Woodside invests $10mn in Indian carbon-to-products co

Australia’s Woodside Energy has announced a $9.9mn equity investment in India-based String Bio Private, the developer of a patented process that can recycle greenhouse gases into value-added products, it said on July 11.

String Bio combines biology, engineering and chemistry in an effort to develop sustainable and scalable products to address global issues such as climate change and food scarcity, Woodside said.

Woodside is exploring the potential of String Bio’s carbon-to-products technology to support its decarbonisation efforts, targeting the abatement of methane emissions at its operational sites.

String Bio’s proprietary technology converts methane into a single-cell protein that could provide a sustainable alternative in animal and human nutrition as well as agriculture products, with a focus on improving the sustainability of crops and food production, land and water use. The companies have also entered a strategic development agreement to explore opportunities for the potential commercial scale-up of String Bio’s technology.

The String Bio investment, subject to conditions precedent, is part of Woodside’s target to spend $5bn on new energy products and lower-carbon services by 2030. CEO Meg O’Neill said the company aimed to thrive through the energy transition with a resilient and diversified portfolio.

“Our investment in String Bio builds on our ability to potentially abate greenhouse gases through the conversion of carbon into useful products,” she said.

“We believe String Bio’s technology could eventually be used to recycle methane at Woodside facilities. It could also be deployed at third-party sites with available biomethane such as landfill facilities and farms,” O’Neill added.