Ocean Alkalinity Enhancement

Enhancing the oceans natural mechanism to remove carbon from our atmosphere

How it works

Accelerating a Natural Process

Throughout geological history, minerals have been washing into the ocean as part of the silicate weathering cycle. This cycle makes slightly alkaline solutions which add to the alkalinity of the oceans, tempering ocean acidification and drawing down CO2 into the oceans, creating a carbon sink for atmospheric CO2 on a huge scale.

This process, however, takes place on a geological timescale and is not fast enough to equilibrate anthropogenic CO2. Ocean Alkalinity Enhancement (OAE) is a way of speeding up the natural process to human timescales by adding alkaline materials to oceanic waters counteracting acidification and permanently removing atmospheric CO2.

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The Science

Raising the alkalinity of seawater increases it's capacity to absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere

When carbon dioxide is dissolved in seawater it reacts to form bicarbonate ions and hydrogen ions, increasing

Hydrogen ions react with carbonate ions form even more bicarbonates

Low carbon Alkalinity is essential to achieve carbon dioxide removal.

One tonne of Magnesium Hydroxide added to sea water will drawdown (capture) around 1.25t of CO2.

The portion of captured CO2 that is actually removed is mostly determined by the embodied carbon of the Magnesium Hydroxide feedstock.

At less than 100kg CO2e per tonne our feedstock has the potential to remove 1.15t of CO2.

That's over 90% of the theoretical maximum.

Key Benefits

Advantages of Our Solutions

Discover the benefits of our OAE technology:

Maximum Carbon Dioxide Removal Potential

High Carbon Dioxide Removal Efficency

At less that 100kg of CO2e/t Mg(OH)2 the Carbon Dioxide Removal potential is 90% of the theoretical maximum.

High Permanence of CDR

Low Secondary Precipitation Risk

Magnesium concentrations in sea water are well below saturation points. Magnesium Hydroxide can be added to seawater with little risk of triggering secondary precipitation of carbonates.

Safe Levels of Alkalinity

Low risk of exceeding safe levels of Alkalinity

In lab conditions, the maximum achievable pH that can be reached by adding Magnesium Hydroxide to seawater is around pH9.5. The effects of dilution and solubility rates will result in much lower peaks

Low Toxicity Risks

Heavy Metals are Removed

Our process removes all metal from our raw material, Olivine to produce pure Magnesium Hydroxide, reducing the complexity of environmental risk management processes.

Gigaton Scale

Material Reserves for Gigaton Scale

The raw material for our process is Olivine; the largest single reserve is estimated to be in excess of 1,400 Million Gigatonnes.