Article

Building prosperity by recycling greenhouse gas emissions

Paul Addo — Co-founder and CEO, SeeO2 Energy

October 21, 2024

University of Calgary

Alberta

Onsite recycling of waste emissions to tackle climate change

To avoid the worst impacts of a changing environment, countries, cities and businesses across the world are striving to meet global targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.   

Recycling waste emissions is one innovative way to reach that goal. Paul Addo, co-founder of SeeO2 Energy, is developing a patented technology that converts greenhouse gas emissions at industrial facilities to fuels — and businesses in Alberta’s oil patch, Europe and elsewhere are taking note.   

We are based in Canada, and we are pushing to be a company that benefits Canada.

Patented technology with global potential

ATCO, an energy and utility company, took an early interest in the concept, and building that private partnership helped convince Addo and his co-founder, Beatriz Molero Sanchez, to launch the startup, which now has pilot projects with different industrial players.   

The company’s patented technology includes an electrochemical process that uses less energy and less expensive materials than those currently on the market. The process transforms carbon dioxide — a greenhouse gas — into useful industrial gases like carbon monoxide and syngas, which is used in plastic, chemical and metal processing.  

Building prosperity for Canada

Seven patents  
15 awards, including the Shell GameChanger Accelerator, Eureka Innovation Award, and a Mitacs Innovation Award 
Three committed pilot projects at industrial facilities   
Private partnerships with four companies

Access to cutting-edge tools led to clean technology solutions

Addo and Sanchez came together in 2017 while pursuing their PhDs in chemistry at the University of Calgary, working with chemistry professor Viola Birss in her CFI-funded lab. Birss also helped start the company and continues to advise SeeO2 Energy as it works to commercialize its range of products.  

Addo says the access he had to key instrumentation in the lab  allowed him and Sanchez to develop these new clean technology processes that help keep emissions out of the atmosphere while keeping Canada competitive.   

“I like my area of study because it’s trying to solve an environmental concern and also build a product out of it,” he says. “It’s not doing the research just for the degree’s sake, and you leave it at the university. The fact that it’s something that you can take out and scale up was of real interest to me.”   