Carbon Engineering's DAC system integrates two main cycles. The first cycle is the absorption of CO2 from the atmosphere in a device called an "air contactor" using an alkaline hydroxide solution. The second cycle regenerates the capture liquid used in the air contactor, and delivers pure CO2 as an end product. These cycles operate in tandem continuously, producing a concentrated stream of CO2 gas as an output, and requiring only energy, water, and small material make up streams as inputs. Energy is used in such a way that no new CO2 emissions are incurred, and thus do not counteract what was captured from the air. The captured atmospheric CO2 can be stored underground, used for enhanced oil recovery, or turned into low-carbon synthetic fuels using the company's AIR TO FUELS™ technology. Carbon Engineering's Air to fuel process can produce fuels such as gasoline, diesel, or jet A using inputs of atmospheric CO2, water, and renewable electricity such as that from solar PV. Electricity is used to split water and manufacture hydrogen, which is then combined with captured atmospheric CO2 to form fuels. This approach offers a means to deliver clean fuels that are compatible with existing engines, and can help de-carbonize the transportation sector by displacing fuels made from crude oil.
Pilot plant demonstration
In 2015, Carbon Engineering started operations of its full end-to-end pilot plant, located in Squamish, British Columbia, Canada. When running, this facility captures roughly 1 ton of atmospheric CO2 per day. In 2017, the company incorporated fuel synthesis capability into the DAC pilot plant and converted CO2 into fuel for the first time in December 2017. Based on the data obtained from the pilot plant, David Keith and Carbon Engineering published a manuscript on June 7, 2018 that presents a simulation suggesting that CO2 can be captured from the atmosphere at a cost of 94 to 233 USD per ton, "epending on financial assumptions, energy costs, and the specific choice of inputs and outputs." The manuscript, titled "A process for capturing CO₂ from the atmosphere," was published in the journal Joule. Both DAC and Air to fuel technologies have been proven at the pilot plant and are now being scaled up into commercial markets. Individual DAC facilities can be built to capture 1 million tons of CO2 per year. At that scale, one Carbon Engineering air capture plant could negate the emissions from ~250,000 cars—either by sequestering the CO2 or by using the recycled carbon dioxide as a feedstock to produce synthetic fuel. Over 9,500 of Carbon Engineering's air capture plants would be needed to offset the annual CO2 emissions from the estimated 2 billion vehicles by 2035, which includes medium and heavy trucks that emit significantly more greenhouse gases than passenger vehicles. More still would be needed once aviation, mining, agriculture, construction and non-vehicle emissions are factored in.
Commercialization
In May 2019, Carbon Engineering announced it was partnering with Oxy Low Carbon Ventures, LLC., a subsidiary of Occidental, to design and engineer a large-scale Direct Air Capture plant capable of capturing 500,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide from the air each year, which would be used in OLCV’s enhanced oil recovery operations and subsequently stored underground permanently. Construction for the plant is expected to begin in 2021, with the plant becoming operational within approximately two years, and it will be located in the Permian Basin. In September 2019, Carbon Engineering announced they were expanding the capacity of the design of the plant from 500,000 metric tons to an expected one million metric tons of CO2 captured per year.
