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VALSER to get its fizz from the air with Climeworks

The brand will be the world’s first to use Climeworks’ exciting new technology that captures CO₂ from the air and purifies it for use in beverages.

Coca‑Cola HBC Switzerland is collaborating with Swiss ETH-Spin-off company Climeworks to use this ground-breaking technology for the first time in the beverage industry, forming a crucial platform to further scale the solution. The project is supported by the Klimafonds of Stadtwerk Winterthur, as well as the Swiss Federal Office for the Environment FOEN. VALSER, recently certified as the first CO₂-neutral mineral water in Switzerland, will become the first brand to use this technology for its beverages.

VALSER to get its fizz from the air VALSER to get its fizz from the air

The global beverage industry is one of the world’s largest users of CO₂ to create bubbles for sparkling drinks. Climeworks provides pure, air-captured CO₂ to its customers, while at the same time offering them the opportunity to reverse their emissions. This collaboration allows Coca‑Cola HBC Switzerland to obtain the CO₂ necessary for sparkling drinks from a sustainable source. At the same time, Coca‑Cola HBC Switzerland helps recycle CO₂ from the air and most importantly offers a market to further scale a technology that is highly relevant to achieving the climate targets set by the United Nations.

VALSER Brand Manager Jana Luecking:
“We are very excited to pioneer this promising initiative with VALSER, a brand that stands for sustainability and its connection with the environment. Initially, it will be used for VALSER Sparkling, VALSER Sparkling Lemon & Mint and VALSER Viva.”

Coca‑Cola HBC Switzerland General Manager Nigel Davis:
“We are proud to be the very first beverage company worldwide to drive the expansion of this ground-breaking technology. Sustainability is built into our strategic business priorities and we are continuously looking at ways to minimise our ecological footprint in everything we do. To do so by supporting a local Swiss business is even more rewarding.”

Climeworks co-founder and CEO Jan Wurzbacher:
“By entering the beverage market with Coca‑Cola HBC Switzerland, we are continuing our path of commercializing our Direct Air Capture (DAC) technology, which began with the world’s first commercial plant in May 2017. We are excited by the chance to collaborate with a beverage industry leader as part of our overarching goal of capturing one per cent of global CO₂ emissions by 2025.”

Climeworks co-founder and CEO Christoph Gebald:
“We are very happy to be entering the beverage market in Switzerland together with Coca‑Cola HBC Switzerland, one of the industry leaders in Dow Jones Sustainability Indices, attaching importance to social and environmental aspects of business. During the past few years, Coca‑Cola HBC Switzerland has been an exceptionally supportive partner and invaluable in moving the application of DAC in the beverage industry forward - something we are very thankful for.”

About Climeworks

Climeworks captures CO₂ from ambient air with the world’s first commercial carbon dioxide removal technology. The Climeworks direct air capture plants capture CO₂ with a patented filter and are powered by either waste or renewable energy.

Climeworks air-captured CO₂ is sold to customers in the Food, Beverage & Agriculture; and Renewable Fuels & Materials markets. Climeworks also offers Emissions Reversal, enabling customers to realize their climate goals by safely and permanently storing air-captured CO₂ underground, and thereby ultimately stopping climate change from reaching dangerous levels.

Founded by engineers Christoph Gebald and Jan Wurzbacher, Climeworks has assembled the world’s largest team of experts in the field and has a goal of capturing one per cent of global emissions by 2025.

More information : www.climeworks.com

Contact : Louise Charles, [email protected]

Climeworks AG
Birchstrasse155
CH – 8050 Zürich
Switzerland


More about the project :

The beverage industry is an attractive pioneer market for Climeworks to commercialise its DAC technology and further reduce costs. Drink carbonation could provide the commercial platform needed to deploy DAC on a large scale.

The pioneering plant in Hinwil, Switzerland was followed in November 2017 by the launch of the CarbFix2 project in Hellisheidi, Iceland, which uses geothermal heat as an energy source to capture and mineralize CO₂ in underground rock formations.

In order to guarantee the highest purity standards required for using CO₂ in beverages, Climeworks works with Pentair Union Engineering, the world leader in purification and liquefaction of high quality CO₂. Pentair Union Engineering and Climeworks have been collaborating since 2016 in CAPDrinks (E!10323) - an EU-funded project, co-funded by the Swiss State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation - to develop a containerized product providing beverage-grade CO₂ from Climeworks air-captured CO₂ . The project is further supported by Stadtwerk Winterthur’s climate fund, as well as the Environmental Technology Promotion of the Swiss Federal Office for the Environment FOEN.