SWISS signs multi-year CDR deal with neustark
Swiss International Air Lines (SWISS), part of the Lufthansa Group, has signed a multi-year agreement for carbon dioxide removal (CDR) with Switzerland-based climate tech start-up neustark. SWISS is the first airline partner to support neustark's solution as part of an agreement to remove carbon dioxide by 2030, with an option to expand the volume and duration.
The long-term strategic partnership will support neustark’s ambition to expand its carbon capture and mineralization (CCM) technology deployment across Europe.
Working towards its ambition to remove hundreds of thousands of tonnes of hard-to-abate carbon dioxide (CO2) via mineralization in waste streams such as demolition concrete in the next years, neustark already operates 38 capture and storage plants across seven European countries.
The partnership equally underscores SWISS’ commitment to scientifically sound, scalable solutions for decarbonizing aviation – and complements SWISS’s comprehensive commitment to sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) and CO2 removal, having already joined forces with other Swiss climate techs such as Climeworks and Synhelion.
We are proud to be working with neustark to drive forward an effective and durable climate solution based on Swiss innovation. Permanent carbon dioxide removal is a key building block on the path to net zero in aviation. Together, we are taking an important and early step toward scaling this technology, commented Jens Fehlinger, CEO of SWISS.
Collaboration across hard-to-abate sectors
The agreement means that for the first time, the aviation and construction industries, two hard-to-abate sectors, come together to further scale carbon dioxide removal (CDR).
The scale-up of such climate technologies requires collaboration across tech pioneers, politics, business, and customers. The partnership with SWISS provides symbiotic support for both industries to scale permanent carbon removal capabilities.
SWISS is our first aviation partner – a hard-to-decarbonize sector. We applaud their multi-technology approach to enabling the scale-up of climate solutions. Pioneers like SWISS play a crucial role in further deploying our carbon removal technology to permanently remove exponentially more tonnes of hard-to-abate CO2 emissions from the atmosphere every single day, said Valentin Gutknecht, founder and co-CEO at neustark.
A first-of-its-kind company
Founded in 2019, neustark is a spin-off from ETH Zurich. Based in Bern, Switzerland, it is the first company to commercialize the permanent storage of CO2 through mineralization in demolished concrete and other mineral waste streams.
It is the first to deploy its solution at multiple sites across Europe with 38 active capture and storage projects in Switzerland, Germany, Austria, the UK, France, Italy, and Liechtenstein already in operation – and over 20 new projects in the line-up for deployment in the next months.
The technology repurposes concrete from demolished buildings and other mineral waste material, such as incinerator bottom ash and slag, as permanent storage for biogenic carbon dioxide (bioCO2) captured nearby, using a process known as mineralization.
The bioCO2 is captured from partnering biogas plants, then liquified and transported to partnering construction waste recycling sites.
There, as an add-on to the existing recycling process, the bioCO2 is injected into demolition granules, triggering an accelerated mineralization process that binds the bioCO2 permanently to the pores and surface of the granules.
CDR verified as measurable and permanent
The bioCO2 is permanently stored and removed from the atmosphere. The carbonated granules can then be used by recyclers to build roads or to produce recycled concrete.
Verified by the Gold Standard, neustark’s CDR is measurable and permanent as the mineralization process stores the captured CO2 for hundreds of thousands of years, and the risk of reversal is proven to be slim to none.
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