TRANSFORMING CARBON EMISSIONS INTO CLEAN ENERGY

27 November 2024

Elbow Beach Capital has led a £2.4m funding round into carbon utilisation company, Barton Blakeley.

Carbon utilisation is one of the most effective technologies for reducing emissions but, despite technological advances, most current solutions remain expensive and inefficient, requiring huge amounts of energy to function. Barton Blakeley has developed a chemical process which permanently removes industrial CO2 emissions and efficiently converts them into synthetic silica. Synthetic silica underpins a $500bn global market, presenting a huge commercial opportunity for Barton Blakeley to disrupt a carbon intensive market with cheaper, decarbonised silica, providing supply chain security.

Barton Blakeley’s process also produces clean energy, making it an ideal solution for industries and companies looking to directly reduce their CO2 emissions. Barton Blakeley has developed modular sites which can be located on the premises of industry partners to directly capture and utilise their CO2 emissions.

With this funding, Barton Blakeley will be able to deploy its first system to industry. Within the next four years, each system deployed will be permanently removing 1 kilo-tonne of carbon per year from the atmosphere, the equivalent of 200 commercial aircraft flights from London to Washington DC.

Elbow Beach Capital notes the appointment of Volker Beckers as Chair of Barton Blakeley. Beckers has outstanding experience in the energy sector, including as former Group CEO of RWE Npower and has recently been awarded a CBE for his services to nuclear energy.

This investment continues Elbow Beach Capital’s backing of technologies of the future, expanding its roster of energy startups which currently includes waste-to energy solutionists, WASE, and cathode technology company, Anaphite.

Jonathan Pollock, CEO of Elbow Beach Capital: “We are delighted to be supporting Barton Blakeley. Their team has developed some exceptional technology and the commercial application has wide-reaching implications across a diverse span of industries and a massive addressable market.

Elbow Beach Capital is pleased to lead this funding round, which will enable Barton Blakeley’s technology to be brought on-site at industrial factories for the first time.”

Christopher Barton, CEO of Barton Blakeley: “After a period of technical development, it is exciting to be taking firm steps towards commercialisation through placing our first system at an industrial site. In addition to capturing carbon, our ground-breaking technology will provide cheaper, greener, and local synthetic silica in addition to green energy, and we look forward to working with industry partners to see this opportunity grow. Elbow Beach Capital’s experience in supporting earlystage startups through the commercialisation process makes them an ideal partner for us and we have already benefitted from JP and the team’s support.”

Volker Beckers: “I am pleased to be joining Barton Blakeley at this pivotal time for the company. With the technology proven, I look forward to supporting the company as it enters its first commercial partnerships and navigates the scale-up process with a great partner in Elbow Beach Capital.”