Heat accounts for roughly half the energy we use in the UK - it’s a big market, and it’s a big source of greenhouse gas emissions. Statix addresses the market for heat, with an innovative reactor that promises to generate heat and sequest carbon dioxide as marketable carbon black. Statix calls this “heat without fire”.

The core innovation realised by Statix is to harness the exothermic potential of chemical dehydration. Sugar crops convert carbon dioxide from the air into sugars through photosynthesis. A Statix reactor can dehydrate that sugar to create three valuable outputs: heat; elemental carbon black; and drinking water.

First working prototype of the Statix process

With seed funding from partners of Columbia Capital and Hillcrest, Statix has already proven the principle with a prototype reactor and protected its intellectual property by patent.

Through OUC, Professor Dermot O’Hare of the Inorganic Chemistry Department at the University of Oxford advised Statix on the optimal set-up of the prototype reactor rig, consulted on health and safety issues, and calculated the thermal energy that could be generated from the prototype.

In full production, Statix will contribute to a reduction in atmospheric CO₂ levels – aiming to reduce the UK’s carbon footprint by about a third of one per cent, enough to mitigate the emissions of a regular 500MW coal power station.

Joe Tapper - Chief Technical Officer - says that in 2010 Statix will capitalise on its proof of prototype and the verification work done by OUC, licensing this innovative technology for commercial exploitation in the UK.

http://statixindustries.com