For several years XPRIZES have been pushing the boundaries of human potential, encouraging brilliant minds to make breakthrough technologies and discoveries in genomics, space research, ocean health, climate change and more.
The first round of the $20 million NRG COSIA Carbon XPRIZE has now closed, having received a raft of fascinating submissions.
The global open innovation contest is a call to tackle the problem of climate change in new ways. A total of 47 teams of scientists submitted their ideas for how to turn carbon dioxide emissions into useful products, such as building materials, fish food and low-emission fuels.
The teams hail from seven different countries, including China, the United Kingdom and Germany with members coming from universities, startups, families, established companies and more.
Among the exciting submissions are a proposal to create carbon negative biofuel from microalgae feedstock and an idea to use carbon dioxide to make a concrete substitute.
The judging panel is now reviewing the submissions before announcing the semi-finalists in October.
In all, the four-and-a-half year open innovation competition has three rounds. Each one will be judged by nine scientists from business and academia. Up to five teams will move into the final round. They will be scored on how much carbon dioxide they convert and the net value of their products.
Dan Wicklum, chief executive of COSIA (Canada’s Oil Sands Innovation Alliance), said in a statement: “As a scientist, I know from experience that when you focus a challenge and incentivize smart people to think about how to address that challenge from different angles and different perspectives, good things happen.”
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