S-Oil has teamed up with a local gas firm to capture carbon dioxide emitted from its facility and use it for carbonated soft drinks and dry ice.

According to the South Korean refinery on Thursday, it has signed an agreement with Dong Kwang Chemical for the project, for which S-Oil will collect by-product gases from its hydrogen production process at the Ulsan plant and supply them through pipelines to the adjacent Dong Kwang facility.

There, carbon will be extracted, refined and then transformed into commercial products, such as dry ice and liquid carbon.

“This partnership is expected to enable S-Oil to trim down carbon dioxide by 100,000 tons per year. Dong Kwang Chemical, which currently produces 100,000 tons of liquid carbon per year, is set to expand its production capacity and double its annual production to 200,000 tons starting the end of next year,” an S-Oil official said.

By Kim Byung-wook (kbw@heraldcorp.com)