– Lilac Solutions announced a $150m Series B financing round led by Lowercarbon Capital and funds and accounts advised by T. Rowe Price Associates.
– The round was also joined by Mercuria Energy Trading and Valor Equity Partners; existing investors Breakthrough Energy Ventures and The Engine also participated in the round.
– Lilac has developed a new ion exchange technology to increase production of lithium from brine resources.
– Lilac will use the new funds to ramp production of the company’s unique ion exchange beads, expand its teams of engineers and field operators, and deploy the technology globally.
– Most of the world’s lithium is contained in brine resources – naturally occurring deposits of salt water. These brines are abundant, but resource developers have struggled to bring projects into production due to a lack of cost-effective technology.

– Compound Foods is a synthetic biology company that creates coffee without coffee beans.
– The company raised $4.5m in seed funding.
– Backers include Chris Sacca’s climate fund Lowercarbon Capital, SVLC, Humboldt Fund, Collaborative Fund, Maple VC, Petri Bio and angel investors like Nick Green, CEO of Thrive Market.

– Nitricity, an agtech startup with unique technology to produce renewable nitrogen fertilizer at point-of-use, announced the close of a $5m Series Seed investment round led by Energy Impact Partners.
– The funding will enable the company to accelerate innovations and recruit top engineering talent in the climate tech and agriculture fields.
– The round included participation from new investor Fine Structure Ventures as well as existing investors including Lowercarbon Capital and MCJ Collective.