Kore also demonstrated its ability to produce UltraGreen hydrogen™ that can be used to decarbonise a variety of industrial applications including steel manufacturing and ammonia production, which can also be upgraded for fuel cell electric cars, trucks, buses, and trains.

The Kore process produces biocarbon, a solid elemental carbon that can be blended into soil to reduce irrigation and fertiliser costs, improve drought resilience, and increase plant yields. Kore biocarbon is a stable form of carbon that will not revert to CO2 or CH4: its use sequesters carbon for centuries.

SoCalGas contributed $1.5m to the demonstration project, which has also received funding from the South Coast Air Quality Management District.

Companies seeking to reduce their carbon footprint can purchase Kore’s carbon credits through voluntary exchange markets.

Cornelius Shields, CEO and founder of Kore Infrastructure, said Kore’s technology is commercially ready and able to scale up to solve the twin problems of reducing waste and increasing access to clean, carbon-negative fuels, while creating a supply chain that is “emissions-free, sustainable, and affordable”.

Kore’s modular system uses a proprietary pyrolysis process, which heats organic waste under high temperatures in a zero-oxygen environment.

Kore Infrastructure’s process is designed to meet South Coast AQMD’s ultra-low NOx and particulate emissions standards. The facility has been running for one year in LA, one of the most tightly regulated airsheds in the country.

This innovative technology is designed to divert organic waste from landfills, reducing short-lived climate pollutant production and instead, producing carbon-negative hydrogen and renewable natural gas (RNG). These clean fuels reduce greenhouse gas emissions from industrial processes and hard-to-electrify sectors, including heavy-duty transportation.

The world’s biogas and biomethane resources could cover 20% of global gas demand while reducing greenhouse gas emissions, according to an IEA report.

The world is only using a fraction of the potential to produce gas from organic waste, which could cover around 20% of today’s global demand for gas. The availability of sustainable feedstocks for these purposes is set to grow by 40% by 2040.

SoCalGas has more than 10 active hydrogen pilot projects. Last year, SoCalGas submitted several research and development initiatives to the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Earthshot Hydrogen Program’s Request for Information (RFI), which is designed to accelerate and enable low-cost clean hydrogen, create jobs, and facilitate a net-zero carbon emissions economy by 2050.

Clean energy and circular economy solutions are becoming more prevalent.

The New York City Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), along with its partners National Grid and Waste Management, have developed an anaerobic digester project at the Newtown Creek wastewater treatment plant in Brooklyn.

It converts methane gases from wastewater (up to 300 million gallons daily) and from food waste (up to 500 tons daily) into clean, carbon-free renewable natural gas (RNG), which can be injected into the local natural gas distribution system and used to heat over 5,000 homes.

Other proponents include Green Era, which is developing the first urban farming campus using inedible food wastes to generate RNG and compost in a historically polluted and underserved neighbourhood on Chicago’s South Side; and Nature Energy, which collects organic wastes from businesses and agriculture to produce RNG and soil nutrients. Based in Denmark, the company is expanding its operations to new projects in Europe, the US, and Canada.

Steen Parsholt, Vice Chairman of Nature Energy, sad with new policies such as the Inflation Reduction Act’s production tax credits, it expects to expand biomethane production by nine times in the next five years.

Matt Tomich, Energy Vision President, which began focusing public attention on the organic waste-to-fuel strategy in 2009, said: “Today, over 250 plants in the US are producing RNG fuel, 90,000 trucks and buses are running on it, and the industry has created 10,000 jobs. This is astonishing growth, which has only just begun.”