PORTFOLIO

Every year, breweries and wineries in Switzerland emit approximately 25’000 tonnes of biogenic carbon dioxide (CO2) through their fermentation processes. In addition to these emissions, biomethane plants currently release up to 60’000 tonnes of CO2 wasted in the atmosphere while the Swiss economy imports a similar quantity of fossil-fuel based CO2. Circea’s mission is to upcycle these large resources of unused biogenic CO2 into a valuable product for the agricultural and the Food & Beverage (F&B) sectors at first, combining a technology of recovery, compression and purification of the gas, and market outlets for the CO2. Our approach aims to not only mitigate climate impact but also to foster the transition towards a more circular economy. By starting collaborating with wineries and breweries we demonstrate the feasibility of recovering and reusing small-scale biogenic CO2 as a sustainable ingredient. With the capacity to recover 85% of the CO2 generated, our project represents a significant opportunity to link local CO2 producers with businesses seeking renewable carbon sources, thereby reducing reliance on fossil fuels. Wineries and breweries are the first step of our project, but we start collaborating with biomethane plants, providing larger sources of CO2, all year long. Our end-vision is to create regional valorizations for bio-CO2 and ecosystems, leading the way towards a defossilised and circular economy for the future.

The project started in 2023 with a partner winemaker in Valais/Wallis, through the development of a prototype thanks to the Innobooster Living Labs for Decarbonisation, to test the technical feasibility, efficiency and quality of capturing and reusing the CO2. After validating the interest with wineries and breweries, a pilot project with one brewery, one winery and one beverage producer could be developed, which officially started in July 2024, creating the first ecosystem in Switzerland of biogenic CO2 recovery and reuse. In parallel, collaboration with the HAFL in Zollikofen (BFH) offers us access to expertise and infrastructure, to develop the project further, as part of First Ventures program. The start-up Circea has been officially founded beginning of 2024.
As part of the first milestones, the project aims at installing a complete CO2-recovery system at a brewery in the Canton of Vaud, validating and deploying the value proposition for breweries, and later on wineries. The necessary tests and analyses are conducted to ensure the process & food-grade quality of the CO2. Collaboration and partnerships with companies in the beverage industry, as well as the biogas sector are ongoing to expand our customer base and applications.