Sora Fuel

Sora Fuel is a climate technology company focused on producing sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) by utilizing carbon captured directly from the atmosphere. Founded in 2024, the company was conceived within the venture firm Engine Ventures, built upon technology developed in Curtis Berlinguette's lab at the University of British Columbia. The founding team includes CEO Gareth Ross, who was previously an Executive in Residence at Engine Ventures and an executive at MassMutual, and Chief Science Officer Patrick Sarver, who holds a PhD in Chemistry from Princeton University and was a Venture Associate at Engine Ventures.

The company operates in the sustainable fuels market, specifically targeting the aviation industry, which is seeking to decarbonize its operations. Sora Fuel's business model revolves around the production and sale of e-fuels created through a closed-loop system that requires only water, air, and renewable electricity. A key milestone was securing an oversubscribed $6 million seed funding round in August 2024, led by Engine Ventures with participation from Wireframe Ventures, to expand its Boston-based team and advance its technology. The company is actively pursuing commercialization partnerships and offtake agreements with jet fuel purchasers. In November 2024, Sora Fuel announced a collaboration with Emerging Fuels Technology (EFT) to combine its direct air capture (DAC) technology with EFT's Fischer-Tropsch synthesis capabilities. Further demonstrating market traction, the company signed an offtake agreement in June 2025 with Future Energy Global for the environmental attributes of the first 10 million gallons of its future e-SAF production.

Sora Fuel's core product is a sustainable aviation fuel that is chemically equivalent to traditional jet fuel but produced with a carbon-neutral footprint. The technology's central feature is a patented liquid bicarbonate electrolyzer that captures atmospheric CO2 and converts it directly into syngas, a precursor to liquid fuels. This process significantly reduces the energy inputs typically required for direct air capture, claiming to capture CO2 at a cost of just $20 per ton, a substantial reduction compared to other DAC solutions. By combining carbon capture and utilization into a single, efficient process, the system eliminates the need for other feedstocks and allows for the production of SAF at prices intended to be comparable to conventional Jet A fuel. The company's approach enables the placement of SAF production plants in any location with access to affordable renewable energy, addressing a key logistical challenge for scaling up SAF production to meet global demand.

Keywords: sustainable aviation fuel, SAF, e-fuels, direct air capture, DAC, carbon capture and utilization, bicarbonate electrolyzer, syngas, Fischer-Tropsch, renewable energy, climate tech, aviation decarbonization, carbon-neutral fuel, Gareth Ross, Patrick Sarver, Engine Ventures, clean energy, drop-in fuel, electrochemistry, CO2 conversion