{"id":157057,"date":"2025-01-28T07:15:00","date_gmt":"2025-01-28T06:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/?p=157057"},"modified":"2025-01-24T14:44:15","modified_gmt":"2025-01-24T13:44:15","slug":"what-you-need-to-know-about-carbon-capture-utilization-and-storage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/what-you-need-to-know-about-carbon-capture-utilization-and-storage\/","title":{"rendered":"What you need to know about carbon capture, utilization and storage"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
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\"Cornell's
Cornell’s Combined Heat and Power Plant will provide researchers access to real-world flue gas emissions as home to the CAPTURE-Lab, an experimental facility that will explore carbon capture and industrial decarbonization. \u00a9<\/strong> Cornell University<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

To contain the damage of climate change, reducing emissions and switching to renewable energy sources will not be enough. Removing some of the excess carbon dioxide warming our planet is critically important; however, current methods for human-directed carbon capture are expensive and inefficient. To support the development of new carbon capture technologies, nine Cornell researchers are establishing the Cornell Advanced Platform for Testing, Utilization, and REsearch in CO2<\/sub> capture and conversion technologies (CAPTURE-Lab). <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The experimental facility will explore carbon capture, utilization or storage, and industrial decarbonization, and it will be sited at Cornell\u2019s existing Combined Heat and Power Plant to give researchers access to real-world flue gas emissions. Three researchers leading CAPTURE-Lab development and research on carbon capture, utilization and storage are Tobias Hanrath<\/a>, the David Croll Professor in Engineering in the R.F. Smith School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Phillip Milner<\/a>, associate professor of chemistry and chemical biology in the College of Arts and Sciences and a field member in the R.F. Smith School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, and Greeshma Gadikota<\/a>, associate professor in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ben Furnas<\/a>, visiting senior fellow at Cornell Atkinson and former executive director of the 2030 Project: A Cornell Climate Initiative<\/a>, interviewed Gadikota, Hanrath and Milner<\/a> about their research and goals for the CAPTURE-Lab. <\/p>\n\n\n

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\"\"
Tobias Hanrath, the David Croll Professor in Engineering in the Smith School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering. \u00a9<\/strong> Cornell University<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Furnas:<\/strong> What is carbon capture and industrial decarbonization? What is the challenge we\u2019re trying to solve?<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Hanrath:<\/strong> A little over 100 years ago, CO2<\/sub> levels were about 300 parts per million (ppm) in the atmosphere. When I was young in the 1980s, CO2<\/sub> levels were at 340 ppm. Today, they\u2019re at 425 ppm. CO2<\/sub> levels have increased that much in just the span of two generations. The pressing questions are what these levels might be in two more generations, and what we\u2019re doing about this now to proactively remove a lot of CO2<\/sub>, very quickly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Milner:<\/strong> About two-thirds of all greenhouse gas emissions come from combustion of fossil fuels for energy production. We can\u2019t switch over quickly enough to solar and wind and other sustainable fuel sources; we have to also do carbon capture. Which means we have to design new types of materials or catalysts that can capture that CO2<\/sub> and convert it into useful chemicals and products.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gadikota:<\/strong> Our estimates show that electrification, particularly using renewable energy resources, will really help cut down CO2<\/sub> emissions, but there\u2019s still going to be emissions from hard-to-abate sectors \u2013 such as the iron, steel, and cement industries \u2013 so our technologies need to help manage those emissions, as well. <\/p>\n\n\n

