Shipping is one of the world's dirtiest industries - could this invention finally clean up cargo fleets?

[jgo]

"
Freighters emit more greenhouse gases than jets, but a tech startup believes a simple and effective technique can help the industry change course

An industrial park alongside the River Lea in the London suburb of Chingford might not be the most obvious place for a quiet revolution to be taking place. But there, a team of entrepreneurs is tinkering with a modest looking steel container that could hold a solution to one of the world’s dirtiest industries.

Inside it are thousands of cherry-sized pellets made from quicklime. At one end, a diesel generator pipes fumes through the lime, which soaks up the carbon, triggering a chemical reaction that transforms it into limestone.

With this invention, Seabound, the company behind it, hopes to capture large amounts of carbon directly from the decks of cargo ships, and help clean up this strikingly polluting industry. More than 50,000 cargo ships are at sea at any moment, producing 3% of global greenhouse gas emissions – more than aviation.
"
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jun/26/global-shipping-emissions-invention-clean-up-cargo-fleets-net-zero

[bucolic_frolic]

1. Google AI tells me first they have to make the quicklime

"Quicklime, also known as calcium oxide (CaO), is a white, alkaline substance produced by heating limestone (calcium carbonate) at high temperatures. This process, called calcination, releases carbon dioxide and leaves behind quicklime. It's a versatile chemical compound with numerous applications in construction, agriculture, and various industrial processes."

So they're going to use energy to make the quicklime, and release CO2 in the process, in order to capture CO2 from the ships.

Sounds to me this is only viable as a means of CO2 capture if quicklime is a wasteful byproduct of some other manufacture process.

[Mosby]

2. I wonder if the ships use DPF systems.