Aether Fuels

Sanjiv Dabee and Steve Liang bring 60+ years of combined engineering experience developing $50B+ of operating fuel production facilities to their roles leading Aether's Engineering organizations

SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. and SINGAPORE Mar 6, 2023 — Aether Fuels (Aether), a next-generation climate technology company, today named two veteran commercial fuel production technology experts to leadership roles, each as a Vice President of Engineering. Sanjiv Dabee will lead Aether’s Americas-based engineering team and direct the engineering of projects in the region. Steve Liang will lead the Singapore-based engineering team and direct the engineering of projects in Asia.

Aether aims to decarbonize the aviation and shipping industries with affordable sustainable fuels made from flexible combinations of waste biomass, biogenic CO2, and clean hydrogen. The company’s solution combines novel flow sheets and plant configurations, proprietary catalysts, and breakthrough equipment to dramatically reduce capex and the cost of input materials. Production processes are optimized for ultra-high yield and efficiencies, cutting costs even further.

Sanjiv and Steve bring 60+ years of combined experience in biomass conversion, gasification, syngas production, and liquids synthesis to Aether. Their specialized expertise is engineering development of pilot and large-scale gasification-to fuel-plants, from initial design and start-up through full production. They join Aether Co-Founder and CEO Conor Madigan to deploy Aether’s innovative technology in commercial-scale plants in the Americas and Asia.

Sanjiv joins Aether from Fluor where he spent over two decades in the company’s energy solutions business, most recently as Fellow and Director of Process Engineering. While there, he served as a key technical leader in developing $10B+ of fuel project facilities currently in commercial operation, and numerous pilot-scale projects to deploy new fuel production technologies. He began his career at gas-to-liquids pioneer Sasol in South Africa.

Steve has directed the development of currently operational gasification-to-fuel projects, collectively amounting to a capital investment of $40B+ throughout his career. The projects include 56 gasifier trains. Previously, he was General Manager of the world’s largest gasification-to-liquids business unit, where he built and made profitable the Ningxia CTL facility in China, one of the largest Fischer-Tropsch plants in the world. In addition, he co-led and successfully built the US-China Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) Project located in Ordos, China. When completed in 2014, it was the largest CCS project operating in China. Over time, Steve successfully piloted and transferred multiple new process and equipment technologies into mass production.

“We’re excited to welcome Sanjiv and Steve to Aether,” said Madigan. “With relentless technical ingenuity and deep engineering expertise, they have each repeatedly demonstrated the ability to successfully build, ramp up, and run pilot and commercial-scale production fuel facilities. What’s more, they’re entrepreneurial and energetic. They think big, move fast, and are at their best when challenged by formidable engineering problems. Above all, they are deeply committed to mitigating climate threats by empowering industries with sustainable fuels that are predictable, plentiful, and economic.”

Sanjiv holds BS and MS degrees in Chemical Engineering from the University of Cape Town in South Africa. He is a member of the Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering Advisory Board at the University of California, Irvine. He also holds several patents related to syngas technology.

Steve holds a BS degree in Engineering from the Daqing Petroleum Institute in China, and an MBA from the China Europe International Business School. He is a prolific inventor of new technologies and was awarded the Gold Medal for “Outstanding Patented Invention” by the World Intellectual Property Organization in 2012 for innovations related to fuel production technology.

About Aether Fuels

Aether Fuels is a next-generation climate technology company aiming to decarbonize “hard-to-abate” industries like aviation and ocean shipping with breakthrough solutions for producing sustainable fuels that are practical, economical, and scalable. Aether was established in 2022 as a spin-out of Xora Innovation, a deep-tech early-stage investment platform of Temasek. The company is based in the United States and Singapore. www.aetherfuels.com

Contact

Genuity PR for Aether Fuels; email: aetherfuels@genuitypr.com