Biocatalytic upcycling of CO2 into added-value chemicals

Sustainable catalytic processes for CO2 conversion to platform chemicals and novel materials

The recent years have seen a rapid rise in the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide from 393 ppm in 2010 to 416 ppm in May 2020. Unfortunately, this rising trend is set to continue due to global surge in demand for energy and materials from fossil sources. Some of the developed countries, including Sweden, have tightened their environmental policies and set ambitious targets to alleviate the drastic impacts of climate change. Sweden is committed to a carbon neutral society by 2030 and having net negative CO2 emissions by 2045. To reach these goals, new solutions are needed for the capture of CO2 at the site of emission and its subsequent sequestration.

The FUSE project funded by the Swedish Energy Agency, is set to develop new catalytic processes that enable conversion of CO2 to platform chemicals amenable to utilization in the production of in bio-based materials. Unique to this project, we combine expertise in electrochemical and biochemical catalysis to achieve CO2 fixation by new-to-nature enzyme chemistries