Occidental’s 1PointFive selected for US DOE grant to develop Direct Air Capture Hub

Occidental Petroleum subsidiary 1PointFive was selected to receive a grant from the US Department of Energy’s Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations (OCED) for development of its South Texas Direct Air Capture (DAC) Hub.

The hub, to be sited in Kleberg County, is expected to include the world’s first DAC plant designed to remove up to 1 million metric tons/year (tpy) of CO₂.

The funding will support 1PointFive’s development of the DAC Hub through the advancement of planning, detailed design, environmental permitting, and procurement of long-lead equipment, Occidental said in a release Aug. 11.

1PointFive’s lease agreement for the South Texas DAC Hub with King Ranch covers about 106,000 acres of pore space estimated to accommodate up to 3 billion metric tons of CO₂ in saline formations (OGJ Online, Nov. 1, 2022). The company estimates the Hub has the potential to remove and store up to 30 million tpy of CO₂ through DAC. The property lies near industrial emitters on the Texas Gulf Coast, where CO₂ also can be captured, transported and securely sequestered at the Hub, the company continued.

1PointFive, along with its partners Carbon Engineering and Worley, is working on the front-end engineering and design for the first DAC plant slated for the South Texas Hub. The design is being adapted from Stratos, 1PointFive’s first commercial-scale DAC plant under construction in the Permian basin (OGJ Online, July 20, 2023). Preparations are under way to drill test wells at the South Texas Hub site to gather geologic data required to obtain a Class VI well permit to sequester CO₂.

As part of President Biden’s Investing in America agenda, 1PointFive's project is one of two commercial-scale direct air capture projects selected by US DOE for advancement through funding of up to $1.2 billion, the agency said in a separate release Aug. 11. The agency also selected Project Cypress in Calcasieu Parish, La., where Battelle, in coordination with Climeworks Corp. and Heirloom Carbon Technologies Inc., aims to capture more than 1 million tpy of CO₂ and store it deep underground. 

Selection for award negotiations is not a commitment by DOE to issue an award or provide funding, the US DOE said. Before funding is issued, the agency and the applicants will undergo a negotiation process, and DOE may cancel negotiations and rescind the selection for any reason during that time.