U of C technology converts waste CO2 into high value fuels, chemicals

Dr. Beatriz Molero, PhD developed the groundbreaking technology which has attracted interest from around the globe.

CO2
U of C Faculty of Science's Dr. Beatriz Molero, PhD won the Mitacs Environmental Entrepreneur Award at a ceremony on Halifax last Tuesday for her technology that converts harmful GHGs, including CO2, into carbon monoxide, hydrogen, oxygen or syngas. Mitacs Twitter photo.

A University of Calgary postdoctoral fellow’s research work converts greenhouse gas emissions into high value fuels and chemicals before they are released into the environment, significantly cutting CO2 emissions.

The technology developed by U of C Faculty of Science’s Dr. Beatriz Molero, PhD won the Mitacs Environmental Entrepreneur Award at a ceremony on Halifax last Tuesday.

“If our commercial scale units were to be used by our end users, such as green plastics or petrochemicals producers, we would significantly decrease CO2 emissions-equivalent to removing 100 million cars off the roads or 700,000 jet planes out of the skies,” said Molero. “For every ton of CO2 removed and re-used, three tons of CO2 emissions are eliminated.”

The technology is a high temperature electrolyzer that uses CO2 from an industrial company’s waste stream and converts it into carbon monoxide, hydrogen, oxygen or syngas (hydrogen and carbon monoxide mixture), all of which can be used downstream or sold for profit.

While the unit requires electricity to run, it is being designed to used excess renewable energy from wind and solar sources.

“We’re trying to stop the increase of greenhouse gas emissions and eventually reduce them, and at the same time we’re monetizing the process by giving businesses a valuable asset at the end,” said Molero. “We need to have economically viable technologies so that industry will be willing to adopt them.”

Beatriz Molero along with her supervisor Dr. Viola Birss, PhD, developed the Intellectual Property (IP) together. Following that, Molero and colleague Dr. Paul Addo, PhD, competed in and were finalists in the GreenSTEM Fellows program, managed by Innovate Calgary, where they received mentorship and IP support to grow their venture; Molero, as chief technology officer, and Addo then founded Calgary-based SeeO2 Energy. Birss continues to serve as a scientific advisor in SeeO2.

Since its launch in April 2018, SeeO2 Energy now has three full-time employees, 10 industry advisors and five board members.

A successful bench-top prototype has been completed, and the company is now securing $1.5 million in seed funding to develop a larger-scale field test unit, with testing scheduled to start in the first quarter of 2020.

The first companies to test the technology include a U.S.-based green plastic producer and ATCO Energy, a natural gas and electricity retailer. Commercial shipments are expected to start in 2021.

“This technology has the potential to be used worldwide,” says Molero, adding that companies from the EU and Asia are already expressing interest. “I come from a scientific and academic background, so this award is validation that in the short time we’ve been at this, we’ve done something right.”

Molero is one of five winners of the Entrepreneur Award, presented by Mitacs (www.mitacs.ca), who are being recognized for their efforts to turn their research into an innovative business that impacts the lives of Canadians.

Mitacs is a national, not-for-profit organization that partners companies, government and academia to promote Canadian research and training.

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