backers was Shopify, which signed a deal in 2020 that would see the Ottawa-based software giant offset its carbon footprint by buying credits based on carbon removal generated by Planetary’s technology.
In 2022, Planetary was awarded a US$1-million prize in a competition funded by multibillionaire Elon Musk and his foundation to come up with sustainable ways of scrubbing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. The same year, it closed pre-seed and seed funding rounds worth a total of $7.8 million.
Last year, Planetary secured US$11.35 million in fresh funding in a round led by Vancouver-based venture capital firm Evok Innovations. It was also named one of 20 finalists in the $100-million Musk-backed XPRIZE carbon removal competition, ultimately capturing a $1-million prize earlier this year.
