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🌞 Researchers at ETH Zürich are pioneering a groundbreaking method to remove carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere with sunlight alone, which marks a potential breakthrough in carbon dioxide removal (#CDR).
🧪 Led by Maria Lukatskaya, the research team’s innovative process relies on light-activated molecules to influence the acidity of a liquid, ultimately enabling the efficient capture and release of CO2.
Here is a [very simplified] breakdown of how it works:
🌬️ Air is passed through a liquid containing photoacids in a dark environment. Since this liquid is alkaline, it prompts CO2 to react and form carbonates.
🔦 When a significant amount of carbonates accumulates in the liquid, the researchers irradiate it with light, rendering it acidic. This transformation causes the carbonates to revert to gaseous CO2, which is released and collected (akin to the fizz in a bottle of carbonated water).
🌑 When CO2 levels in the liquid are sufficiently reduced, the researchers simply switch off the light, and the cycle restarts, making the liquid ready to capture CO2 once more.
⚡ The ETH Zurich’s approach eliminates the need for energy-intensive heating or cooling, making it much more energy-efficient compared to traditional carbon capture technologies, reliant on temperature or pressure differentials that necessitate significant energy inputs.
🥼 While this research is in the early-stage lab phase, it demonstrates the potential for photoacids in CO2 capture. The next steps involve enhancing the stability of photoacid molecules and optimising the overall process to bring this innovative method closer to market readiness.
📣 This is an exciting, novel new development that demonstrates the need for tech-neutral policies to support a wide-range of solutions to ramp up CDR to reach our global net-zero targets and fight climate change.
❓ Would love to hear your thoughts.
🔗 Link to paper: https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.chemmater.3c02435
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