Direct Air Capture

Technologies for direct air capture of CO2 (DAC) criteria for start-up selection

Problem: Direct Air Capture (DAC) of CO2 present in the air is gaining strong momentum, because it creates negative CO2 emissions having attractive value. the domain is emerging , the challenge is How to identify the most promising technologies for DAC and how to select the best start-ups in this field?

The Direct Air Capture (DAC) technologies can be classified into 3 categories

High Temp including the Liquid K-Ca caustic loop technology of Carbon Engineering
Low temperature with solid sorbents (ex Climeworks)
Electrochemical technologies with potentially lower energies (ex Repair)

Today the DAC cost is > 500$ / Ton CO2, however a simplified cost modelization shows that

for a 1MT capacity of DAC plant, the levelized cost of CO2 is in the range of 130 – 170$/T CO2 in US and 150 -200$/T CO2 in EU.
The main contributions to the cost are
- High energy consumption
- The Financial cost due to the high capex, it is expected to decrease with the industrial learning curve

Some criteria for screening and selecting technologies and start-ups in the field of Direct Air Capture of CO2