Verde Clean Fuels announced the closing of the previously announced $50-million equity investment by Cottonmouth Ventures, LLC, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Diamondback Energy, Inc.. The investment consists of the purchase of 12.5 million shares of Verde’s Class A common stock by Cottonmouth at a purchase price of $4.00 per share. The investment represents the second investment by Cottonmouth in Verde over the past two years, for a total investment of $70 million, making Cottonmouth the second largest shareholder of Verde.

Proceeds from the investment are expected to be used to further the development and construction of potential natural gas-to-gasoline production plants and for other general corporate purposes. The proposed plants to be jointly developed by Verde and Cottonmouth would produce fully-refined gasoline utilizing Verde’s patented (STG+) process from associated natural gas feedstock supplied from Diamondback’s operations in the Permian Basin.

In connection with the investment, Verde expanded its Board of Directors from seven to eight members and appointed Johnny Dossey, as Cottonmouth’s director designee, to its Board of Directors.

Verde is a clean fuels company focused on the deployment of its innovative and proprietary liquid fuels processing technology through development of commercial production plants. Verde’s syngas-to-gasoline plus (STG+) process converts syngas, derived from diverse feedstocks, into fully finished liquid fuels that require no additional refining. Verde is currently focused on opportunities to convert associated natural gas into gasoline, which would provide a market for such natural gas with the added potential benefits of flare mitigation and production of gasoline with a lower carbon intensity than conventional gasoline.

Diamondback is an independent oil and natural gas company headquartered in Midland, Texas focused on the acquisition, development, exploration, and exploitation of unconventional, onshore oil and natural gas reserves in the Permian Basin.