Noya

Noya (also referred to as Noya Labs) is a carbon dioxide removal company founded in 2020 and headquartered in San Francisco, California, with an in-person presence listed in Oakland, California. Its stated mission is to accelerate the world's transition to carbon negativity. Initial research and development focused on retrofitting existing cooling towers so they could function as direct air capture (DAC) devices, with the captured CO2 repackaged and resold to industrial CO2 consumers. Under that early model, Noya worked with cooling tower owners, retrofitted the towers to capture CO2 without physical changes to the tower, and paid the owners for the CO2 captured.

Following passage of the U.S. Inflation Reduction Act in 2022, which the company identified as creating an opportunity for DAC developers capturing 1,000 or more tons of CO2 per deployment, Noya shifted to prioritizing larger standalone projects and a modular DAC approach. The company describes a system built from activated-carbon materials soaked in a blend of CO2 capture chemicals; because the materials are electrically conductive, CO2 can be released without the heat losses associated with thermally regenerated sorbents. The design is modular, so additional monoliths can be added to scale a system up.

Founding story

Josh Santos and Daniel Cavero were roommates in San Francisco before founding Noya Labs in 2020. Santos holds a B.S. in chemical-biological engineering from MIT and previously worked on electric vehicle development at Tesla and as a senior program manager for EV powertrain development at Harley-Davidson; Cavero holds a B.S. in mechanical engineering from San Diego State University and previously worked on AI and robotics at Nod Labs and rLoop. Analyzing the cost structure of direct air capture systems, they concluded that a large share of cost hinged on the air contactor component and set out to reduce it to enable a scalable process.

Business model

Noya captures CO2 from the atmosphere and sells the resulting carbon removal or CO2 supply to corporate buyers. In its early cooling-tower model, it retrofitted third-party cooling towers, paid the tower owners for CO2 captured, and repackaged the recovered CO2 for sale to industrial CO2 consumers. Its later focus is on deploying modular direct air capture projects capturing 1,000 or more tons of CO2 per deployment, a threshold tied to U.S. Inflation Reduction Act incentives.

Sale of captured CO2 to industrial consumers and of carbon removal credits to corporate purchasers, including long-term carbon removal credit arrangements such as one with a confidential endowment on behalf of a leading university.

Traction

Reported customers include Shopify, Watershed and Piva Capital. Shopify provided funding for rooftop carbon-capture machines. A confidential endowment acting on behalf of a leading university joined the Series A and partnered with Noya to obtain long-term carbon removal credits. Climatebase lists company headcount in the 21-50 range.

Latest developments

In April 2023, Noya announced an $11 million Series A led by Union Square Ventures and Collaborative Fund, with proceeds directed at expanding the team and its testing and manufacturing capacity and accelerating a first commercial pilot planned for later that year. Press coverage of the round described it as accompanying a pivot to modular direct air capture. Sophie Bakalar of Collaborative Fund and Fred Wilson of Union Square Ventures joined the board of directors as part of the deal.