22: Interview with Applied Carbon – the 2024 Wilkes Climate Launch Prize Winner

In September this year, the Wilkes Center for Climate Science and Policy awarded Applied Carbon, the climate tech company based in Houston, Texas, the $500,000 Wilkes Climate Launch Prize.Applied Carbon, formerly Climate Robotics, is a technology company designing automated biochar production machines that convert in-field agricultural crop waste into biochar.Jason Aramburu, who is a Co-founder and CEO of the company, has researched biochar since he was an undergraduate student at Princeton, and in the last 15 years he and a partner have been developing a technology to utilize biochar for large commercial agricultural operations.Biochar was in fact produced by Indigenous farmers in Central and South America for thousands of years to improve crop yields. It is made heating plant matter to high temperatures and applying it to the soil.  And, as it turns out, biochar could also be a promising and durable way to remove excess carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.Jason Aramburu visited Salt Lake City to receive the Wilkes Climate Prize, and I was fortunate to have some time to talk with him about the success of his biochar startup, and how he envisions his biochar technology becoming a climate change solution and making a positive impact on commercial agriculture more broadly.wilkescenter.utah.edu/podcast/22-interview-with-applied-carbon/