It sounds impossible: producing energy from CO2. Yet that’s exactly what China has achieved, launching two fully operational power generators that run on this surprising gas. But here’s the catch—it’s not the kind of CO2 floating in the air, and the system doesn’t pull it from the atmosphere either.
The system in question reuses waste heat from steel production at a facility in Liupanshui, Guizhou province, in southwest China. Instead of letting that thermal energy dissipate, the supercritical CO2 absorbs it, powers the turbine, and keeps cycling endlessly.
Source: straightdge