“Project Bison,” a direct air capture (DAC) facility, is set to break ground on what will be the world’s largest carbon capture and storage project.
The direct air capture (DAC) facility will be made up of large arrays of modules about the size of 40-foot shipping containers equipped with “reactors,” which essentially act as filters that absorb CO2 from the air, reports The Hill.
The Bison Project came about with the partnership of two companies: CarbonCapture Inc. (CarbonCapture), a Los Angeles, California-based climate tech company that develops direct air capture (DAC) systems based on a groundbreaking modular open systems architecture, and Texas-based Frontier Carbon Solutions, a carbon sequestration-focused company.
The direct air capture facility will be made up of large arrays of modules about the size of 40-foot shipping containers equipped with “reactors,” which essentially act as filters that absorb CO2 from the air.
Once the filters are saturated, they are heated up and the carbon is extracted from the modules and pumped deep underground in saline aquifers for permanent storage.
Wyoming was a great choice for this new project, having already established itself as a national leader in power-sector carbon capture and geologic storage. It may soon add direct air capture to the list, according to The Star Tribune.
For the first phase scheduled for 2023 and 2024, Carbon Capture Inc., which manufactures the actual modules, is expected to start removing somewhere around 12,000 tons of CO2 each year and scale up capacity to about 200,000 tons by 2026.
By 2030, operations will scale up to the removal of 5 million tons of atmospheric CO2 each year, roughly the emissions from one million gas-powered vehicles driven in a year.
“With the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act, the proliferation of companies seeking high-quality carbon removal credits, and a disruptive low-cost technology, we now have the ingredients needed to scale DAC to megaton levels by the end of this decade,” said Adrian Corless, CEO, and CTO, CarbonCapture Inc. in a press release. “We plan to have our first DAC modules fielded by the end of next year and to continue installing capacity as quickly as modules come off our production line. Our goal is to leverage economies of scale to offer the lowest priced DAC-based carbon removal credits in the market.”
While carbon capture and storage are now considered key elements in mitigating climate change and great strides in technology have been seen over the past decade, there are a limited number of demonstration projects globally that are relatively small.
The largest plant currently operating in the world, the Orca plant in Iceland, currently captures about 4,000 tons of carbon per year.
“As the Energy State, we are committed to advancing the carbon management industry in Wyoming,” Gov. Mark Gordon said in a written statement. “We are an early leader in developing carbon capture possibilities and policy. The interest in locating a project of this scale here demonstrates Wyoming’s commitment to CO2 capture, use and storage projects as this industry develops.”
