What hard-to-abate industries can CCU technology decarbonize?

Carbon capture and utilization (CCU) technology can decarbonize hard-to-abate industries including steel production, chemicals and petrochemicals, and synthetic fuel manufacturing, sectors where emissions are structural, not incidental, and cannot be eliminated simply by switching to renewable electricity. These industries emit COâ‚‚ as a direct byproduct of their core chemical and metallurgical processes, making conventional decarbonization approaches insufficient on their own. The sections below address the most pressing questions about how CCU works across each of these sectors.

Which industries are classified as hard-to-abate and why?

Hard-to-abate industries are sectors where COâ‚‚ emissions are embedded in the production process itself, not just in energy consumption. Steel, cement, chemicals, petrochemicals, and long-distance transport fall into this category because their emissions arise from chemical reactions, high-temperature processes, or the use of carbon as a raw material, not simply from burning fossil fuels for heat or power.

In steelmaking, for example, carbon plays a dual role: it is both a fuel and a chemical reducing agent that strips oxygen from iron ore. In the chemical sector, fossil hydrocarbons are the primary feedstock for producing plastics, solvents, and intermediates. Replacing electricity sources with renewables addresses part of the problem, but it does not eliminate the need for carbon-based inputs in these processes.

This is precisely why hard-to-abate industries require dedicated solutions like carbon capture and utilization. Rather than treating COâ‚‚ as a waste stream to be stored underground, CCU technology intercepts those emissions at the point of generation and converts them into usable chemical building blocks. The result is a circular carbon model that keeps carbon in productive use rather than releasing it into the atmosphere or burying it indefinitely.

How does CCU technology convert COâ‚‚ into usable feedstock?

CCU technology captures COâ‚‚ from industrial off-gases and converts it into carbon monoxide (CO) or syngas using an energy input, in the most advanced systems, renewable electricity. The conversion breaks the bond between carbon and oxygen inside a reactor, producing CO as a primary output that re-enters the industrial value chain as a low-carbon feedstock for chemicals, fuels, and materials.

The specific mechanism varies by technology. Plasma-based conversion, such as the approach developed by D-CRBN, uses a fully electrified plasma reactor to split COâ‚‚ molecules at high energy density. The Plasma ARCâ„¢ platform supports two distinct conversion routes from a single reactor design:

COâ‚‚ to carbon monoxide: A COâ‚‚-rich stream is processed inside the plasma reactor alongside a solid carbon feed. The output is carbon monoxide, a critical building block for chemicals and metallurgical applications.
Biogas to syngas: COâ‚‚ is combined with biomethane inside the reactor. The carbon already present in the methane reacts with the COâ‚‚ to produce syngas (CO + Hâ‚‚) without requiring an external hydrogen input.

What makes plasma conversion particularly suited to industrial deployment is its operational flexibility. The reactor operates at ambient pressure, requires no rare-earth materials, and can handle diluted COâ‚‚ streams containing up to 50% nitrogen, meaning it integrates with a wide range of capture setups without demanding highly purified input gas. It can also switch on and off rapidly, allowing operators to align production with periods of surplus renewable electricity and optimize around energy pricing.

The energy efficiency of this approach is a decisive commercial factor. At approximately 1,100 kWh per tonne of COâ‚‚ processed, D-CRBN’s plasma conversion technology is roughly five times more efficient than competing conversion routes such as the reverse water-gas shift reaction, making it viable at a price point competitive with fossil-derived CO and syngas.

What role can CCU play in decarbonizing the steel industry?

In the steel industry, CCU technology can intercept COâ‚‚-rich blast furnace off-gases and convert them back into carbon monoxide, which can then be recycled as a reducing agent within the same steelmaking process. This closes the carbon loop at the point of emission, reducing net COâ‚‚ output without requiring a fundamental redesign of existing blast furnace infrastructure.

Steel production is one of the most carbon-intensive industrial processes in the world. Blast furnaces emit large volumes of COâ‚‚-rich process gas as a direct consequence of using coke to reduce iron ore. CCU offers a route to intercept those emissions before they reach the atmosphere and convert them into CO feedstock that partially replaces virgin fossil carbon inputs.

The first industrial trial of D-CRBN’s plasma technology took place at a major European steel plant, the first steel facility in the world to test this specific process. The pilot demonstrated safe operation at a major-hazard industrial site and achieved a record-low electricity consumption of 1.1 kWh per kilogram of CO produced. Critically, the trial confirmed that the impurities naturally present in steelmaking off-gases do not harm the conversion process, a key validation for real-world deployment.

For steel producers operating under Europe’s Emissions Trading System (ETS), the carbon footprint reduction enabled by CCU directly translates into lower compliance costs. Producing carbon monoxide from recycled COâ‚‚ rather than fossil feedstocks reduces the ETS liability associated with each tonne of steel produced. Operators interested in on-site CO production can explore electrified CO feedstock solutions designed specifically for integration with existing industrial gas streams.

How can chemical and petrochemical companies use CCU technology?

