CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) – Organizers of a $ 20 million competition to develop products from greenhouse gas flowing from power plants announced two winners Monday, ahead of the launch of a similar but much larger competition backed by Elon Musk.
Both winners made concrete that traps carbon dioxide and kept it out of the atmosphere, where it can contribute to climate change. The production of cement, the main ingredient in concrete, is responsible for 7% of global greenhouse gas emissions, said Marcius Extavour, XPRIZE vice president of climate and energy.
“So it is not surprising that the winning teams focused on reducing emissions related to concrete, which will be a game-changer for global decarbonization,” he said in a statement.
Meanwhile, Musk, the electric auto and space entrepreneur, has pledged $ 100 million for researchers who can demonstrate how to capture massive amounts of carbon dioxide straight from the atmosphere and permanently store the gas. That match starts on Thursday, Earth Day.
“We want teams to build real systems that can have a measurable impact and scale up to gigaton level. No matter what. Time is of the essence, ”Musk, founder and CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, said in February.
Both competitions are organized by XPRIZE, which encourages new technology by raising prize money for showcasing achievements. The best known is that Mojave Aerospace Ventures won a $ 10 million XPRIZE in 2004 by being the first to fly a privately funded, reusable rocket plane multiple times into space.
The $ 20 million prize announced Monday had two parts: one at a coal-fired power plant in Wyoming and the other at a gas-fired power plant in Alberta, Canada. The competition focused on using carbon dioxide from the factories’ chimneys, and the winners showed that they can capture the emissions in cement, which in some cases makes stronger concrete.
The winner of the Wyoming plant, Los Angeles-based CarbonBuilt, used carbon dioxide to cure concrete and trap it in a process that also emits less greenhouse gas compared to traditional cement production, according to XPRIZE.
The winner in Alberta was CarbonCure Technologies, based in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, which showed it can inject carbon dioxide into water used to flush out cement trucks and mixers in a cement plant, resulting in a mixture that makes stronger concrete, according to XPRIZE .
The two winners will share $ 15 million. Ten finalists shared the remaining $ 5 million in 2018.
The US portion of the competition took place at the Wyoming Integrated Test Center, a facility in a coal-fired power plant near the town of Gillette that is researching ways to capture carbon dioxide and use it in realistic scenarios.
Gov. Mark Gordon has often touted the research center as an example of Wyoming’s interest in finding solutions to climate change – possibly preserving the state’s declining coal industry in the process.
Coal production in the US has declined by half over the past 15 years as utilities get more electricity from renewables and cheaper natural gas. About 40% of America’s coal comes from Wyoming, by far more than any other state.
The state is covering three-quarters of the $ 20 million cost of the Wyoming Integrated Test Center, which opened in 2018.
“There will be no one-size-fits-all to manage carbon,” said Jason Begger, the center’s general manager. “A cement plant might not make much sense in a Wyoming power plant, but it just might make a lot of sense in Japan.”
Wyoming officials have expressed interest in participating in the Musk-funded XPRIZE contest but have not heard from him, Gordon spokesman Michael Pearlman said.
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