For industry, CO2 capture is crucial to efforts to become carbon-neutral or even carbon negative.

While there are existing commercial technologies, they fall short in terms of energy efficiency and are also primarily designed to capture CO2 from concentrated sources such as industrial plants, rather than from the air.

A Finnish value chain initiative of scientific and industry partners embarked on a co-research project that aims to address these gaps. The project team will be exploring more effective techniques for directly capturing CO2 from the air and, ultimately, assessing the potential for scaling the technology. If successful, the project could provide a further benefit, beyond reducing atmospheric carbon: the chemicals industry requires carbon for the synthesis of many chemicals; atmospheric carbon could help the industry to move away from fossil-based sources.

The initiative is part of the SPIRIT (Sustainable Plastics Industry Transformation) programme, a Finnish R&D initiative seeking to bring about a circular and net-zero transformation of the plastics value chain.

CO2 direct capture can be sen in Borealis' circular cascade model as a part of their ABC alternatives: Atmospheric carbon, Biomass-based renewable feedstock and Circular tech from mixed waste streams.

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