User:Sunnyrabiussunny/sandbox/Soletair Power

Soletair Power is a Finnish company specializing in indoor carbon dioxide extraction and Direct air capture technology. The company has invented a machine that filters office-air CO₂ directly from the air and turns that into fuel. Soletair Power markets carbon capture as indoor air quality control.

Making buildings carbon sinks
The effect of high CO₂ level indoors can be explored based on physiological and neurophysiological measurements. During experiments conducted by Snow S. et al. the measurements were obtained from the group of independent participants influenced by CO₂ concentration up to 2700 ppm that is more than 6 times higher current normal atmospheric level but common for indoors. The results of this study published in 2019 had shown the visible reduction of respiration rate and simultaneous increase of heart rate and skin temperature of the participants. Soletair Power tackles this challenge by capturing the CO₂ from office air and make buildings carbon sinks.

How it works
Direct air capture of carbon dioxide is often associated to large filter machines piled one on top of another and moving large volumes of air. Large contactors are required due to the small concentration of carbon dioxide in the air and large daily production targets of these plants. As air is pushed in the filter, carbon dioxide and moisture are trapped or adsorbed. When the filter is saturated with these compounds the machine is closed and regenerated via vacuum and heating to collect the CO₂ and water. Moisture is condensed leaving pure CO₂ for compression.

Soletair Power delivers solutions for capturing CO₂ in air supplied to building ventilation. The same Adsorption and Regeneration principle is used in their system to capture carbon dioxide but the dimension is compact.

The captured CO₂ is integrated to an electrolyser and synthesis unit where it gets converted to fuels or other hydrocarbons.

Many factors govern the design of ventilation systems, Soletair Power’s ventilation-integrated CO₂ capture system is designed to work within these established design requirements. The system is aimed to meet the ventilation speed typically in cubic metre per second (m3/s) and the customers preferred indoor CO₂ level measured as parts per million or ppm.

Commercialization
For a standard ventilation unit handling 3.3m3/s, Soletair Power CO₂ capture system will have a dimension of 3m (length), 2m (width) and 2m (height) and can produce 47 kilograms of carbon dioxide per day. Due to the space limitation in HVAC room, the system’s piping, and dimension can also be modified to fit customer’s specification.

Soletair Power system can be installed as turn-key solution or can be assembled on site. The latter is especially suited to building retrofit installation where access path to HVAC system can be limited. The system has a modular design principle therefore it is easy to install multiple units if required.

The conversion of the CO₂ to fuels or other hydrocarbons are done is a separate room in the building. Carbon dioxide from the CO₂ capture system is piped to thatroom.

Funding
Soletair Power has received seed funding from technology giant Wärtsilä in 2019 and 2021. In 2021, Wärtsilä invested €1m in Soletair Power Oy, for developing a breakthrough solution for capturing CO₂ from air in buildings that can be used when creating synthetic renewable fuel. They also made a €500,000 investment in 2019.