Carbon Dioxide: A Friend in Industry and an Environmental Foe

Merchant CO2 Opportunities and Emissions Control: CO2 sources can represent excellent long-term money-making opportunities

The merchant CO2 market is about 20 million tons of annual consumption, when taking into consideration all forms of this merchant product. This is from the common liquid product used in industry, i.e., soft drink bottling, specialty food freezing, meat and vegetable processing, and the ever present MAP (modified atmosphere packaging) applications for this most versatile product – plus endless industrial applications. The so-called developed markets such as the European Zone, Japan and the U.S. consume the majority of this product, which is refined and liquefied (or compressed into dry ice); however, in developing markets, places with lots of high atmospheric temperatures, and requirements for refrigeration, CO2 is an excellent means of achieving this end.

Today, some markets in Asia, Africa, and Latin America ‘make’ carbon dioxide on site v. using a concentrated by-product from sources such as hydrogen reformers in the refining industry, off gas from chemical plants such as ethylene oxide and titanium dioxide, natural gas processing, fermentation; and sometimes concentrated high pressure underground wells. If the CO2 source is the initial form suggested as the smaller CO2 made for this purpose only, and not a by-product of the chemical industry as described, then fuels such as diesel, coal, coke, oil, etc., are used, and then the CO2 is concentrated; then the CO2 is purified and liquefied to meet often primarily beverage grade standards…