Chemical and petrochemical companies can use CCU technology to replace fossil-derived carbon monoxide and syngas with low-carbon equivalents produced from captured COâ‚‚. Carbon monoxide is a foundational building block for acetic acid, polycarbonates, and a range of other chemical intermediates, making CCU a direct route to defossilizing core production chemistry without changing downstream processes.

The chemical sector’s dependence on fossil feedstocks is structural. Conventional CO production routes rely on steam methane reforming or partial oxidation of hydrocarbons, both of which are carbon-intensive and expose producers to fossil price volatility. CCU-derived CO and syngas offer price stability and supply security by anchoring feedstock production to electricity costs rather than natural gas or oil markets.

For petrochemical operators, syngas produced via CCU is particularly valuable. Syngas, a mixture of CO and hydrogen, serves as the starting point for methanol, ammonia, and synthetic hydrocarbon production. D-CRBN’s biogas-to-syngas route, which converts biomethane and COâ‚‚ into green syngas without requiring external hydrogen, is currently being piloted in a full value-chain project linking a wastewater treatment operator, a plasma conversion unit, and a chemicals producer targeting green methanol output.

The modular, plug-and-play nature of plasma-based CCU systems means chemical companies do not need to write off existing assets or redesign plant layouts. The technology integrates as an additional production unit, feeding directly into existing infrastructure. Companies evaluating electrified syngas production can scale deployment from distributed sites below 100 ktpa up to large industrial operations above that threshold using the same underlying reactor design.

Can CCU technology produce synthetic fuels for hard-to-abate transport?

Yes. CCU technology can produce the syngas and carbon monoxide feedstocks required to manufacture synthetic fuels, including e-fuels and sustainable aviation fuel, making it directly relevant to decarbonizing long-distance transport sectors such as aviation, shipping, and heavy road freight, segments where direct electrification is not technically or economically viable at scale.

Synthetic fuel production requires a carbon source and a hydrogen source. Conventional routes draw both from fossil hydrocarbons. CCU-based routes replace the fossil carbon input with COâ‚‚ captured from industrial emissions, converting it into CO or syngas that then undergoes further processing, via Fischer-Tropsch synthesis or methanol-to-olefins routes, for example, into liquid fuels compatible with existing engines and distribution infrastructure.

The advantage of plasma-based COâ‚‚ recycling for e-fuel production is that it avoids the hydrogen dependency that limits many other CCU pathways. D-CRBN’s biogas-to-syngas route produces syngas at a targeted Hâ‚‚:CO ratio of 2:1 directly from COâ‚‚ and biomethane, without requiring separately produced green hydrogen as an input. This simplifies the production chain and reduces both capital requirements and operational complexity for synthetic fuel producers.

Transport operators and fuel producers seeking supply chain resilience, particularly those exposed to geopolitical volatility in fossil fuel markets, can use CCU-derived feedstocks to establish on-site or near-site production of synthetic fuels, reducing dependence on centralized fossil supply chains. To discuss how this applies to a specific production context, electrifying your feedstock supply is a practical starting point.

What are the main barriers to CCU adoption in heavy industry?

The main barriers to CCU adoption in heavy industry are energy cost and availability, capital expenditure, COâ‚‚ stream purity requirements, and the absence of established market infrastructure for CCU-derived products. Each of these barriers is real, but none is insurmountable, and the most advanced CCU technologies are specifically engineered to address them.

Energy cost and efficiency

CCU processes require electricity to drive the conversion reaction. If that electricity is expensive or carbon-intensive, the economics and environmental case for CCU deteriorate rapidly. This is why energy efficiency is the single most important technical parameter for any CCU system. A process that requires 5,000 kWh per tonne of COâ‚‚ converted cannot compete with fossil-derived feedstocks on price. A process operating at 1,100 kWh per tonne, as demonstrated by D-CRBN’s plasma technology, can. The ability to run on intermittent renewable electricity, switching on during periods of surplus solar or wind generation, further reduces the effective energy cost and allows operators to treat CCU as a form of energy storage.

Capital expenditure and integration risk

Heavy industry operators are understandably cautious about capital commitments to unproven technologies. CCU systems that require purpose-built facilities, specialized materials, or significant modifications to existing plant layouts face high adoption friction. Modular, containerized designs that integrate directly into existing infrastructure, without requiring asset write-offs or major civil works, substantially reduce this barrier. D-CRBN’s SPARC reactor design is built around this principle: scalable from a minimal unit to full industrial throughput, deployable as an add-on to existing production rather than a replacement for it. Industrial operators ready to evaluate deployment options can connect with the D-CRBN team directly.

Regulatory uncertainty and the absence of clear carbon pricing signals in some markets also slow investment decisions. However, Europe’s tightening ETS framework and the growing cost of carbon allowances are shifting the calculus: for industries with large COâ‚‚ liabilities, CCU increasingly represents a cost-reduction strategy rather than a premium sustainability investment. The value proposition is no longer “pay more to be green,” it is “reduce your carbon cost while securing feedstock supply.” That framing, grounded in competitive economics, is what makes industrial COâ‚‚ recycling a credible near-term option for hard-to-abate sectors navigating both decarbonization pressure and fossil feedstock instability.

Electrified CO

Electrified SYNGAS

INSIGHTS | KNOWLEDGE BASE |

news