4 Carbon Capture

4.1 Low Scale Carbon Capture

CarbonQuest

The room-sized CO2 filtration and liquefaction system, installed early this year by CarbonQuest, is a rare instance of carbon capture that actually works and delivers an economic payback. Power-plant or industrial-scale carbon capture has a long history of disappointing results.

CarbonQuest captures emissions from existing heating systems, paying back the investment by avoiding penalties under New York’s carbon-reduction rules and selling industrial-grade CO2 to paying customers.

CarbonQuest had tapped into the insulated duct that carries hot boiler exhaust to the chimney, diverting the flow through a circuitous array of hissing, humming machinery that pulls out moisture and isolates the carbon dioxide from nitrogen and oxygen, which get released back out the flue.

The carbon dioxide then gets cooled to a liquid state and stored, under pressure, in a metal tank. Eventually, a truck pulls up on the street outside, connects a hose to a nozzle on the side of the building and sucks out the liquid carbon for delivery to a concrete factory, which will inject the greenhouse gas into concrete blocks, making them stronger.

At its current scale, it catches 60 percent of the entire building’s gas emissions.

Spector (2022) Carbon capture for New York high-rise apartments is a real thing now