Companies leading the hunt for ways to skim carbon dioxide from the air are attracting interest from big deep-pocketed corporations — including oil companies.
HUNTSVILLE, Ala. — At the end of a cul-de-sac called Fresh Way, two bright green structures the size of shipping containers gleam in the warm sunlight, quietly sucking from the air the carbon dioxide that is warming the planet.
will require measures to reduce emissions, including the further deployment of existing and new technologies.” Over the past several years, the firms have vied to make technological progress. The cost of carbon capture has fallen from $600 a ton to as low as $100 a ton — and lower if a cheap or free source of heat or energy is available.
The federal tax credits, known as 45Q credits, were slipped into the 2018 federal budget in the wee hours of Feb. 9, 2018, after a nine-hour government shutdown. It attracted support from both parties, with leading roles played by Sen. John Barrasso , whose state relies heavily on oil, gas and coal production, and Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse , who has spoken almost weekly on the Senate floor about the urgency of climate change and the danger of burning fossil fuels.
But of the 65 million tons of carbon dioxide that is pumped underground in the United States every year, about 60 million tons is for enhanced oil recovery, said Sally Benson, co-director of Stanford University’s Precourt Institute for Energy. And demand is growing. “People now understand the need for addressing climate change,” Carbon Engineering’s chief executive Steve Oldham said in an interview after testifying before a Senate committee. “When you don’t have a solution, it’s a scary thought.”
Drawing on research at the University of Calgary and Carnegie Mellon University, Carbon Engineering converts carbon dioxide into transportation fuels. It does that by combining CO2 with hydrogen — creating a carbon neutral cycle. That could help oil companies meet California’s requirement to reduce the carbon intensity of motor fuels by 20 percent by 2030.
Like Global Thermostat, Climeworks traps CO2 simply by exposing a filter to air. The filter contains amines, a derivative of ammonia. Once the filter is saturated, it is heated with steam past the boiling point of 100 degrees Celsius, hot enough to free the carbon dioxide so it can be pumped into pipes or storage tanks. Currently, the Climeworks uses free waste heat from a local incinerator, reducing its costs.Global Thermostat has a somewhat different model than the other two.
The company’s process uses devices called monoliths that look like sponges to maximize surface area. That area is covered with amines, the nitrogen based chemical that naturally absorbs carbon dioxide from the air. The monoliths are similar to those used in catalytic converters and Chichilnisky says that the manufacturer Corning has provided key materials.
Many analysts wonder why the direct air capture companies don’t place their devices near the exhaust of a natural gas or coal plant. Chichilnisky explains that sometimes lower concentrations work better, just as gasoline in a combustion engine needs oxygen. She said that their process requires less energy and works best at concentrations found in the air at 400 parts per million, 300 times more diffuse than in power plant smokestacks.
Arguing that is doable, Climeworks notes that it is equal to the number of shipping containers that pass through Shanghai harbor every two weeks.
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