In the future, the bubbles in your cola, sparkling water, and other fizzy drinks may well come from industrial CO2 emissions. That’s thanks to a new technology developed by Taiwan’s Industrial Technology Research Institute.
And this is only the beginning—at an ongoing trade show, the institute is showing off this and other techniques it’s developed to save the environment.
The Industrial Technology Research Institute is testing a radical idea at a coal-fired power plant in central Taiwan: what if you could capture CO2 emissions, and, through a chemical process, turn them into something useful.
Suggestions so far for products the carbon-capture technology could be used to make include dry ice, and even carbonation for soda. The institute’s dreamers are now showing off the results at the 2020 Circular Taiwan trade show, which opened Thursday.
Alongside this at the show is a technology that uses big data to analyze industrial waste and byproducts and help turn them into reusable materials such as asphalt.
Finally, there is a dye-sensitized solar cell technology that allows for solar cells much smaller than conventional panels to generate power from sunlight. The institute says that Taiwan has limited energy resources, and that these technologies will allow Taiwan to make the most of them.