Carbon reimagined: Strengthening America’s industrial base

[ad_1] It’s 4:30 a.m. at a bottling plant, and one final truck is operating late. It’s not carrying syrup or cans — it’s delivering carbon dioxide (CO ₂ ), the gasoline that makes each drink sparkle. When the truck misses its window, manufacturing slows, carbonation drops, and schedules begin to slip.

We normally consider carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gasoline. However in on a regular basis {industry}, it retains meals chilly as dry ice, places the fizz in drinks, helps clear and stabilize water, and helps metalwork in manufacturing. It even performs a task in hospitals and labs. When provide runs brief, manufacturing slows, prices rise, and high quality can undergo.

The weak hyperlink is provide. For many years, U.S. CO ₂ has come primarily from just a few byproduct and natural-well sources — seasonal, geographically concentrated, and weak to upkeep cycles and power markets. That fragility can negatively impression companies: bottling strains pause, cold-chain prices leap, and regional distributors scramble.

To construct a extra resilient and aggressive industrial base, we want a home, round CO ₂ spine. The answer is inside attain: seize CO ₂ from renewable, distributed waste streams, refine it to meals and beverage-grade high quality, and ship it regionally. The outcome can be shorter routes, steadier costs, fewer single factors of failure, and a decrease environmental footprint.

How can we understand this imaginative and prescient? First by securing provide of captured, home CO ₂ , then by embedding CO ₂ into supplies that make markets extra round, and at last by enabling lower-carbon fuels that may assist future-proof aviation, maritime transport, and logistics.

The Cisco Basis helps advance breakthroughs on this area by way of its Regenerative Future Fund, its early-stage funding car for early-stage power, local weather, and resilience ventures, backing innovators that flip CO₂ from a constraint right into a catalyst for financial resilience.

Turning “natural waste” into dependable industrial feedstock <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="wp-image-481060 " src="https://blogs.cisco.com/gcs/ciscoblogs/1/2025/11/rsz_23d_rendering_of_alchemy_facility-1024x996.png" alt="3D rendering of a carbon capture facility." width="378" height="368" srcset="https://blogs.cisco.com/gcs/ciscoblogs/1/2025/11/rsz_23d_rendering_of_alchemy_facility-300x292.png 300w, https://blogs.cisco.com/gcs/ciscoblogs/1/2025/11/rsz_23d_rendering_of_alchemy_facility-1024x996.png 1024w, https://blogs.cisco.com/gcs/ciscoblogs/1/2025/11/rsz_23d_rendering_of_alchemy_facility-768x747.png 768w, https://blogs.cisco.com/gcs/ciscoblogs/1/2025/11/rsz_23d_rendering_of_alchemy_facility.png 1110w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 378px) 100vw, 378px"/> 3D rendering of Alchemy facility. A brand new era of innovators is remodeling how industries supply carbon. They're capturing CO ₂ from renewable, distributed streams and refining it right into a reliable, high-purity provide.

AlchemyCO ₂ recovers CO ₂ from renewable pure gasoline (RNG) services — the place biogenic CO ₂ is launched throughout upgrading — and purifies it to be used throughout meals, beverage, and manufacturing. With 500+ operational RNG websites in North America (and roughly 150 extra on the way in which), this co-located method brings CO ₂ nearer to clients, reducing transport miles and publicity to fragile provide chains.

For renewable gasoline producers, it turns what was as soon as wasted CO ₂ into a brand new, regular income. For patrons, it means high-quality CO ₂ that may be extra reasonably priced and reliably sourced close by.

AlchemyCO ₂ has secured long-term entry to greater than a hundred-thousand metric tonnes of renewable CO ₂ annually and financing to scale modular vegetation for regional clusters. Its first services are anticipated to return on-line in 2026. Backed by a rising patent portfolio and a course of that recovers about 20% extra CO ₂ than typical methods, AlchemyCO ₂ is striving to construct a nationwide community of about 50 services by 2030, making a extra resilient, round provide chain for certainly one of {industry}’s important gases.

