Energy climate

Rise Reforming

Website

Geopolitical conflicts and natural disasters frequently expose the vulnerability of the American chemical industry. The reason? Production is centralized and fossil fuel-dependent. The solution? Localized production using an undervalued resource: biogas. The US produces enough biogas to make over $20 bn/y worth of chemicals, but 60% is wasted in lo

Founded 2024Origin source ↗Checked 2026-09-15

Overview

Geopolitical conflicts and natural disasters frequently expose the vulnerability of the American chemical industry. The reason? Production is centralized and fossil fuel-dependent. The solution? Localized production using an undervalued resource: biogas. The US produces enough biogas to make over $20 bn/y worth of chemicals, but 60% is wasted in low-margin applications or flared altogether.

Rise Reforming is commercializing a modular process to transform this underutilized biogas on-site into cheap, supply-secure chemicals. Our beachhead market is dimethyl ether (DME), used as an aerosol propellant and a low-carbon fuel additive in propane. Our target market is methanol: an established billion $ chemical and the future of low-carbon shipping.

We're doing our pilot project at a Chicagoland wastewater plant. This will be the first wastewater biogas-to-methanol demo in the Americas.

We're hiring for a senior chemical process engineer. Apply here: https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/rise-reforming/jobs/wJ9Q9nv-senior-chemical-process-engineer

Company description As recorded 2026-11-08
LinkedIn
Energy climateHardware deviceBusinessesMid marketHardware sales

Founders & team

George Rose

Founder/CEO

Co-founder and CEO at Rise Reforming (S26). Previously @ Nexamp, Highland Electric Fleets, Mantel Capture, GenH. Background in Molecular Engineering @ UChicago.

LinkedIn
Founder profile As recorded 2026-09-15

Lucas Zubillaga

Founder/CTO

Co-Founder & CTO at Rise Reforming (S26). Double B.Sc. in Molecular Engineering and Physics from the University of Chicago. Prev: nuclear waste management at Argonne National Laboratory, offshore wind at Avangrid/Iberdrola. Led the design, procurement, construction, and operation of a bench-scale reforming unit with controls. Also have a Spotify playlist with 200k+ saves. Check it out at: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3rV2gyEKHxixpKa3IDQLvF?si=3458c33e03e84738&nd=1&dlsi=d0006826be884d

LinkedIn
Founder profile As recorded 2026-09-15

Jona van Oord

Founder/COO

Environmentalist turned engineer. Plan on spending the rest of my life building hardware to address the climate disaster :) Co-Founder and COO @ Rise Reforming (S26), Molecular Engineering @ UChicago

LinkedIn
Founder profile As recorded 2026-09-15
4team members reported
Source-reported As recorded 2026-09-15

Founded 2024 · Source

News & product activity

Sources & observations

Hacker News · Y Combinator

Profile depthenriched profile
Website observationwebsite reachable
Last website check2026-11-11
Location · source statedChicago, IL, USA
Pricing evidenceNo pricing page confirmed
Maturity: Not assessed · 3 of 6 areas documented

Source-based assessment · automated evidence rules

The latest capture is empty, blocked or a parked website.

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