Belfast-based cleantech company Catagen has launched five new climate technologies that could help industry to reduce carbon emissions by enabling the production of green hydrogen and e-fuels.
Catagen also officially launched the ClimaHtech brand under which the technologies will go to market. The company is also planning to grow its current workforce of 36 to 75 in the next year, and more than 130 in 2024.
The new technologies were developed following the five funding awards from the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy’s Net Zero Innovation Portfolio Catagen received in early 2022, aimed at accelerating research and testing its net zero products. The company has developed new ways to generate green hydrogen, bio-hydrogen and e-fuels, as well as complementary systems for carbon capture and hydrogen compression in nine months.
The Queen’s University spin-out has delivered prototypes for each of its technologies, and is now on track to deliver full-scale demonstrators in 2024. It plans to to scale the business significantly in the next three to five years.
“Climate change affects everything. It’s shaping cities, economies, landscapes, how we move and how we live. We are creating new technologies that clean and decarbonise the air, applying our innovations to decarbonising challenging sectors such as industry, shipping, and aviation. We are committed to finding a collective solution that will cut CO2 emissions and enable a move away from fossil fuels to cleaner energy sources,” said Catagen chief executive Dr Andrew Woods.
“Technology, talent, and a united sense of purpose have taken us to the point where today our team can launch ClimaHtech, a configurable system which uses advanced climate technologies to produce green hydrogen and efuels. This technology is scalable and by adopting efficient green hydrogen energy powered by renewable sources such as wind and solar, we can help fulfil net zero pledges across multi sector industries.”
Chief technology officer Prof Roy Douglas said the company was seeing tremendous demand for innovation across manufacturing, electricity, agriculture and transportation.
“Industry has to change and has to become cleaner, cutting its carbon-dioxide emissions to zero. Working in partnership with the UK Government and industry leaders, our goal is to accelerate the shift away from fossil fuels to cleaner greener energy, helping to decarbonise and reduce emissions in the most challenging sectors of industry,” he said.
