Carbon Capture and Storage

Carbon capture and storage (CCS) (or carbon capture and sequestration or carbon control and sequestration) is the process of capturing waste carbon dioxide (CO2) from large point sources, such as fossil fuel power plants, transporting it to a storage site, and depositing it where it will not enter the atmosphere, normally an underground geological formation. The aim is to prevent the release of large quantities of CO2 into the atmosphere (from fossil fuel use in power generation and other industries). Source: Wikipedia

Tiny microbes could brew big benefits for green biomanufacturing

May 10, 2023
By Theresa Duque | Lawrence Berkeley National Lab

Green industrial illustration

A team of scientists from the College of Chemistry and Berkeley Lab find a new route in bacteria to decarbonize industry. The discovery could reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the manufacturing of fuels, drugs, and chemicals. Specifically, the team is looking at a metabolic process in bacteria that could be a sustainable source of carbon-based...

College startups featured at SkyDeck’s annual Demo Day

February 11, 2020
Ivan Natividad | Berkeley News

SkyDeck features College startups

UC Berkeley is not just one of the best research universities in the world, but also a unique place for entrepreneurs, students and alumni to grow and build their own innovative startups. Many of the ideas are based on issues young entrepreneurs first encountered in Berkeley classes or labs. Two College of Chemistry startups presented among 23 young companies last week at Berkeley SkyDeck’s annual Demo Day, where entrepreneurs pitched new devices, apps or inventions that, they hope, will provide big, bold fixes to the world’s problems, from climate change to disease.

To battle climate change, scientists tap into carbon-hungry microorganisms for clues

November 30, 2022
By Theresa Duque | Lawrence Berkeley National Lab

Illustration of carbon reduction cycle

New technique could fast-track future carbon-free solar fuels. (image: 3rdtimeluckystudio/Shutterstock)

Scientists at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have demonstrated a new technique, modeled after a metabolic process found in some bacteria, for...

A simple, cheap material for carbon capture, perhaps from tailpipes

August 10, 2022
By Robert Sanders | UC Berkeley media relations

Illustration of a new method for removing CO2 from these flue gases involves piping the emissions through a porous material based on the chemical melamine

Carbon dioxide (depicted in red and white at left) is the main greenhouse gas warming Earth and is...

Startup to Sale: How alumnus Tom McDonald co-founded and built Mosaic Materials

May 13, 2022
activate.org

Tom McDonald, chemistry Ph.D. alum 2015

Baker Hughes has acquired the startup Mosaic Materials and plans to deploy its carbon dioxide capture technology across the industrial value chain.

Tom McDonald (Ph.D. '15, Chem) was going to be a professor. That was the plan. He even had a postdoc lined up at Imperial College London and...

New Technique Improves Conversion of Carbon Dioxide Into Liquid Fuels

November 17, 2021
By Rachel Berkowitz | Berkeley Lab

automobile exhaust

Cars powered by fossil fuels emit carbon dioxide (CO2), the most prevalent greenhouse gas. A team of scientists led by Berkeley Lab has developed a new technique that improves the conversion of CO2 emissions into useful chemicals and liquid fuels. (Credit: Adobe stock)

Cars powered by fossil fuels emit carbon dioxide (CO2), the most prevalent...

ExxonMobil collaborates on discovery of new material to enhance carbon capture technology

August 2, 2021
UC Berkeley, College of Chemistry Press Release

Researching the development of a sustainable energy future

Scientists from ExxonMobil, University of California, Berkeley and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have discovered a new material that could capture more than 90 percent of CO2 emitted from industrial sources, such as natural gas-fired power plants, using low-temperature steam,...

Drop in CO2 emissions during pandemic previews world of electric vehicles

November 10, 2020
By Robert Sanders | UC Berkeley media relations

In the six weeks after the San Francisco Bay Area instituted the nation’s first shelter-in-place mandate in response to the growing COVID-19 pandemic, regional carbon dioxide emissions dropped by 25%, almost all of it due to a nearly 50% drop in road traffic, according to new study from the University of California, Berkeley.

Though emissions have steadily increased since then, the dramatic response to a sharp cut-off in vehicular fossil fuel burning shows how effectively a move toward broad use of electric-powered vehicles would reduce the major greenhouse gas responsible for...

Miniature Sensors Can Detect Potential Dangers of CO2

June 12, 2020
By Wallace Ravven | Berkeley Research

Roya Maboudian discusses C02 capture

While rising carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere cause great concern worldwide, most of us pay little attention to risks posed by CO2 changes indoors. Roya Maboudian, Professor of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, studies the properties of nano-materials, including how their surfaces affect their performance. As a 2019-2020 Bakar Fellow, she is developing small, inexpensive and sensitive CO2 sensors. She described her research and its potential.

The Secret to Renewable Solar Fuels Is an Off-and-On Again Relationship

July 21, 2020
by Aliyah Kovner | Berkeley Lab

analysis of copper ore

From alum Walter Drisdell's lab at LBL: new research published in the journal ACS Catalysis exams experiments performed vis X-ray spectroscopy on working solar fuel generator prototypes to demonstrate that catalysts made from copper oxide are superior to purely metallic-origin catalysts when it comes to producing ethylene, a two-carbon gas with a huge range of industrial applications – even after there are no detectable oxygen atoms left in the catalyst.