Interview with Esther Kamau, 8 Rivers

Interview with Esther Kamau, 8 Rivers

From carbon capture & clean hydrogen to a groundbreaking partnership with Siemens on zero-emissions turbine power, Catherine McLean sat down with Esther Kamau at 8 Rivers, to talk about how 8 Rivers is leading the charge toward global net-zero goals. They also explored how the company balances technological & financial risks in energy commercialization & the meaningful steps they’re taking to ensure their projects benefit underserved communities while driving environmental progress. This episode was recorded at the WRISE Leadership Forum in D.C.

Transcript

Catherine: Hi, I’m Catherine McLean, Founder and CEO of Dylan Green. We’re filming today from the WRISE Leadership Forum here in Washington, D.C. and I have with me Esther Kamau. Thank you for joining me, Esther. Esther is a Capital Management Analyst at 8 Rivers. Thank you for joining me today.

Esther: Thank you for having me.

Catherine: Can you please introduce yourself and tell us a bit more about your current role?

Esther: Yeah, as you mentioned, I am a Capital Management Analyst at 8 Rivers. 8 Rivers is a clean technology development company. We focus on low carbon solutions and blue hydrogen in direct air capture, as well as in neocarbon power. I sit specifically on the team that is tasked with raising funding, both at the top co-level and the project SPV level. And my company, or my team, I should say, is also tasked with bringing in strategic partnerships that help us advance these projects once this technology is once deployed into projects. So I’m mainly spending my day on financial models, project finance specifically. I’m trying to evaluate these projects and validate them to be able to raise funding from both debt and equity investors.

Catherine: Okay, great. Carbon capture and clean hydrogen are key areas, as you highlighted at 8 Rivers. What role do you see these technologies playing in achieving global net zero goals? Specifically, what is 8 Rivers positioning to be a leader in this space?

Esther: Yeah, I think 8 Rivers is doing a good job of touching multiple sectors that need to be decarbonized. Specifically, I think of the hydrogen space that is applicable in multiple areas, including the agricultural sector, including the refinery sector. And so being able to apply 8RH2 technology, which uses oxycombustion to produce low carbon hydrogen, and that also is a technology that is used to produce low carbon ammonia, will be extremely pivotal and integral in decarbonizing some sectors that I just mentioned, the agricultural sector, transportation sector, ocean shipping as well. I think of low carbon power sectors. So electricity is another area that needs to be decarbonized, in addition to electrifying some sectors that do not have that as a function right now. And so I feel 8 Rivers is doing a good job in touching multiple industries in multiple sectors while applying clean energy technologies by sequestering that CO2.

Catherine: Okay. 8 Rivers recently partnered with Siemens on a zero emissions turbine and a development program of carbon capture power generation. Can you elaborate a bit on this partnership and why you feel it’s significant?

Esther: So this partnership will help to support the Allen-Fettman cycle, which is our CO2 cycle, or which is a cycle that uses oxycombustion processes to capture CO2 and eventually utilize it in various processes or sequester it underground. And so this is a first of a kind turbine that will be applied in this solid fuel technology. Both our bio and AFC carbon technologies will use this turbine and benefit from it. And so we see Siemens Energy’s expertise in the industry and in engineering, as well as its access to the supply chain being a key factor in helping us advance this technology, not only within the U.S., but also abroad, as Siemens is a global partner.

Catherine: Right. Given your expertise in clean energy and technology commercialization, how do you balance the technological and financial risks involved in bringing these cutting edge energy solutions to market?

Esther: Yeah, it’s definitely critical to balance both because if you’re looking for financing and if you’re looking to bring in equity and debt investors, they’re going to have to be comfortable with deploying their capital into your technologies. And so for us, as a first of a kind technology developer, we’re having to make sure that we’re innovating and bringing our technologies to a high TRL level so we can be able to attract this funding. And so at 8 Rivers, we’re working every single day to innovate, to make our projects much more efficient, both thermally as well as cost effective, to be able to attract that capital. I think it’s also important to focus on how policies have helped unlock this area of financing for us and have helped us de-risk in these areas. I think of the IRA, for instance, and 45E and 45Q, which has helped or which is going to help stimulate first of a kind technologies that otherwise would have struggled to come online without that 10 to 12 year of funding or financing that we or that revenue stream that we’re able to gain from the IRA. And so I think it’s definitely a multi-pronged response here in the sense that we are looking to de-risk our technologies in order to be able to bring in that financing to deploy into the projects that will then help us sequester CO2.

Catherine: What steps is 8 Rivers taking to ensure its projects are benefiting both the environment and underserved communities?

Esther: Yeah, so we’ve talked about the environment part of that a little, but let me touch on the community part. I think we recognize at 8e Rivers that if anyone’s looking to set up an energy project at the level that we’re looking at, they definitely will be going to a certain part of the U.S., which is in Texas. And so these communities have repeatedly and consistently been faced with, you know, the same issues, big industries coming in and setting up in their communities. And so we take a different approach at 8 Rivers. We want to engage with these communities. We are proactive about that engagement, ask questions, listen to them, ask them about, you know, help them understand how the technologies will not only benefit us and the economy, but also benefit them and their communities. And so just being very proactive for the communities and engaging with them.
We have a community working group in Port Arthur, Texas, where we’re setting up a AtoH2 project, which is called Project Cormorant. The working group actually reached out to the community and had conversations with them before Cormorant was announced. And so they had that awareness before it was public. Our working group will be consistently working with the community in addition to helping them develop, or in addition to helping them understand how our project enables their lives economically. And so it doesn’t just stop here. Now that we’ve had these first few conversations with them, it doesn’t just stop here. It is going to be a continuous conversation with them until the process begins operation and is eventually implemented.

Catherine: That’s great. Well, thank you so much for talking to us a bit about the work that you’re doing. Thank you.

Esther: Thanks for having me.