AGC Carbon: Pioneering a Sustainable Future with Carbon Capture Innovation
AGC Carbon is a participant in cohort 2 of Resurgence, a cleantech accelerator at the University of Chicago’s Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation in partnership with the Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering.
Recognizing a critical gap in the industry’s ability to meet global net zero goals, Sumeet Gandhi founded AGC Carbon with a mission to create a sustainable, cost-effective carbon capture solution.
“Existing technologies require extensive infrastructure, consume large amounts of utilities like electricity and natural gas, and do not resolve the issue of carbon dioxide disposal,” explained Gandhi. “These challenges have led to prohibitively high costs for carbon capture.”
Without a cost-effective, scalable solution for capturing and reusing carbon dioxide, Gandhi said “humanity’s goal of limiting global temperature rise to below 2°C would remain out of reach.”
Through extensive research, Gandhi identified soda ash and sodium bicarbonate as ideal candidates for carbon dioxide conversion. However, a key challenge remained: conventional carbon capture systems consumed too much energy, exacerbating the stress on fragile power grids already strained by climate change.
The solution would have to address both carbon capture and grid stability, Gandhi explained.
A breakthrough came when he identified sodium hydroxide’s potential to serve as a medium for grid energy storage, while simultaneously facilitating carbon dioxide capture and conversion into soda ash.
“This integrated system would tackle climate change from multiple angles—reducing the burden on both industries and taxpayers, while turning carbon into a reusable commodity,” Gandhi said.
With this vision, he assembled a team of experts in renewable energy and environmental policy, launching AGC Carbon with a mission to create a sustainable, cost-effective carbon capture solution that addresses energy demands and mitigates climate impact.
Today, AGC Carbon is preparing to build a lab-scale demonstration of its technology, with plans to install a pilot plant within the next five years at a US-based facility.
In partnership with the Resurgence program and renowned institutions like Argonne National Labs, Gandhi said the company is poised to attract investors and policymakers – accelerating the path toward large-scale implementation.
Said Gandhi, “With innovative technology and strategic collaborations, we are leading the charge toward a sustainable, net zero future.”
// Resurgence provides full-spectrum support for its cleantech startups focused on four specific areas of the cleantech industry: energy storage and infrastructure, next-generation nuclear solutions, hydrogen and alternative fuels, and materials refinement and process intensification.