Direct-air-carbon-capture project at Nutrien gets funding

The start-ups AirCapture and OCOchem and the fertilizer maker Nutrien have received a $2.9 million grant from the US Department of Energy to set up a carbon-dioxide-capture system at Nutrien’s plant in Kennewick, Washington. AirCapture has technology to capture CO₂ from air using industrial waste heat—in this case steam from nitrogen fertilizer production. OCOchem will use the captured gas in its process to combine water and CO₂ into formic acid, an industrial chemical and potential fuel. Nutrien already captures CO₂ from its ammonia plants in Louisiana and Alberta.