Hydro buys minority stake in US carbon capture firm Verdox towards utilization of emission reduction technology at aluminium smelters

On 22^nd February 2022, the Norwegian aluminium giant, Norsk Hydro has announced that it has picked up a minority stakeholding in the US carbon capture firm Verdox for $20 million and projects to utilize its technology at aluminium smelters in a drive to down emissions.

The leading aluminium producer, Hydro however announced that plans in 2021 to axe its carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions by 30% during this decade, which will navigate the company to attain net-zero by 2050 at the latest, in compliance with the 2015 Paris climate agreement delineated to restrict global warming.

Eivind Kallevik, the Head of Hydro’s Aluminium Production Division said, “More and more customers are requesting metals produced with a smaller carbon footprint. The ultimate goal here is to deliver zero emissions from the production process itself.”

“By applying Verdox technology at existing smelters it would both speed up its decarbonisation and ensure the plants could stay in operation for the long term”, Hydro added.

“Hydro had evaluated more than 50 carbon capture technologies before settling on the U.S. firm”, Kallevik added.