What They Do

Aquatic Labs is unlocking scalable ocean carbon removal through breakthrough sensor technology that measures the marine carbon cycle with unprecedented precision. Their core innovation — a solid-state sensor that measures total alkalinity, pH, and other carbonate system variables in real time, without reagents — addresses a critical measurement gap for scaling ocean-based carbon removal methods such as Ocean Alkalinity Enhancement (OAE).

While Aquatic Labs’ catalytic impact on carbon removal was clearly the primary focus behind Counteract’s investment, their same technologies can deliver industrial process monitoring solutions, biodiversity monitoring applications, regulatory compliance for offshore infrastructure, and broader ocean health diagnostics, thus providing a risk-mitigated commercialisation trajectory.

Why It Matters

Credible carbon removal depends on reliable measurement. For ocean-based methods like OAE, that means tracking four variables: pH, pCO₂, total alkalinity (TA), and dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC).

Until now, no sensor could directly measure TA or DIC in situ. Instead, the industry has relied on expensive lab analysis or uncertain models. Autonomous sensors exist for pH and pCO₂, but these two variables alone can't accurately define the carbonate system. Aquatic Labs changes that. Their sensors can deliver continuous, in-situ data on the full carbonate system, at a low cost and a view for massive scale.

Led by tour-de-force Allan Adams, Aquatic is building the foundational data the ocean carbon economy needs to move from pilots to gigatonne scale.