Collison brothers' Frontier carbon-removal fund makes €52m bet on crushed rocks

A growing number of startups are developing negative-emission technologies that the world is increasingly likely to need in the coming decades in a bid to limit global warming to 1.5C.

Patrick and John Collison are founders of Frontier, which plans to invest €0.92bn in carbon-removal startups.

A Stripe-led group that buys carbon removal services has made its biggest bet yet on a small startup that uses crushed rocks to clean the atmosphere.

Alphabet and JPMorgan Chase are among the buyers that will pay Lithos Carbon $57.1m (€52.4m) to remove around 154,000 tons of carbon, Frontier said. The San Francisco-based startup will pull that amount of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere between 2024 and 2028 using a technique known as enhanced rock weathering (ERW).