NET Power, Rice complete business combination
Clean energy company NET Power, LLC and Rice Acquisition said June 8 they had completed their previously announced business combination, which will be listed on the New York Stock Exchange from June 9 and operate as NET Power Inc.
The merger carries an estimated enterprise value of $1.5bn and a market capitalisation of more than $2bn. Proceeds from the transaction are expected to provide NET Power enough capital to fund its corporate operations and grow its backlog of utility-scale power plant projects, with plant deliveries expected to begin in 2026.
As a result of the business combination, NET Power received gross proceeds of more than $675mn, with more than $135mn coming from Rice Acquisition’s trust account and about $550mn from other strategic and financial investors. Additionally, Occidental provided $10mn in interim financing to support NET Power’s operations through the closing of the business combination.
Since the proposed business combination was announced late last year, NET Power has started front end engineering and design (FEED) for its first standardised utility-scale project near Occidental’s Permian Basin operations and announced a planned joint venture with SK Group to pursue the development of utility-scale NET Power plants across Asia.
“This deal sets NET Power on a path to accelerate the buildout and commercialisation of our technology and bring the world the trifecta of clean, affordable, and reliable energy,” NET Power CEO Danny Rice said. “Rapid deployment of decarbonised baseload power around the world is critical to addressing climate change and NET Power’s technology offers a path forward.”
NET Power’s proprietary process combines oxy-combustion (combustion of natural gas with pure oxygen) with a supercritical CO2 power generation cycle to generate electricity. The process inherently captures more than 97% of produced CO2 for sequestration or utilisation.
“We believe NET Power has a transformative technology that supports our net-zero ambitions through its ability to provide near emissions-free power to our Permian Basin operations and future direct air capture sites,” Occident CEO Vicki Hollub said. Occidental, using technology developed by Canada’s Carbon Engineering, is developing a direct air capture facility in the Permian that will draw an estimated 500,000 metric tons/year of CO2 from the atmosphere.