Cement and building solutions manufacturer Lafarge Canada has teamed up with carbon capture specialist Svante to start producing synthetic wax from captured CO2 emissions.
Cement production is a notoriously emissions-intensive process that companies around the world are starting to try and abate.
Lafarge started using carbon capture technology provided by Svante already in 2019 at its cement plant in Richmond, Canada, thus preventing the release of 1 metric ton of CO2 into the atmosphere each day.
With such immense quantities of captured emissions, the question of what to do with them inevitably arises.
And while permanent underground storage is certainly among the existing solutions, it requires much effort to establish the sequestration and pipeline infrastructure, which may not always be a possibility.
Hence, utilizing CO2 to create valuable products is an option that Lafarge has now decided to explore by launching a new project that will convert the greenhouse gas (GHG) into carbon-neutral synthetic wax.
“Given the lack of CO2 transportation and sequestration infrastructure in southern British Columbia today, utilization of captured CO2 is fundamental to the decarbonization of large industries in the region,” Lafarge said.
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The partnership will also include the expertise of Dimensional Energy, a US manufacturer of carbon-neutral fuels, to combine the captured CO2 with hydrogen in order to make wax, which has many applications across a range of industries.
For example, the material can be used to produce lubricants, plastics and cosmetics, among other things.
Specifically, the collaboration with Dimensional Energy and Svante will allow Lafarge to yield 1.5 barrels of synthetic hydrocarbons, which is a kind of premium grade wax, suitable as a precursor for the above uses.
“By utilizing this technology for production of the fuels and products that people use every day, the goal is to lower the carbon intensity of our entire economy once scaled,” the company said.
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