Founder - Carbon Mineralisation

over 1 year ago
Contract position
Paris, IDF, FR... more
Paris, IDF, FR... more

Job Description

About Marble

Marble is a climate tech venture studio. Our north star is to erase billions of tons from annual greenhouse gas emissions and create a thriving future.

We partner with scientists, engineers and operators to create deeptech companies that can solve hard climate problems, and reshape multi billion $ industries.

Together, we co-create radical solutions that slash emissions in hard to abate sectors, remove carbon from the atmosphere, and cool the planet. We shape the most promising ideas into new companies, funded by Marble.

We're proud to be backed by leading climate investors across Europe and the US.

 

Hard Climate Problem: CO2 Mineralisation

Mineralisation occurs when certain rocks are exposed to CO2, which binds with calcium, magnesium or other elements to form carbonate minerals. This phenomenon naturally removes 1.1 gigaton of CO2 per year and could be enhanced to multi-gigaton scale by 2050. Mineralisation has three unique advantages: chemical reactions require no energy input, the reactive minerals are in almost unlimited supply, and sequestration into rocks ensure maximum permanence. However, the reaction rate is very slow, the distribution of optimal resources is poorly understood, and certain methods face other challenges across water use, safety, logistics scaleup, and carbon uptake measurement.

We are scoping opportunities to remove these bottlenecks and unlock the gigaton potential of carbon mineralisation. This impact area being relatively unexplored compared to other pathways, we believe that several whitespaces exist for radical improvement.

 

Potential opportunities:

  • Efficient production of artificial, optimised alkaline materials
  • Novel approaches for particle size reduction, either through thermal processes, electrochemistry, bioweathering, soniccation, etc
  • Ex-situ mineralisation reactors that improve reaction kinetics and mass transfer
  • Synergies with mining and industrial operations (carbonation and remediation of alkaline waste streams) or agriculture (enhanced rock weathering)
  • Mapping existing alkaline resources: natural (basalts, peridotites, serpentinites) and human-made (mining and industrial waste)
  • Hybrid applications: metal recovery, clean energy, CO2 utilisation, etc
  • Scaleable logistics to handle very large material quantities
  • Optimised in-situ mineralisation for CO2 storage
  • Carbon-negative concrete
  • Surprise us!

We are actively looking for new Founders in Residence to join us, either:

  1. As First Founders to scope entirely new approaches
  2. As Co-Founders for projects in development within Marble

Ideal Background(s)

If you are a mission-driven individual with deep expertise in one of the areas below, or any adjacent field, we would love to hear from you!

  • Geochemistry and related (e.g. mineralogy, geobiology, other geosciences) with experience in rock weathering and/or CO2 mineralisation
  • OR Process / chemical / mechanical engineering with experience in areas like CCUS, material processing (mining, cement, lime, ceramics, industrial waste), metal recovery, electrochemistry, reactor design, fluid flow in porous media
  • OR Experience in mining, cement, industrial waste management
  • OR Microbiology or biotechnology with experience in bioweathering or bioleaching
  • OR Geospatial data modelling, machine learning

Nice to have: process optimisation, MRV, techno economic modelling, life cycle assessment, exposure to Direct Air Capture and CO2 storage

 

Who We Are Looking For

We encourage you to apply even if you feel you don’t meet all requirements. We know that some skills can be learned while you are building.

We value intelligence, creativity and Founder Potential:

  • You dream of founding your own company and build a stellar team.
  • You are a pragmatic optimist with a driving motivation to mitigate climate change.
  • You know how to communicate about deeply technical subjects in a way that speaks to non technical individual to spark their interest
  • You are self-motivated, outcome focused, and action oriented. You enjoy working on multiple project areas with an interdisciplinary team, in a fast-paced environment.
  • You are naturally inquisitive and curious, anchor on the right concepts quickly, and go deep enough to surface non-obvious insights.
  • You approach radically new ideas with an open mind. You get to the salient questions quickly, and your first instinct is to ask how they scale.
  • You understand that innovation starts with people. You enjoy building collaborations within a team and with external partners.

 

What We Offer

As a Founder-in-Residence, you’ll be joining like-minded individuals who also believe in the need for deeptech solutions to fight climate change.

  • For First Founder opportunities, you would be scoping entirely new approaches together with us, before we go on to find your future co-founders.
  • For Co-Founder opportunities, you would be partnering with a Founder in Residence who has already been developing a great idea within Marble. You will have the opportunity to meet her/him before making any big commitment — to learn more about the idea and evaluate how well you’d be working together!

In both cases, we offer (among other things)

  • A €2500 monthly allowance during your participation in the programme
  • A €250,000 pre-seed investment on startup creation, if you are successful. You and your team will own 80% of the company at pre-seed.
  • Full-stack support in our venture creation programme
    • Mentorship and guidance at every step of the way
    • Hands on support across technology and market research, landing interviews with experts and customers, techno economic modelling, roadmap and scaleup strategy, sourcing your future co-founders and advisors, and more
    • Access to an unparalleled network across science, industry, talent, investors, mentors, and other climate deeptech founders
    • Access to our research insights, knowledge base and curated resources
    • Weekly check-ins, work sessions in our Paris HQ (or remote) and continuous peer learning with other programme participants
  • Seed Fundraising support after the programme. Introductions to the best seed investors and help with term sheet negotiation.
  • Founder Visa sponsorship if you wish to relocate to France. Remote participation is possible, preferably from Europe and with regular in-person meetings.

 

How To Apply

We are currently taking applications for the April 2023 cohort:

We believe that a diverse group of minds is key to solving the climate crisis. We strongly encourage women and people of colour to apply.

Studies have shown that under-represented candidates are less likely to apply for a role unless they feel they meet every single qualification.

We are committed to building a diverse, inclusive and mission-driven cohort. If you’re excited about the programme but your past experience doesn’t align perfectly with what you read on our website, we encourage you to apply anyways!

 

FAQs

For a full list of FAQs, please visit our website.

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