The climate technology startup SpiralWave has unveiled a futuristic, sci-fi-esque device that transforms carbon dioxide into liquid fuel, and it could be a game-changer in fighting the climate crisis.
As TechCrunch reported, SpiralWave was co-founded by Abed Bukhari and Adam Amad. Bukhari made spectrometers and semiconductor equipment at his previous startup, KomraVision. Some of the components used a partially ionized gas called cold plasma, which Bukhari realized could be utilized in carbon capture technologies.
"I needed to build something that can stall the biggest challenge we have on Earth these days, which is removing a huge quantity of CO2," he told TechCrunch.
However, unlike most carbon capture and storage facilities that trap CO2 and store it underground, Bukhari's system uses "pulsing plasma towers," as the news outlet explained, to break down carbon dioxide.
According to the report, waves of white plasma are stimulated by microwaves of varying frequencies, which trigger chemical reactions to separate the molecular bonds holding CO2 together, among other results.
"The first one breaks down CO2 into CO, the second one breaks down H2O into H and OH, and the third one is to join them into methanol," Bukhari told TechCrunch.
Methanol, also known as wood alcohol, is a colorless liquid that can be used as an alternative fuel, according to the Department of Energy. While it has been used in the past in conventional gas-powered cars, it primarily fuels race cars, some model aircraft, some commercial vehicles, and ships today.
Aside from being burned as fuel, methanol can also be utilized in industrial applications or to produce chemicals such as formaldehyde or acetic acid. As TechCrunch explained, SpiralWave's technology turns 75% to 90% of the system's electrical energy into chemical energy stored as methanol.
This is more energy-efficient than other techniques — such as combining wind power, electrolysis, and direct air capture — for transforming carbon dioxide into methanol. According to some research, this combined method has an efficiency of around 50%.
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SpiralWave has built several prototype plasma devices, including the Nanobeam and Microbeam. These systems can generate somewhat over a ton of methanol with a carbon dioxide concentration of around 90% and 7,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity.
The team is already brainstorming other plasma wave systems, Megabeam and Gigabeam, that would have an even bigger impact. Gigabeam is expected to be nearly 330 feet tall and remove 1 million tons of carbon dioxide annually, per TechCrunch.
Since we'd need as many of these devices as possible to cool our planet, SpiralWave is working to install its smaller systems at customer sites. Eventually, they hope to scale up the technology enough to produce clean, cost-effective fuel on a commercial scale.
"With ten, 20-foot containers, we would have the largest e-methanol plant to date," SpiralWave co-founder Adam Amad told the outlet.
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