NitroVolt, a Danish startup developing green ammonia for farmers, today announced it has raised €3.5 million in seed funding. The participants in the round include BackingMinds, a Swedish early-stage venture capital firm, EIFO, the sovereign wealth fund of Denmark, and EQT Foundation, Satgana, and DivisionM. The Breakthrough Energy Fellowship provided a grant in 2023 and is now following that with an equity investment in the current round. The funding round will be used to build the first on-site container-sized demonstration unit, producing green ammonia from air, water, and clean electricity.
Current ammonia bulk production methods emit 500 Mt CO2 / year, equivalent to 2% of global CO2 emissions, which is on par with the entire aviation industry and 18.5 times larger than the entire yearly CO2 emission of all Nordic countries. And ammonia is also synthesized in large and centralized facilities, far away from the point-of-use, leading to additional CO2 emissions from distribution. Furthermore, the whole supply chain is at the mercy of global events and political disruptions, as evidenced by the drastic price increases during the COVID pandemic and war in Ukraine.
NitroVolt is working towards a solution that will produce green ammonia directly at the point-of-use – at the farm – thus transforming this cumbersome and long supply chain while circumventing all CO2 emissions. This is done with the company’s “Nitrolyzer” system, which will be a container-sized system that combines only air, water, and renewable electricity in an electrocatalytic ammonia synthesis process. And NitroVolt’s solution totally removes fossil fuels from the production process, making its ammonia 100% renewable, carbon-free, and competitive with current ammonia prices.
With the seed funding round, NitroVolt plans to take its technology to the real world. And the next phase of the company will be to scale its technology and prove viability by building a demonstration unit on a farm. The funding round will also be used to identify and forge partnerships with partners and suppliers to further support the scaling and building of these systems as the company continues to grow.
KEY QUOTES:
“My ambition in life is to make a measurable and lasting positive impact, which is exactly why we started NitroVolt. The climate crisis demands action today, and by providing small modular units, we can do a fast implementation of a green solution. What gets me excited to go to work every day is the knowledge that NitroVolt has the possibility of enabling both environmental impact by abating significant CO2 emissions and societal impact by proving nitrogen-fertilizer to the most exposed and at-risk regions, thereby alleviating global hunger.”
- CEO Suzanne Zamany Andersen, Ph.D. in Physics Engineering who in 2017 founded the company together with CTO Mattia Saccoccio, Ph.D. in Mechanical and Energy Engineering
“The invention of industrial ammonia production has been vital in sustaining the world’s growing population throughout the last century. Unfortunately, current production methods take a huge toll on the climate and in EIFO we are excited to support Nitrovolt on their journey to bring ammonia production into the green era where it is needed the most – on farms all around the world.”
- Lasse Truels Köhler, investment manager at green investments at EIFO
“NitroVolt’s technology is a potential game changer for farmers and our food security. The founders, Suzanne and Mattia, have impressed us with their execution power and have recruited a great core team around them. We’re proud to continue to NitroVolt and are happy to see a stellar line up of new investors join this round.”
- Jasenko Hadzic, Principal at BackingMinds