Supplies that make markets extra round One of the crucial sensible methods to strengthen industrial resilience is to make the supplies we depend on extra environment friendly and sustainable by way of the upcycling of waste — decreasing reliance on virgin supplies and advancing a extra round financial system.

<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="wp-image-481047 " src="https://blogs.cisco.com/gcs/ciscoblogs/1/2025/11/rsz_1cmus_-_press39-768x1024.jpg" alt="Three cement blocks" width="301" height="401" srcset="https://blogs.cisco.com/gcs/ciscoblogs/1/2025/11/rsz_1cmus_-_press39-225x300.jpg 225w, https://blogs.cisco.com/gcs/ciscoblogs/1/2025/11/kaWWjNPD-rsz_1cmus_-_press39-768x1024.jpg 768w, https://blogs.cisco.com/gcs/ciscoblogs/1/2025/11/rsz_1cmus_-_press39.jpg 1071w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 301px) 100vw, 301px"/> CarbonBuilt Concrete masonry items (CMUs). CarbonBuilt is demonstrating how this may be achieved at scale. Its Reversa Binder, a proprietary mix of business byproducts wealthy in the identical chemical parts as cement, replaces as much as 50% of the cement in concrete. Alongside cement substitute, CarbonBuilt implements course of enhancements at manufacturing vegetation that considerably cut back waste and improve operational effectivity. The result's a useful equal to standard concrete that may be produced at a decrease price and with greater than 50% decrease embodied carbon content material.

So far, CarbonBuilt shared their know-how has been used to fabricate over 50,000 tons of concrete, decreasing greater than 2,000 metric tonnes of CO ₂ emissions within the course of. T he know-how permits larger industrial effectivity, lowers manufacturing prices, and produces a constructing materials with substantially-reduced embodied carbon.

CarbonBuilt is demonstrating that financial competitiveness and environmental efficiency can go hand in hand.

Fuels that future-proof aviation and logistics Captured CO ₂ can also be a important molecule for next-generation fuels. Artificial aviation fuels (SAF), together with power-to-liquids e-SAF, mix captured CO ₂ with renewable hydrogen to supply a drop-in jet gas that makes use of current plane and fueling infrastructure.

IATA tasks SAF manufacturing to double to ~2 million metric tonnes in 2025 , which stays ~0.7% of whole airline gas use . Provide is scaling however nonetheless trails demand — one other case the place sturdy purchaser alerts and cross-industry partnerships may unlock quantity and cut back prices.

Cisco stepped in early: in January 2023, Cisco joined United Airways’ Eco-Skies Alliance , serving to spur real-world SAF use whereas we proceed exploring methods to help power and aviation companions. The through-line is sensible: seeding dependable markets for various gas sources strengthens U.S. power safety and competitiveness in hard-to-abate sectors.

Backing sensible builders of a stronger carbon worth chain We’re proud to again innovators making the U.S. carbon worth chain extra dependable, native, and with decreased lifecycle emissions, together with AlchemyCO ₂ and CarbonBuilt. Collectively, they stabilize important inputs for manufacturing and development whereas laying the groundwork for tomorrow’s fuels — creating provide assurance, worth stability, and industrial vitality.

What industrial leaders can do subsequent

Map CO ₂ dependencies. Determine the place operations depend on CO ₂ (cooling, carbonation, welding, water remedy, supplies) and assess focus danger by supply and area. Pilot round CO ₂ merchandise. Begin with low-friction substitutions, like CO ₂ -mineralized blocks and mixes, the place specs are confirmed and prices are aggressive. Safe resilient provide. Discover native, renewable CO ₂ sources or multi-supplier methods to scale back single factors of failure and shorten routes. Sign demand for lower-carbon fuels. Take into account becoming a member of purchaser alliances, signal offtakes, or trial SAF certificates to assist unlock quantity and decrease prices over time.

Reimagining carbon as a useful resource — not solely a waste stream and an emission — is how we will construct a extra self-reliant industrial spine. By scaling dependable, round CO ₂ provide and the supplies and fuels that use it, Cisco and the Cisco Basis are serving to flip a identified constraint and pollutant into sturdy aggressive benefit for American {industry}.