• This global airlines' fund invests in innovative startups that decarbonise air travel.
• Heirloom's scalable, low-cost technology uses limestone to capture carbon directly from the air.

United Airlines, one of the largest airlines in the world, has announced that the UAV Sustainable Flight Fund has invested in Heirloom's direct air capture (DAC) technology to remove carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere.

The UAV Sustainable Flight Fund, with over $200 million in commitments from United Airlines and its corporate partners, has been designed to back startups that develop technologies to decarbonise air travel.

Heirloom is a California-based company that uses limestone to absorb CO2 naturally and speeds up this process to capture carbon emissions more efficiently. This is potentially a low-cost method to reduce carbon directly from the atmosphere.

READ MORE: Japan Airlines, Heirloom Partner for CO2 Removal

To this end, United will purchase up to 500,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide removal (CDR) as part of the agreement. This captured carbon could be used for sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) production or permanently stored underground to lower emissions.

Andrew Chang, head of United Airlines Ventures, said: "Carbon capture is one of our country's fastest-growing, energy-enabling pathways. At UAV, our primary focus is finding solutions for decarbonization that are profitable. Heirloom's technology aligns directly with this objective, offering a scalable and commercially viable approach and complements United's commitment to net zero by 2050."

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For United, this is its third investment in carbon capture technology and the first, particularly in DAC. There is a difference between point source capture and DAC. The former captures CO₂ directly from industrial emitters like power plants, while the latter captures it directly from the air.

Shashank Samala, CEO of Heirloom, added: "We are incredibly proud to welcome the United Sustainable Flight Fund as an investor and to work with them to scale our DAC technology.

"By utilizing DAC as a dual-pronged tool that can both greatly reduce CO2 emission from aviation fuel and remove residual emissions, we are charting a true path to Net Zero aviation."

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Source: United