Capture process turns CO2 into construction materials

’We want to capture carbon dioxide and turn it into something that will be stable for hundreds of thousands of years rather than store it underground,’ said Angela Belcher, the WM Keck professor of energy at the university.

By genetically engineering ordinary baker’s yeast, Belcher and two of her graduate students, Roberto Barbero and Elizabeth Wood, have created a process that can produce about two pounds of carbonate for every pound of carbon dioxide captured.

To create the yeast-powered process, Belcher drew inspiration from marine animals that build their own rock-solid shells from carbon dioxide and mineral ions dissolved in seawater.

Funded by the Italian energy company Eni, the new process requires two steps. The first step is capturing carbon dioxide in water. Second, the dissolved carbon dioxide is combined with mineral ions to form solid carbonates.

Since yeast does not normally perform any of those reactions, Belcher and her students had to engineer them to express genes found in organisms such as the abalone. Those genes code for enzymes and other proteins that help move carbon dioxide through the mineralisation process.