Mumbai: The team of four students from Iit-Bombay, guided by their two professors, has found a new method to capture carbon dioxide emissions from the industry and turn it into useful salts, thus isolating the gas emitted permanently from the atmosphere.
Their concept won a $ 250,000 prize (around Rs 1.85CR) in the global competition, which saw the participation of 195 teams.
Sasitb is between 23 global teams led by students to win the demonstration competition for carbon removal and the only single institutional award from India.
The winners were announced on Thursday at the Continuous Innovation Forum at the COP26 Summit at Glasgow.Rrinath Iyer and Anwesha Banerjee (SHD students), Srushti Bhamar Bachelor Students, and fellow Junior research Shubham Kumar is part of the XPRIZE team to win the XPRIZE competition, supported by Elon Musk Foundation.
Speaking to Toi, Bhamar said that being an energy science student, he was always excited about the topic and when the competition was announced, they gathered on the team to move the concept.
Assistant Professor Vikram Vishal, the Department of Earth Sciences, said that this research focuses on developing tri-modular systems, where they will help capture carbon dioxide (15-20% of exhaust gas) from the source of large points and then change it into mineral carbonates which is stable, which can be reused in the industry.
“In this way, permanent absorption of carbon dioxide can occur from the atmosphere,” he said.
The aim is not to achieve zero-zero emissions, but net-negative emissions, said Arnab Dutta, Associate Professor from the Department of Chemistry, talking about CO2 released in the last 50-60 years.
“The industry can oppose the idea of ​​just capturing CO2 because it will increase their production costs, but we give them new material, making it cost-effective solution,” Dutta said.