Clean Energy Fuels Corp. and its largest shareholder, Total SE, formed a 50/50 joint venture to develop carbon-negative renewable natural gas (RNG) production facilities in the United States, as well as credit support to build additional downstream RNG fueling infrastructure. (Earlier post.)

The initial firm commitment is $100 million and can increase to $400 million as development opportunities progress. Since Clean Energy and Total will be providing the equity portion of the investments, the actual amount of capital invested in RNG projects may be higher than $400 million depending on the amount of leverage that is deployed.

In addition, Total will be providing credit support for Clean Energy development in the RNG value chain, including $45 million for contracted RNG fueling infrastructure.

Carbon-negative RNG is produced when carbon emissions are captured from dairies and turned into a transportation fuel. As a result, the California Air Resources Board gives these carbon-negative RNG projects a weighted average carbon intensity (CI) Score (gCO₂e/MJ) of -317 compared to 100 for diesel and 19 for electric batteries.

Clean Energy is the largest provider of RNG as a transportation fuel in the United States, and the largest RNG fuel provider under the California LCFS program. RNG can be used directly as a vehicle fuel or can be used as a feedstock to produce “green” hydrogen or “green” electricity and still generate LCFS environmental credits.

The companies have already partnered to expand the use of RNG in the heavy-duty truck market with the Zero Now program, which allows fleets to purchase RNG trucks for the same price as diesel trucks. The demand for carbon-negative RNG has rapidly accelerated through the Zero Now program with trucking companies such as Kenan Advantage, KeHE Distributors, Estes Express Lines, Tradelink Transport, among many others, taking advantage of the economic savings while powering their new fleets with the clean fuel.