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Great hopes for climate protection rest on it: the world's largest facility for storing CO₂ has gone into operation in Iceland.
Every year it is supposed to suck around 4,000 tons of climate-damaging carbon dioxide from the air and store it in the ground forever.
The Swiss company Climeworks has developed the system with the name Orca - the Icelandic word for energy - over the years.
In eight containers, fans suck in air, which naturally contains tiny amounts of CO₂.
The harmful gas molecules are filtered out and collected, then dissolved in water and pumped into the earth at suitable locations - up to 1000 meters deep.
Jan Wurzbacher, Climeworks:
»There the CO₂ is mineralized with the basalt rock. It literally turns to stone. That will happen within two years. It is therefore the safest and most durable method of removing CO₂ from the atmosphere that is currently available on the market. "
Orca can absorb as much CO₂ under full load as an average of around 870 cars emit each year.
Measured against the 31.5 billion tons of annual CO₂ emissions worldwide, that is still little.
And the technology is expensive.
The pioneering plant in Iceland cost 10 to 15 million dollars.
The operators ban the greenhouse gas into the ground on behalf of investors such as Bill Gates, Microsoft and Audi.
Jan Wurzbacher, Climeworks:
»We offer this as a service for private and corporate customers. We call our customers pioneers, pioneers in carbon dioxide removal. "
The extraction of carbon dioxide from the air is seen by scientists as crucial in order to limit global warming - but it is also repeatedly criticized.
So-called direct air capture technologies are still expensive and not widespread enough.
According to the International Energy Agency, 15 of these plants are currently in operation around the world.
In total, they store around 9,000 tons of CO₂ per year.
The Orca operators are convinced of their technology.
You are already working on a system ten times larger.
Jan Wurzbacher, Climeworks:
“There's a lot of interest. With the new customers, most importantly, we can attract our development, hire more people, accelerate investments. That will help us to increase our standards, so in a first step to reach one million tons per year. And finally, as climate science teaches us, by the end of the century we have to remove billions of tons of CO₂ per year. "
The electricity for Orca in Iceland is generated by a geothermal power plant - climate neutral.
This is an essential prerequisite for technologies such as those in Iceland to actually make a contribution to limiting global warming.