# 280 Earth

> 280 Earth is a climate-tech company that removes carbon dioxide permanently from the ambient air using a modular Direct Air Capture (DAC) system spun out of Alphabet's X, The Moonshot Factory. Its continuous-flow process uses a proprietary sorbent, off-the-shelf industrial equipment and low-grade waste heat or clean electricity to pull CO2 - and fresh water - out of the atmosphere at low energy cost. Its first plant in The Dalles, Oregon began operating in May 2024 and is designed to scale from hundreds to more than 20,000 tons of CO2 removed per year. The company's name references 280 parts per million, the pre-industrial atmospheric CO2 concentration it aims to help restore.

- **Founded:** 2022
- **Headquarters:** Palo Alto, California, United States
- **Founders:** John Pimentel (Co-founder & former CEO), Jacques Gagne (Co-founder & CTO), Darren Bonnstetter (Co-founder)
- **Team size:** ~24 employees
- **Products:** Direct Air Capture (DAC) System, The Dalles DAC Facility - Gen 1 Phase I, Permanent CO2 removal & carbon credits, Co-produced fresh water
- **Notable:** Started operating its first direct air capture plant in The Dalles, Oregon in May 2024 - one of the first operating DAC facilities in the United States., Closed a $50M Series B funding round in May 2024., Spun out of Alphabet's X, The Moonshot Factory in 2022 after about four years of R&D.

## Products & services

- **Direct Air Capture (DAC) System** — A continuous-flow DAC system using a proprietary sorbent in a gravity-fed dual-chamber design that moves material between adsorption and desorption stages, powered by low-grade industrial waste heat and/or clean electricity, and built largely from off-the-shelf modular components.
- **The Dalles DAC Facility - Gen 1 Phase I** — First operational plant in The Dalles, Oregon, sized to capture roughly 500 tons of CO2 per year; started operations May 2024, powered principally by local hydropower.
- **Permanent CO2 removal & carbon credits** — Sale of durable, verifiable carbon removal (permanent sequestration) to corporate buyers via offtake agreements, plus liquefied CO2 for industrial use.
- **Co-produced fresh water** — The process also captures water vapor from ambient air; paired with data centers, the recovered water can provide supplemental cooling.

## Achievements

- Started operating its first direct air capture plant in The Dalles, Oregon in May 2024 - one of the first operating DAC facilities in the United States.
- Closed a $50M Series B funding round in May 2024.
- Spun out of Alphabet's X, The Moonshot Factory in 2022 after about four years of R&D.
- Signed a ~$40M Frontier offtake agreement for 61,571 tons of permanent CO2 removal.
- Designed a water-positive DAC process that can save up to ~200,000 tons of water per year per 60-MW facility when paired with data centers.

## Latest updates

- **2024-05** — Announced Oregon's first direct air capture plant and closed a $50M Series B round.
- **2024-05** — Gen 1 Phase I plant (~500 tons CO2/year) began operations in The Dalles, powered largely by hydropower.
- **2025-09** — Anand Saxena, a longtime X engineer, is listed as CEO & CTO of 280 Earth.

## Links

- Website: https://280.earth
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/280-earth
- Twitter/X: https://x.com/280earth
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/280earth/

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/280-earth
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-07-14