- Octavia Carbon builds Africa’s first geothermal-powered Direct Air Carbon Capture plant in Kenya, targeting a 1,000-ton annual CO₂ removal capacity by 2026.
- Kenya leverages its Rift Valley geothermal resources and basalt formations to power carbon removal and store CO₂ underground.
In central Kenya, engineers operate four metallic tanks that pull carbon dioxide directly from the air using geothermal heat. Octavia Carbon, a Nairobi-based startup, designed and built the machines to pioneer Direct Air Carbon Capture (DACC) in Africa.
Positioned along the Great Rift Valley, Kenya generates nearly half its electricity from geothermal energy. This gives it a natural advantage in powering energy-intensive DACC technology, said Hannah Wanjau, an engineer at Octavia.
“Geothermal steam lets us run our systems efficiently and cheaply,” Wanjau said. “And the local basalt rock formations store the captured CO₂ safely for thousands of years.”
DACC systems suck air through a chemical filter that traps CO₂. Heating the filter in a vacuum then releases the gas, which Octavia can store underground or sell as carbon credits to governments and businesses seeking to offset emissions.
Each of Octavia’s prototype machines captures around 10 tons of CO₂ annually, equivalent to what 1,000 trees absorb. The company already sells credits based on this capture rate, and it has signed deals worth $3 million, with nearly half prepaid.
Co-founder Martin Freimüller said Octavia will commission a 1,000-ton-per-year plant by 2026. “Yes, what we do now is small,” he said. “But scaling to a billion tons starts with the first thousand.”
According to Oxford University researchers, the world must remove 7 to 9 billion tons of CO₂ annually by 2050 to limit global warming to 1.5°C. The planet breached that threshold for the first time last year.
Octavia has partnered with Cella Mineral Storage, a New York-based startup, to inject CO₂ deep underground. If successful, Kenya will become the second country, after Iceland, to use this method to store air-captured carbon.
Freimüller believes Kenya’s combination of geothermal energy, engineering talent, and political will creates a model for global action. “People often see Africa as a climate victim,” he said. “We want to show the world that Africa can help solve the problem, with technology built here for the world.”
While critics like Greenpeace accuse carbon capture of enabling fossil fuel dependence, the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) argues it remains vital for cutting emissions in hard-to-abate industries like cement and steel.
Octavia aims to prove that climate innovation from the Global South isn’t just possible, it’s essential.