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\"Phillip
Phillip Milner, associate professor of chemistry and chemical biology. \u00a9<\/strong> Cornell University<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Furnas: What are the problems with existing carbon capture technologies?<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Milner:<\/strong> For a lot of post-combustion carbon capture and direct-air capture efforts, we rely on a century-old technology using molecules called amines that can selectively pull carbon dioxide out of these streams. But certain amines are very prone to degradation, especially by oxygen, which is of course one of the major components of air. So we\u2019re essentially trying to use air-sensitive molecules to pull CO2<\/sub> out of air. That really compromises the long-term stability of these materials. Some amines also produce ammonia as a byproduct, which is either released as a pollutant, or captured itself, at significant cost. So our goal is to figure out fundamentally new chemistry by which we can selectively remove carbon dioxide from hard-to-abate sectors, and also directly from air. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Furnas: There\u2019s been a huge amount of new federal legislation designed to make major investments in decarbonization technologies, including carbon capture utilization and storage. Have you been able to leverage this new support to make measurable progress in decarbonization? <\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Gadikota<\/strong>: Yes. We received Rapid Response Fund<\/a> seed support from Cornell Atkinson, and leveraged the progress we made to earn a $4 million grant from the Department of Energy to develop energy-efficient carbon capture and conversion solutions. We\u2019ve developed technologies that can take CO2 and turn it into inorganic carbon, as calcium and magnesium carbonates, in very energy-efficient pathways. This allows us to make sustainable cements and reduce the carbon footprint of cement production significantly. We\u2019re now working with several industry partners<\/a> here in the US, to help decarbonize the cement industry. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Furnas: How will the CAPTURE-Lab support decarbonization efforts? <\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Hanrath:<\/strong> There are researchers around the world working to address this challenge, with a variety of new chemistries and technologies that work in the lab. But a critical translational aspect of this is demonstrating that it works not just if you feed it CO2<\/sub> from a high-purity cylinder under carefully controlled laboratory conditions, but CO2<\/sub> from real-world sources like a power plant, with all its impurities. So the ability to walk over to an actual, working heat and power plant, like Cornell has right on campus, and set up your technology and run it with flue gas is a critical, unmet need to attract support from federal funding agencies like DOE, the private sector, and investors to really move these technologies forward and have an impact. The CAPTURE lab addresses a critical gap to enable lab-to-impact translation of emerging CO2<\/sub> capture and conversion technologies. Cornell\u2019s \u2018living laboratory\u2019 approach and close collaboration between facilities, academics, and start-ups presents a unique opportunity in this space.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Milner:<\/strong> The U.S. government does have a testing facility, but it is for testing things on a fairly massive scale. If you\u2019re at a tiny scale \u2013 at the discovery stage \u2013 it\u2019s really difficult to find someone who will help you with that. Cornell is powered by a natural gas-fired combined heat and power plant, so we\u2019re building a permanent testing station right next to the plant, the CAPTURE-Lab, where anyone in the world could come and bring their materials or catalysts and test them on actual flue gas with no strings attached. <\/p>\n\n\n

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\"Greeshma
Greeshma Gadikota, associate professor in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering (right). \u00a9<\/strong> Cornell University<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Furnas: As leaders in carbon capture research, why have you chosen to do your work at Cornell? <\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Gadikota: <\/strong>It\u2019s really been a pleasure being here at Cornell and being able to develop scalable technologies, in collaboration with graduate students and postdocs. Cornell Technology and Licensing has been instrumental in helping us go through the patenting process and license this technology. One startup that we\u2019ve developed from this research, Carbon to Stone<\/a>, has raised close to $2 million in funds to get this technology across from the academic valley of death and into translation in industry. I\u2019m incredibly grateful to Cornell as well as our industry partners.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hanrath:<\/strong> The support for interdisciplinary research and interdisciplinary thinking at Cornell, including through Cornell Atkinson and the 2030 Project<\/a>, has been very helpful. In my lab we seek to combine perspectives from many fields. For example, we\u2019re looking at the ways plants catalyze CO2<\/sub>, as opposed to the ways humans have devised to catalyze CO2<\/sub>. If you think about how plants are designed, they\u2019re adaptable to a wide range of different environments, they\u2019re dynamic \u2013 they\u2019re an obviously successful carbon-capture technology. Humans, on the other hand, as a species, are better than nature at manipulating electricity and electrons in general. Can we learn from the things plants are doing well, in design, and then optimize electron-driven catalysis? Particularly, can we do so photochemically, using light directly? This meshing of plant science and engineering is an inspiration for our technology development.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Milner:<\/strong> The CAPTURE-Lab in particular fits perfectly into Cornell\u2019s view of the university as a living laboratory. One primary goal in my lab is to decrease the energy needed to capture carbon. Current technologies require heating up to very high temperatures \u2013 sometimes over 900 degrees C \u2013 and that\u2019s why we can\u2019t do it at a massive scale right now. We\u2019re really excited about developing alternative chemical processes that enable solar light to directly drive the carbon capture and release process. We\u2019ve done experiments using flue gas from the Cornell heat and power plant and shown that it does work, so now we\u2019re improving, testing, and working to scale our discoveries. We really needed to be doing carbon capture about 30 years ago, but the second-best time to do it is now. Existing technologies have significant limitations, so we need to fundamentally improve those technologies for the next generation and generations to come. <\/a><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To contain the damage of climate change, reducing emissions and switching to renewable energy sources will not be enough. Removing some of the excess carbon dioxide warming our planet is critically important; however, current methods for human-directed carbon capture are expensive and inefficient. To support the development of new carbon capture technologies, nine Cornell researchers […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":114,"featured_media":157059,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","nova_meta_subtitle":"The experimental facility will explore carbon capture, utilization or storage, and industrial decarbonization, and it will be sited at Cornell\u2019s existing Combined Heat and Power Plant","footnotes":""},"categories":[5571],"tags":[10744,12330,10416,10408,10743],"supplier":[1166],"class_list":["post-157057","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-co2-based","tag-carboncapture","tag-ccu","tag-circulareconomy","tag-greenchemistry","tag-useco2","supplier-cornell-university-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157057","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/114"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=157057"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157057\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/157059"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=157057"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=157057"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=157057"},{"taxonomy":"supplier","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/supplier?post=157057"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}