Crusoe Energy Systems Inc. closed a Series C financing round worth $350 million.
We’re excited to announce our $350m Series C round of funding being led by @G2VPLLC! https://t.co/Z5c5pgciYM
— Crusoe Energy (@CrusoeEnergy) April 21, 2022
It was led by G2 Venture Partners. Participants included: Valor Equity Partners, Lowercarbon Capital, Polychain Capital, Bain Capital Ventures, Founders Fund, MCJ Collective, Winklevoss Capital and others.
One of the new investors is FootPrint Coalition Ventures, the venture firm of Hollywood star Robert Downey Jr.
In addition to equity financing, the company secured credit lines from SVB Capital, Sparkfund and Generate Capital totaling up to $155 million.
Crusoe uses Bitcoin mining powered by flaring gas from associated petroleum gas (APG). It will use the funds to expand outside the United States, accelerate the launch of its CrusoeCloud cloud computing solution, and grow the workforce from 157 to 250 by the end of 2022.
According to the press release, Crusoe deployed 86 modular Digital Flare Mitigation units. The mobile data centres prevented burning of about 71 million cubic metres of gas in flares, cutting methane emissions by 99.89%. Under conventional flare-gas disposal, a substantial amount of this greenhouse gas would be released unburned.
The Crusoe installation fleet could cut CO2-equivalent emissions by 650,000 tonnes per year. That is equivalent to removing about 140,000 cars from the road, the company says.
“Stopping methane emissions from flaring is an immediate and effective step in mitigating climate change. Crusoe’s technology converts gas into valuable computing resources,” said Ben Kortlang, a partner at G2 Venture Partners.
In May 2019 Crusoe raised $4.5 million in a seed round with the participation of Peter Thiel’s and the Winklevoss brothers’ venture firms. In December of the same year the company raised $70 million and announced deployment of 70 Digital Flare Mitigation units.
Crusoe became a partner of ExxonMobil in a pilot project of the oil giant to mine Bitcoin using flare-gas energy in North Dakota.