Novo Holdings A/S (Novo Holdings) and LanzaTech, a pioneer in the production of next-generation fuels and chemicals through the recycling of CO₂, have formed a partnership to grow LanzaTech’s sustainable fuels and chemicals platform. Novo Holdings is making a $72-million investment in the company in a Series E financing, and Senior Director Anders Bendsen Spohr will join LanzaTech’s Board of Directors.

LanzaTech’s process uses gas streams (waste, or produced via gasification) to feed its proprietary microbes, which produce a range of end products, eliminating single-use carbon.

Examples of the uses of the technology include taking steel mill emissions in China and unsorted, unrecyclable household waste in Japan and converting these wastes to ethanol, sustainable aviation fuel or polyethylene for consumer goods.

When a product has reached the end of its useful life, it can go unsorted and uncleaned to a LanzaTech facility and be recycled repeatedly without losing any of the properties of the original material. This locks carbon into a cycle and supports a transition to a circular economy.

The transaction underlines Novo Holdings’ increasing focus on investing in market-leading bio-industrial companies with the ability to have a long-term sustainable impact on society through innovative technologies.

Additionally, the investment in LanzaTech marks Novo Holdings’ fourth investment within the growth equity area this year. Growth equity investments enable Novo Holdings to support companies at the forefront of transformative technologies, fueling transitions that will take companies to the next level of development.

Novo Holdings’ investment will expand LanzaTech’s carbon recycling platform and enable LanzaTech to accelerate the commercialization of Carbon Smart products allowing consumers to choose from where the carbon in their products comes, recycled carbon or fossil carbon.