CO2 Solution Inc.: A Company Working on Ways to Capture Carbon

In order to mitigate climate change due to greenhouse gas emissions, work is required on various fronts. Conservation measures and more efficient technologies are needed in order to consume less energy. Greater use must be made of renewable energy. And carbon capture and sequestration is needed in order to reduce the effects of the continued use of fossil fuels as a source of energy. Carbon capture and sequestration involves separating CO2 at its sources, such as power plants and factories, transporting it, and injecting it into subsurface geological formations where it can be stored indefinitely and kept out of the atmosphere.

According to the U.S. Department of Energy, the most likely options that have been identified for separating and capturing CO2 from emissions include chemical and physical absorption or adsorption, low temperature distillation, gas separation membranes, and mineralization or bio-mineralization. CO2 Solution Inc., a Canadian company, has adapted carbonic anhydrase, a natural biocatalyst enzyme that manages CO2 during respiration, for use in industrial applications. The enzyme functions in a reactor as a type of industrial lung. The company claims that by applying the enzyme to conventional CO2 capture using capture solvents such as amine, performance is improved, lowering the cost of capturing carbon.

According to CO2 Solution Inc., its technology has been successful at a prototype scale in Alcoa Inc.'s aluminum smelter at Deschambault, Quebec, and at the Quebec City waste incinerator. The company is now commercializing the technology for use in coal-fired power plants, and in the oil sands and other industries that emit significant amounts of CO2 where there is a need for cost-effective carbon capture.

In June 2010, CO2 Solution Inc. announced that the results of its testing indicated that by using its enzyme, the rate of CO2 absorption could be increased more than 10 fold and therefore the size of CO2 absorber columns in coal-fired power plants could be reduced by 90 percent, significantly lowering capital costs. And by using the low-energy properties of MDEA, a solvent used for natural gas treating, the energy required for the process could be reduced by approximately 30 percent compared to the current standard carbon capture process in the industry.

As reported on PR Newswire, in June 2010 the company announced that it had received a U.S. patent that grants exclusivity in using carbonic andydrase with amine solvents for capturing CO2. And as part of its commercialization strategy, in June 2010 CO2 Solutions announced that it had signed an agreement with CLEA Technologies B.V based in the Netherlands. The agreement gives CO2 Solution the global rights to use CLEA Technologies' cross linked enzyme aggregate technology for the carbonic anhydrase enzyme that CO2 Solution uses in carbon capture.

In July 2010, the CNW Group reported that CO2 Solutions Inc. and Codexis had announced that they are working jointly on a program to develop carbon technology to reduce CO2 emissions from coal-fired power plants. Codexis is a U.S. company that provides biocatalysts for producing biofuels, pharmaceuticals and chemicals, and generally to make industrial processes cleaner and more efficient. This program actually began with a joint development program reported on PR Newswire in December 2009, in which Codexis made an equity investment of $2 million Canadian dollars in CO2 Solutions Inc. Through its development agreement with Codexis, CO2 Solution is investing about $3 million in research and development and will receive tax credits for about $600,000 in Quebec.

Sources:
Carbon Capture Research - U.S. Department of Energy
CO2 Solution
CO2 Solution Announces CDN$2 Million Equity Investment by Codexis and Collaboration in Carbon Capture - PR Newswire
CO2 Solution Announces Significant Technical Results - CNW Group
CO2 Solution Announces U.S. Patent Issuance - PR Newswire
CO2 Solution Obtains Exclusive Global Rights to Leading Enzyme Delivery Technology - PR Newswire
CO2 Solution to Receive up to $600,000 for R&D Expenditures - PR Newswire
Codexis and CO2 Solution Unveil Carbon Capture Program - CNW Group