Direct Air Capture (DAC) technology startup Heirloom announced today that it has raised $53 million in a Series A funding round, one of the largest private financings in direct air capture to date. The financing was co-led by Carbon Direct Capital Management, Ahren Innovation Capital, and Bill Gates-founded energy transition venture fund Breakthrough Energy Ventures.

Proceeds from the financing will be used to help scale the company by funding R&D and the technology’s first deployments. Heirloom’s solution aims to provide Direct Air Capture at low cost, enhancing the natural process of binding CO2 to naturally occurring minerals utilizing abundant and affordable minerals and leveraging mature technology and infrastructure. The company has set a goal to remove 1 billion tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere by 2035.

Shashank Samala, Co-founder and CEO at Heirloom, said:

“The costs of Direct Air Capture have to come way down to make a meaningful impact on climate change. Utilizing low cost, earth abundant minerals as a sponge for CO2 is key to making the economics work. In the 10 months since we launched, we’ve made a breakthrough in the rate we take up CO2 from the atmosphere, giving us a clear path to ultra-low cost, highly scalable carbon removal, and achieving our mission to help reverse climate change.”

Additional investors included the Microsoft Climate Innovation Fund, Breyer Capital, Grantham Environmental Trust, Chris Sacca’s Lowercarbon Capital, Marc Benioff’s TIME Ventures, Carbon Removal Partners, and Seven Seven Six.

Mark Kroese, General Manager, Sustainability Solutions at Microsoft, said:

“To limit the planet’s warming to 1.5°C, we need to combine significant carbon reductions with carbon removal from the atmosphere. Our catalytic investments in durable direct air capture technologies like Heirloom aim to drive mainstream adoption by bringing down the green premium through large-scale deployment.”

Jonathan Goldberg, founder and CEO of Carbon Direct, added:

“Carbon removal is essential to hit our climate goals. Heirloom’s vision is to remove 1 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide by 2035 and deliver cost-effective direct air capture. Heirloom is already being deployed, and Carbon Direct is excited to work with Heirloom to hyper-scale its critical technology.”