According to the UN, the potential for carbon capture and storage to mitigate climate change is considerable. Succeeding with carbon capture, however, will depend on a number of factors, including financial viability.

The majority of commercially available carbon capture technologies rely on physical or chemical solvents to separate carbon from other gases. This solvent is normally distributed simply using gravity.

However, Compact Carbon Capture has developed a technology – 3C – which instead distributes the solvent using G-forces. The technology is solvent-neutral, allowing for more viscous and efficient solvents and paving the way for more environment-friendly solvents.

3C allows Compact Carbon Capture to build capture plants which are more than 75 per cent smaller than conventional plants. The technology is modular and scalable and can be retrofitted to existing sources of emission. It thus has the ability to be a game changer for carbon capture, by lowering the bar for deploying carbon capture equipment.

The 3C technology captures CO2 at a lower cost and in a more environment-friendly way than conventional methods. Installing the technology will lead to immediate reductions in carbon emissions.

The technology aims to reduce capital expenditure by 50 per cent without losing capacity or efficiency. It also lowers operating expenses compared to conventional capture plants.

The 3C technology can be installed on most of the existing sources of carbon emissions. Globally, the emissions catchable with carbon capture and storage technology exceeds 10 billion metric tons per year.

The 3C technology was invented in collaboration with Fjell Technology Group, Equinor, CMR Prototech and SINTEF. The development project was initiated by Equinor in 2007, while the first patent for the technology was granted in 1999. The project is funded by Climit, the Norwegian governmental financing institution for carbon capture and storage.