A Startup Wants to Power Data Centers With ‘Supercritical’ Carbon Dioxide — SkimNews
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- American Supercritical launched with $8 million in funding, planning to sell 10-megawatt supercritical CO2 units that retrofit existing gas turbines and capture exhaust heat to generate additional electricity
- Data centers rely on simple-cycle turbines that convert only about 35% of fuel energy to electricity, compared to 60–65% for combined-cycle plants, leaving most energy to escape as exhaust
- Amazon's Texas data center, built with only simple-cycle turbines, is permitted to emit more than 33 million tons of greenhouse gases per year—more than the annual total of some small countries
- The closed-loop CO2 system eliminates or greatly reduces water use in power generation, addressing a major scrutiny point for data centers, and the CO2 never needs refilling, cofounder Matthew Carlson said
- Cofounder Simon Shuham said the units could be converted to work with small modular reactors, a technology that has drawn strong support from the Trump administration; the company has signed an initial agreement with one unnamed partner
- China announced earlier this year that operations began at the world's first geothermal plant using supercritical CO2, and Carlson said he has researched supercritical CO2 applications in nuclear, geothermal, and solar energy
- Industry observers including University of Central Florida professor Subith Vasu flagged remaining technical and cost challenges, while adviser Doug Hofer said incumbent turbine makers are unwilling to fund potential competitors—the 'innovator's dilemma'
Why it matters: The $7 trillion set to be invested in data centers globally by 2030 is driving demand for power that is currently met by inefficient, high-emitting simple-cycle gas turbines—and American Supercritical's retrofits could extract up to 50% more electricity from those turbines without more emissions or water. But the source notes the ceiling: gas-fired turbines still warm the planet, and Amazon's 33-million-ton Texas plant shows the absolute scale of pollution involved even before efficiency gains.
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