Othersphere, the pioneering startup specializing in location optimization for zero / low greenhouse gas commodity infrastructure, today announced the successful close of C$3 million in seed funding. The round was led by Active Impact Investments, with additional contributions from Thin Line Capital, KDX, and Keiki Capital.
Othersphere has developed a patent-pending platform to identify ideal locations for commodity production assets based on economics, emissions, and fit with local surroundings. Othersphere initially serves project developers, offtakers, and financiers, beginning with hydrogen and expanding to other physical commodities over time.
Othersphere's core technology indexes the globe based on commodity, human, and environmental system variables, and was made possible by catalytic funding from Breakthrough Energy's Fellows program—a research and development fellowship focused on accelerating the commercialization of potential breakthrough climate technologies. Further support has been provided by Google for Startups.
"We believe that Othersphere will play a meaningful role in scaling the low-emission commodities that will drive the clean energy transition by addressing the massive project deployment bottleneck," said Mike Winterfield, Managing Partner at Active Impact Investments, Canada's largest climate tech seed fund. "Their platform lowers costs for customers while improving yields and reducing greenhouse gas emissions, all of which accelerates the development and adoption of low emissions commodities."
"Companies have to weigh a huge number of factors when deciding where to locate climate technology projects, from clean hydrogen production to direct air capture," said Ashley Grosh, VP of Breakthrough Energy Fellows. "Othersphere will make it easy for climate tech companies to evaluate where they can have the biggest impact, demystifying a complicated process with the potential to accelerate decarbonization."
Currently in closed beta development, Othersphere's initial SaaS product offers multiple benefits:
"Thanks to our investors, Othersphere is poised to accelerate scaling of zero / low GHG commodities, starting with hydrogen," said Othersphere CEO, Robert Murphy. "Our products are designed to reduce project risk and improve stakeholder alignment, to help unlock the trillions of dollars needed to deliver sustainable, equitable global prosperity. This funding allows us to grow the incredible team that will bring our first product to market. We are excited to hear from potential users and stakeholders as we move toward launch, and in particular hydrogen consumers interested in participating in our offtaker survey program."
For further information: press@othersphere.io, Phone: +1 (236) 428-4400
Source:
Original data source:
Spatial coverage:
Visibility:
Methodology:
Download:
License:
The data provided herein is made available on an "as-is" basis, without warranty of any kind, either expressed or implied. The provider does not guarantee the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of the information. By downloading this data, the user acknowledges that the provider shall not be held liable for any errors, inaccuracies, or omissions in the data, nor for any damages, losses, or consequences arising from the use, misuse, or reliance on this data. The user assumes full responsibility for the use of the information provided and agrees to use it with caution and at their own risk.
Finding ideal sites for infrastructure isn’t about map layers 🗺 — it’s about actionable answers 💡
At Othersphere we are constantly working to make it easier for our users to site, design, and vet infrastructure assets. For example, we recently integrated our Global Land Cost Model 🌍 , which estimates land values globally. This 5-tier ensemble model is trained on terabytes of data, considering factors such as infrastructure, land use, topography, population density, and GDP.
Included within our Explorer tool, this new data helps users more quickly assess one of the many (many) considerations that go into infrastructure developments. In this case, land cost can have a significant impact on project economics, especially for assets with large physical footprints and more modest hardware or operating costs.
Curious about the key factors influencing the results? The example SHAP (SHapley Additive exPlanations) graph provides a breakdown of the six most impactful drivers for a rural landscape, highlighting GDP, population density, and water stress as important drivers of land value.
We recently integrated our Global Land Cost Model, which estimates land values globally and adds this new level of depth into results in Othersphere Explorer.
Equipment sizing and operating strategy LCOH optimizations for hydrogen electrolysis plants are cumbersome and time-consuming. It can take days to weeks to get the data, with each optimization run often taking hours. This limits analytical efforts to a handful of potential sites, leaving many opportunities unexplored.
The result — sub-optimal capital allocation and higher risks, with countless missed opportunities.The difference between initial cost calculations versus hourly optimizations can be dramatic, and highlights location as a critical element of project success.
Othersphere has revolutionized this process by combining the power of our underlying spatial economics platform with neural networks for dimensionality reduction and surrogate modeling.
Our global search engine now recommends pre-optimized projects in seconds, having already run an hourly optimization considering:
1) Hourly day-ahead wholesale power market pricing
2) Grid upgrade CAPEX (developed with a global leader in grid transmission engineering and equipment)
3) Grid fees associated with transmission connections
4) Variable stack efficiency by load, incorporating operational ranges
5) System economies of scale, as well as commercial and technical nuances between PEM and alkaline plants
6) Hourly carbon intensity data
7) Demand profiles and cost of storage
8) Co-located renewables CAPEX
9) High-spatial resolution hourly solar and wind capacity factor data
All of this is delivered through the Othersphere Explorer tool, which provides a novel, bottom-up view of potential hydrogen projects, evaluating key factors such as production costs, emissions, available offtakers, and fit with local surroundings.
Introducing the world’s first global optimizer for hydrogen projects
Please reach out if you would like to learn more about Othersphere, our products, and opportunities to partner in accelerating global industrial decarbonization.
