With the Octopus project, the New Zealand start-up Capture6 and the state-owned water company K-Water in South Korea want to absorb CO2 from the atmosphere and desalinate seawater at the same time.
As a result of climate change, humanity is increasingly confronted with problems. Finally, the proportion of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere is constantly increasing. At the same time, there is less and less clean drinking water due to pollution and environmental disasters.
Many companies have been trying to fill a gap in the market for some time and offer innovative solutions in the fight against climate change.
One example is the New Zealand start-up Capture6, which specializes in carbon capture. In a press release, the company recently announced a strategic partnership with South Korean organizations K-Water and BKT. The goal is to build an unprecedented facility called Projects Octopus.
Project Octopus aims to absorb CO2 from the air
The project is based on the use of the desalination plant operated by K-Water, combined with technologies from Capture6 and BKT. The aim is to absorb CO2, recover drinking water and extract green chemicals. With the partnership, those involved in the project want to demonstrate new technologies for carbon capture technology and water treatment and make them marketable. Because there is a lot of potential in this area.
The time at which the project started is by no means coincidental. The state water utility in South Korea has been building the country's largest desalination plant for some time to provide water for heavy industry in the Daesan industrial complex.
The reason: The region suffers from water shortages due to droughts and dependence on external water resources. The facility is currently located around industrial facilities that produce around 17 megatons of CO2 emissions annually.
Compensation of up to 500,000 tons of CO2 per year is conceivable
This presents an opportunity for Capture6 to test its own Direct Air Capture (DAC) technology to further decarbonize the region. The proposed project represents the world's first fully integrated water management and CO2 removal facility using a seawater desalination plant.
The goal is to develop a large-scale commercial facility capable of removing up to 500,000 tons of CO2 annually. But the choice of location is also attractive for Capture6. The company uses salt water from the plant for the process to create solvents for carbon capture.
At the same time, the technology reduces environmental impact by dumping excess brine into the sea. The facility produces green chemicals from the brine to further decarbonize the water management operations of K-Water and heavy industries such as steel manufacturing.
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Source: https://www.basicthinking.de/blog/2024/01/24/projekt-octopus/
