Australian manufacturer successfully demos cement carbon capture tech in EU project

Calix (ASX:CXL) has announced that its carbon capture technology has completed preliminary test runs on cement and lime meal at a European Union-supported trial.

The trial at Heidelberg Cement’s Lixhe, Belgium site uses the “Direct Separation” process from Calix, the project leader, and according to the statement is successfully demonstrating separation of CO2 with more than 95 per cent purity.

“Whilst there are still challenges ahead to achieving full design capacity, we have achieved many breakthroughs in many key areas of the technology,” said Mark Sceats, Calix’s chief scientist and founder.

“The carbon capture piece of our technology represents a unique approach to mitigating CO2 emissions from lime and cement manufacturing and has the potential to leapfrog other technologies in terms of both timing and cost.” 

The 21 million Euro “Project LEILAC” is supported through 12 million Euro under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 program. Other participants include Lhoist, Cemex and Tarma.

Tests runs will continue for the rest of the year.

Calix was established in 2005 and manufactures “mineral honeycomb” at Bacchus Marsh using flash calcined magnesite. These products have uses in infrastructure, agriculture and aquaculture markets. 

Picture: calcined lime (via http://rocmet.com)