Carbon capturing fruits, modeled after the human lung

Carbon capture, removal, and storage technology is a relatively new technology, but it has been around for some time with little success. Essentially what the technology does is it sucks carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and either converts it to another molecule or stores it underground, whichever one is cheaper. However, due to the technology’s high prices and the high amounts of energy it consumes, it isn’t very popular. On top of this, there are a lot of technical problems with capturing carbon from the air. Even though the carbon dioxide levels in our atmosphere are at a record high, it is still very diluted and in low concentrations, so it is difficult to remove it. Furthermore, many direct carbon capture technologies produce high emissions and use high amounts of energy, which defeats the purpose of reducing carbon from the atmosphere. These are some of the reasons that the industry is not a very successful one, so research on how to make the technology greener and cheaper is still primarily being done. That said, there is one startup, Spiritus, that has likely found a groundbreaking carbon capture technology that is green, cheap, and effective.

Spiritus’ take on carbon capture is a unique one. The technology itself is a spherical piece of sorbent material that is modeled after a human lung. The mechanisms that the human lung uses to take in and filter massive amounts of air is the perfect concept to apply to carbon capture because the technology needs to take in large amounts of air and absorb only the carbon dioxide. Once the sphere absorbs the carbon dioxide, it would be brought to a device that applies low heat to it and removes the carbon dioxide. This technology would be implemented in something Spiritus calls “carbon orchards”. It would mimic any kind of fruit orchard and the spheres, similar to the size of an apple, would be laid out across the orchard, just like apples would be at an apple orchard. These devices would then absorb the carbon and continue on with the rest of the removal process.

This method is a groundbreaking technology for a few reasons. Firstly, it is the sheer success in the technology itself. This technology works and according to the CEO of Spiritus, Charles Cadieu, these “fruits” capture around 1,000 times more carbon dioxide than a forest does, proving that this technology is more efficient in removing CO2 per acre, versus forestry. Furthermore, this mode of carbon capture uses low levels of heat and energy, which makes it less costly, both financially and environmentally, something that cannot be said about numerous carbon capture technologies. This technology, developed by Spiritus, might be able to turn us around and help stop the climate crisis. It is still in the early stages of development, and we will have to wait and see If it can be economically implemented on a large scale. We also need to ensure that this technology doesn’t put any additional burdens on the environment, such as manufacturing and disposing of the devices. If this this technology works, and does not harm the environment, it will likely be a large turning point in the fight between us and our rising carbon levels.