Carbon capture reactor achieves commercial scale, which makers say will capture 100,000 t/y of CO2

Carbon Clean

BRITISH carbon capture and storage (CCS) company Carbon Clean has achieved commercial scale for its series of modular reactors, which it expects to capture up to 100,000 t/y of CO2.

Carbon Clean’s announcement comes after testing the latest in their CycloneCC series of reactors, which uses a centrifuge to extract CO2 from industrial flue gases. Using a patented solvent derived from amine-promoted buffer salts, its target industries are cement production, steel production and waste incineration. The centrifuge, manufactured by UK-based Thomas Broadbent and Sons, is known as a rotating packed bed (RPB). Carbon Clean says the latest reactor is the “world’s largest” RPB-based CCS unit.

The latest tests were run at Thomas Broadbent’s main site in Huddersfield and represent a 20-fold scaleup from the first industrial demonstration of a CycloneCC unit, with Carbon Clean now capturing up to 285 t/d of CO2.

RPB-based CCS units are around half the size of conventional solvent-based setups which have large  absorber and desorber columns. Carbon Clean says this makes its units considerably cheaper. The company also hopes the modular design will make them suitable for mass factory production.

Aniruddha Sharma, chair and CEO of Carbon Clean, thanked the “skills and experience of the teams on the ground” for enabling their technology to “exceed acceptance criteria”. He added that the latest reactor “is a testament to the UK’s outstanding manufacturing capabilities”.

‘Global deployment’

Carbon Clean, based in London since 2012 after incorporating in 2009 in India, has installed trial reactors with a number of high emitting companies around the world. The latest deal was announced in December 2024, with a trial CycloneCC unit slated for installation on a gas compressor turbine exhaust stack for Saudi Arabian national oil  company Saudi Aramco.

Previously, Carbon Clean trialled CycloneCC reactors at cement maker Cemex and waste incineration operator Veolia. Carbon Clean also has deals to supply captured CO2 to Swedish manufacturer Liquid Wind who will use the gas to produce methanol, as well as partnerships with Japanese cement maker Taiheiyo Cement and US hydrogen producer BayoTech.

Sharma said: “Producing the first commercial scale product of this size in the UK is a strong signal that we are ready for large-scale global deployment.”