Deep Pockets -- If OXY Can't Do It, Who Can? October 25, 2023

Locator: 45821CO2. 

Link here.

Link here.

 

It took a little sleuthing, but I believe this is "plant" we're talking about: Stratos, Ector County, Texas. From Energy Intelligence, May 3, 2023:

On a tract of wind-whipped scrubland in remote Ector County, Texas last week, Occidental Petroleum formally unveiled the project it now calls “Stratos,” a direct air capture (DAC) facility foundational to the company’s future ambitions. With numerous executives, partners, local officials and other interested parties in attendance, the formal groundbreaking didn’t offer much to look at beyond an early-stage construction site and some ceremonial shovels. But the event was imbued with a sense that something big was under way — the first glimpse of a plant that is one day expected to pull up to 1 million tons of CO2 from the air. Stratos, using technology from Canada-based Carbon Engineering, will be the first and largest project of its kind and a milestone in the battle to reduce CO2 emissions. Oxy CEO Vicki Hollub said the plant’s new name is meant “to convey a real sense of scale and possibility,” both in terms of the technology and the climate challenge itself. “It’s an ambitious challenge,” she told the crowd.

Stratos is the first of potentially dozens of DAC plants Oxy intends to build over the next decade-plus. It is initially designed to capture 500,000 tons/year of CO2, with start-up due in late 2024 and commercial operations set to commence in 2025. A second, identical plant would double the capture capacity of the site in the Permian Basin. Oxy has wagered a good part of its future on DAC; Hollub believes that within about 10 years the company’s low-carbon business will be about equal to the revenue, earnings and cash flow of its chemicals business, which is expected to generate income of $1.3 billion-$1.6 billion in 2023. Oxy is already the world’s largest handler of CO2, permanently storing up to 20 million tons per year, almost exclusively for enhanced oil recovery (EOR). The DAC business will support EOR as well, initially, but will also open up new revenue streams through the sale of carbon offsets, a business line that is already gaining momentum.

The strategy will not come cheap. Stratos is expected to cost at least $1 billion. Oxy’s hope is that each future plant will get successively less expensive as it incorporates best practices and moves more into “mass production.” Michael Avery, president of 1PointFive, the Oxy subsidiary leading the Stratos project, said “this first facility will not just be a milestone in size, but a cornerstone of learning, informing how we optimize direct air capture plants going forward.”