There's still some life in the carbon removal market, despite major purchaser Microsoft's pause earlier this year.

Case in point: U.S. Bank is buying its first carbon removal credits from Carba's Minnesota landfill project, the companies tell Axios Pro.

What they're saying: "This market is continuing, it's growing, it's maturing," says Carba CEO Andrew Jones, a chemical engineer and a Minnesota native.

• Carba, a Minneapolis-based startup that has raised $6 million in seed funding from Rusheen Capital Management, plans to launch a Series A round shortly, Jones tells Axios Pro.

• U.S. Bank chose the project because biochar production is a proven process, and for its Minnesota community ties, says Ariel Meyerstein, the bank's head of sustainability.

Inside the landfill: Carba has deployed the first of four reactors, which heat biomass without oxygen and turn it into biochar, a charcoal-like substance that stores carbon.

• The landfill project converts wood chips, made from trees trimmed away from utility lines, and buries the biochar underground to increase the carbon removal's permanence.

• Carba's reactor uses molten salts as a heat transfer fluid, letting it lock in more carbon than would a traditional biochar reactor, while more efficiently managing high temperatures.

• Because the reactors are deployed on site at the landfill, it reduces the costs of moving the feedstock around.

Zoom in: The project was the first to receive validation from Isometric for biochar storage in low-oxygen environments.

• Carba says its process is low-cost, under $100 per ton removed, and can remove carbon for a thousand years.

The intrigue: Microsoft — which paused its carbon removal this year amid slowing demand — is already buying credits for 44,000 tons of carbon removed from the project.

The big picture: Expensive carbon removal technologies like direct air capture have struggled to scale, and some carbon removal companies have looked to focus on power generation.

Reality check: U.S. Bank wouldn't comment on future prospective investments.

• "This was a test balloon, and we'll see what the future brings," says Meyerstein

Read the article on Axios