Building a Distributed Refining Network
The AirPlant™ One eManufacturing facility is operating commercially in Moses Lake, Washington, and Twelve is applying what it has learned to build a distributed refining network. Abundant onshore feedstocks and renewable power set the stage for America’s new wave of industry.
For most of modern industrial history, refining infrastructure has followed the resource. Facilities were built around oil fields, ports, pipelines and other fixed points in the petroleum supply chain because the geography of the feedstock largely determined the geography of production.
AirPlant™ changes that equation. Its primary inputs are CO2, water and electricity, creating greater flexibility in where fuels and chemical feedstocks can be produced. That flexibility is one of the defining advantages of the AirPlant™ platform, but it also makes site selection a critical part of the industrial model.
AirPlant One in Moses Lake, Washington, is already operating commercially, producing two flagship products: E-Jet® Fuel, drop-in synthetic aviation fuel, and E-Naphtha™, a key building block for thousands of everyday products.
As Twelve develops the larger AirPlants that follow, three factors increasingly define the map: the cost and availability of electricity, access to dependable sources of CO2, and the infrastructure required to move finished products efficiently to customers.
Twelve Co-Founder and CEO Nicholas Flanders recently discussed that framework with gasworld, along with how operating experience from AirPlant One is shaping the next generation of facilities.
Start With Power
Electricity is the primary energy input to Power-to-X production and the largest driver of project economics.
At an AirPlant, electricity powers the electrochemical conversion of CO2 and water into synthesis gas, or syngas. That syngas is then converted through established synthesis and upgrading processes into hydrocarbon products with the performance characteristics required by existing markets.
Electricity can account for the majority of variable production costs, making the cost of power foundational to site selection. AirPlant One illustrates the strategy. Moses Lake offers access to abundant Columbia River hydropower, providing the combination of competitive electricity and industrial-scale availability required for commercial production. “That’s the main cost driver for e-fuels and the most important input to our site selection strategy,” Flanders told gasworld.
This creates a different relationship between energy infrastructure and manufacturing. Regions capable of delivering competitive, reliable electricity at industrial scale can become candidates for new hydrocarbon production.
This creates a different relationship between energy infrastructure and manufacturing. Regions capable of delivering competitive, reliable electricity at industrial scale can become candidates for new hydrocarbon production. AirPlants can then convert that power into energy-dense fuels and chemical feedstocks that are storable, transportable and compatible with existing industrial systems.
Bring Carbon to the Advantage
Electricity may define the starting point, but every hydrocarbon molecule also requires carbon. For Twelve, that carbon comes from CO2. The important distinction is that the CO2 source does not necessarily need to be physically attached to the AirPlant. Unlike industrial models that depend on immediate proximity to a particular geological resource, Power-to-X allows carbon and power to be optimized independently.
“It doesn’t need to be directly co-located with the plant,” Flanders said. “It can be moved to the site if the advantage is to have lower-cost power.”
AirPlant One demonstrates that approach today. The facility uses biogenic CO2 captured from a nearby ethanol plant and transported to Moses Lake. Future facilities can source CO2 through truck, rail or pipeline depending on regional infrastructure, project scale and economics.
That flexibility expands the potential geography of production. Rather than requiring every input to exist in precisely the same location, Twelve can prioritize the most important economic variable, competitive electricity, while designing the surrounding supply network to deliver CO2 efficiently.
At larger scale, reliability becomes as important as proximity. Long-term CO2 supply agreements can provide greater visibility into a major feedstock cost, one of several characteristics that can make Power-to-X projects structurally different from production models tied more directly to volatile commodity markets.
Connect Production to Existing Markets
A distributed production model only works if its products can reach customers economically.
That makes logistics the third major component of Twelve’s siting strategy. Future AirPlants are evaluated not only for their access to inputs, but also for their connection to the rail, terminal, pipeline and maritime infrastructure required to move fuels and chemical feedstocks at commercial scale.
For larger AirPlants, rail access becomes particularly important. Access to ports and waterways can create additional options for domestic distribution and export.
The drop-in nature of Twelve’s products strengthens this model. E-Jet Fuel and E-Naphtha are designed to integrate into existing systems rather than requiring entirely new downstream infrastructure. They can move through much of the same logistics network already used to transport the fuels and chemical feedstocks they complement.
The objective is not to eliminate logistics. It is to optimize the entire system around the lowest delivered cost.
“It’s really about optimizing for cost,” Flanders said. “It’s not a hurdle to scale if you can figure out the logistics to be cost effective.”
AirPlant One is More Than the First Plant
Site selection determines where the network grows. AirPlant One is helping determine how.
First-of-a-kind industrial facilities have an importance that extends well beyond their initial output. They generate the operating data, engineering knowledge and real-world performance information that make subsequent facilities more efficient to design, finance, build and operate.
At AirPlant One, one of the most important variables is yield: how effectively each kilowatt-hour of electricity and kilogram of CO2 is converted into the highest-value finished products.
“We’re getting really important and proprietary operating data on how to make sure that we’re maximizing the yield of the e-fuels,” Flanders said. “We want to make as much of the core products as possible from each kilowatt hour of electricity and each kilogram of CO2.”
At industrial scale, incremental improvements matter. Higher conversion efficiency improves plant economics directly, and those gains compound when they are carried forward into every subsequent facility.
AirPlant One is therefore both a commercial production facility and an industrial template. The lessons being generated in Moses Lake are informing the design and operation of AirPlants Two and Three, now in development, as well as the broader platform that follows them.
Scale, Standardize, Repeat
Building a distributed refining network requires more than constructing increasingly large plants. It requires turning first-of-a-kind engineering into a repeatable industrial system.
Twelve’s approach rests on three complementary levers: increasing facility scale, standardizing plant design and continuously improving operating performance.
Larger facilities benefit from economies of scale. Standardization reduces the amount of engineering that must be reinvented from project to project. Operating data creates a feedback loop in which each facility informs the next.
“By making a really standardized plant design, and then making that repeatedly, you’re able to drive down the cost,” Flanders said.
The significance of standardization is not simply lower equipment cost. Repetition can reduce engineering risk, shorten development timelines, improve procurement, create more predictable construction processes and ultimately make infrastructure easier to replicate across geographies.
For Twelve, the long-term objective is to make each AirPlant less of a bespoke industrial project and more of a repeatable node in a broader production platform.
From Plant to Platform
This is where the AirPlant model becomes more consequential than any individual facility.
Power determines where production is economically attractive. CO2 supply provides the carbon. Logistics connect production to customers. Standardization and operating experience make the model increasingly repeatable.
Together, those elements create the foundation for a distributed network of hydrocarbon production that is not constrained to the traditional geography of petroleum refining.
AirPlant One is the first node in that network. AirPlants Two and Three are in development. Each facility that follows can build on the same fundamental architecture while adapting to the power, feedstock and logistics advantages of its region.
The result is a different model for scaling industrial infrastructure: diversify the inputs, distribute production, integrate with existing markets and turn individual plants into a repeatable platform.
That is the larger promise of AirPlant. Not simply a new way to make fuels and chemicals, but a new map for where they can be made.
