Harvard University scientists say they have found the ticket to cutting carbon pollution cheaply by pulling it directly out of the air.
A team of scientists from Harvard University and the company Carbon Engineering announced in the journal Joule that they have cut the cost of an existing technology called direct air capture.
If their technique is successfully implemented commercially, the Atlantic reported, it could “transform how humanity thinks about the problem of climate change.”
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The technology has been slow to catch on as a viable, commercial means of cutting carbon dioxide, which is a greenhouse gas. For the most part, direct air capture continues to remain under study in the United States.
Meanwhile, other technologies that strip carbon out of coal plant emissions through a conventional catalytic process have been catching on in Washington and many nations.
The study provides important data for the new technique of direct air capture that shows the cost would be reduced from about $600 per ton of carbon dioxide to as little as $94 per ton.
The study suggests the cost would be between $94 and $232.
A Swiss company said last year that it is looking to master a similar price point in building the world’s first direct air capture plant.
The company Climeworks said it aims to capture 1 percent of global CO2 with a fleet of its machines for about $100 per ton. But for now, its price point still hovers around $600 per ton.
