Member Spotlight: Jeanine Ash

This week, I spoke with Jeanine Ash, biogeochemist, carbon storage expert, climate optimist and VP of Carbon Storage at Capture6. Her path to climate work was anything but straight—and all the richer for it. Her journey spans decades of academic research across oceans and continents, uncovering the deep-time stories written in Earth’s sediments. She is now turning that knowledge into climate tech impact—safely storing CO₂ in global pilot projects.

Laura Knaub: What’s your climate journey?

Jeanine Ash: I’m a biogeochemist, someone who looks at interactions between Earth’s biology, geology and chemistry through time. Climate is a natural application of this lens. 

I took a long and winding path to biogeochemistry - at first I thought I was going to be a classical percussionist! I had some false starts to getting a college degree, and ended up volunteering at a preserve on the coast of Tampa Bay. I spent a lot of long days by myself driving an amphibious golf cart, removing invasive plants, and getting chased by wild pigs. The landscape was beautiful, hurricane season was devastating, and there was evidence all around me of the Seminole people who lived there before us. It got me thinking about how humans, climates and landscapes shape each other. 

I’d been taking classes at community college for almost a decade at this point, and had only two science classes left - which I put off because they seemed like something I would abhor. I ended up taking Intro to Geology and Intro to Environmental Science that summer, and I knew I was supposed to be a geoscientist the second I walked in the classroom. I spend the next decade completing a bachelors, masters, and doctorate degrees in geoscience and geochemistry, then working as an academic researcher. My work took me to oceans all over the world - the Baltic Sea, the Ross Sea, the Gulf of California - drilling kilometers of sediment from under the seafloor, looking for records of past climate and eventually, strange microbes that regulate the methane cycle in the subseafloor. 

I moved from academia into climate tech in 2022. I’d returned back to the southeast US, and the change in the intensity and frequency of extreme climate events was stark. I knew I had to get out of the lab and on the frontlines of climate change mitigation. Geoscientists have a legacy to contend with when it comes to climate change - many of the field’s advances have been for the extraction of fossil fuels and minerals. We also have the agency to direct our knowledge to climate solutions, and that’s what I did. 
I’m now the VP of Carbon Storage at Capture6 where we build projects that integrate with water industry partners to valorize brine and remove atmospheric CO2 using direct air capture. My team and figure out how to  permanently and safely store removed carbon for our projects in Southern California, Western Australia and South Korea.

Laura Knaub: Why did you choose to join 9Zero?

Jeanine Ash: Community is important. My goal is to have a global impact on atmospheric CO2, but that work will always take place in the context of local and regional communities. Also…Seattle winters can be pretty long and dark, it helps to have a place to head to share a cup of tea and stay motivated when it feels like it’s 5pm all day long.

Laura Knaub: Do you have a favorite spot or feature at the Climate Hub?

Jeanine Ash: Tied between the candy dish and the quiet area. I get a lot done when I’m focused and supplied with chocolate!

Laura Knaub: What’s been inspiring you lately?

Jeanine Ash: I’ve been noticing a lot of climate-positive local action in Seattle - more protected bike lanes, rain gardens, and vibrant buy-nothing groups reducing consumption. 
I also think that no time is more critical than right now to work on climate solutions, and I wake up every day and think about how lucky I am to be doing this work in the company of all the other great people working on climate.

Laura Knaub: Can you share a specific moment or experience at the Climate Hub that made you think, “This is exactly where I need to be”? Maybe a great conversation, a valuable connection, or a breakthrough for your work?

Jeanine Ash: I feel like I have one of these every time I come in! Probably my favorite flavor of this is when Lowell runs by and says, “Jeanine - another biogeochemist has joined! I told them to talk to you!” The day we can have “Geoscience Sector Lunch” at 9zero will be the pinnacle.

Laura Knaub: What’s up and coming with Capture6 that you’re  most excited about?

Jeanine Ash: Capture6 is deploying its first pilot projects this year, and I can’t tell you how incredible it feels to have seen these projects grow from emails to meetings to proposals to steel in the ground. I’ve had a counter on my desk since 2022 labeled “tonnes of CO2 removed.” When I get to move that dial from zero to one will probably be one of the proudest moments of my life. 

Also, I maintain a high level of excitement at all times that Taylor Swift will release Reputation, Taylor’s Version any day now. 🐍