Equinor, Captura partner to develop ocean carbon removal pilot project

Equinor ASA and Captura have partnered to test, mature, and industrially scale technology with a goal to build large-scale, commercial plants to remove carbon dioxide (CO₂) from the ocean.

The partnership will begin with a 1,000-ton/year (tpy) pilot at Equinor’s Kårstø natural gas processing plant on the west coast of Norway that will test various configurations of Captura’s technology with the goal to scale, the companies said in a joint release Nov. 1. Feasibility and design have begun, with installation planned for fall 2024.

The pilot plant is expected to draw in and remove a measurable stream of CO₂ from seawater which is then expected to be used for commissioning of the Northern Lights plant, the world’s first open-source CO₂ transport and storage infrastructure project being developed by Equinor, Shell plc, and TotalEnergies SE (OGJ Online, Nov. 11, 2022).

The ocean absorbs about 30% of global CO₂ emissions as part of a natural equilibrium with the atmosphere. Captura’s direct ocean capture solution uses renewable energy and electrodialysis technology to capture CO₂ directly from seawater, the company said. The CO₂-depleted seawater then has the capacity to absorb the same quantity of CO₂ from the air that was originally removed, it continued.

The Kårstø plant will be the final system in Captura’s pilot and scale-up program and is designed to demonstrate the technology’s readiness for commercial deployment. It follows a 1-tpy system that began operations at Newport Beach, Calif., in August 2022, and a 100-tpy system that was recently installed at the Port of Los Angeles, the companies said.

Equinor is an investor in Captura and its second plant deployment partner.