The new research and development centre at Hamburg Blue Hub combines the testing of modular CO2-capture technologies with preparations for international deployment. A key focus is the collaboration with Canadian project developer Deep Sky.
Hamburg, 16 October 2026. eFUEL GROUP and DACMA GmbH today opened the DACMA Competence Center at Hamburg Blue Hub. Hamburg’s Senator for Economic Affairs, Dr Melanie Leonhard, joined company representatives for the official opening during the Hydrogen and Carbon Capture Technology World Expo. Keynote speakers also included Evelyne Coulombe from the Canadian Embassy. Her visit highlighted the importance of German-Canadian cooperation in CO2 capture.
Dr Melanie Leonhard, Senator for Economic Affairs, Labour and Innovation, said: “In Hamburg, we develop new technologies and bring them into industrial practice. The DACMA Competence Center creates new opportunities to do just that. Here, businesses and researchers can work together to explore how CO2 from ambient air can be used as a raw material for industry. This also supports the development of synthetic fuels that will be needed in aviation and shipping in the future. With this expertise, we are strengthening Hamburg as a hub for innovation and industry and laying the foundations for new business models and industrial applications to emerge here.”
Direct Air Capture (DAC) refers to the capture of CO2 from ambient air. The captured CO2 can be used as a carbon source for synthetic fuels and other chemical products, or stored permanently in geological formations. When combined with permanent storage, the process can contribute to the net removal of CO2 from the atmosphere, provided that emissions across the entire process chain are lower than the amount of CO2 stored.
At the DACMA Competence Center, modular DAC systems are tested under real industrial conditions. The focus is on investigating technical components and materials, as well as analysing operating processes and energy and material flows. Together with international universities and research institutions, the partners aim to use these findings to develop approaches to technical optimisation.
German-Canadian cooperation on international DAC projects
DACMA and Canadian project developer Deep Sky are working together to further develop and deploy Direct Air Capture technology in Canada. The partnership includes an initial DACMA unit with a planned capture capacity of 600 tonnes of CO2 per year, as well as the joint development of a next generation of technology for larger facilities. Deep Sky combines the capture of CO2 from ambient air with permanent geological storage.
For its future large-scale facilities, Deep Sky has stated a target of removing one million tonnes of CO2 from the atmosphere annually. This scale represents an expansion target, rather than a removal capacity already achieved. What matters for the climate is how much CO₂ is permanently removed after deducting emissions from construction, operation, transport and storage: verified net removal of one million tonnes would take that amount of CO2 out of the atmosphere each year. Unlike emissions avoidance, this process addresses CO2 already present in the atmosphere.
Evelyne Coulombe praised the partnership between DACMA and Deep Sky as a milestone in German-Canadian cooperation and a pioneering contribution to both countries’ joint commitment to decarbonisation. “Decarbonising industry is a challenge, but also an opportunity. Canada offers ideal conditions for climate-friendly production. Companies benefit from clean electricity and access to raw materials, CO2 storage capacity and infrastructure, as well as a stable investment environment. Removing CO2 from the air will become increasingly important in achieving the net-zero climate target. Canada has the infrastructure, regulatory framework and financing instruments to successfully decarbonise industrial production.”
“At Deep Sky, we focus on scaling the world’s best Direct Air Capture technologies to industrial scale. Our collaboration with DACMA shows what is possible when companies work across borders to develop and scale the technologies needed to build a global carbon removal industry. The competence centre in Hamburg reflects our shared approach: real-world deployment is the crucial step in understanding how technologies perform under actual conditions and building on that knowledge as we prepare to bring DACMA’s first unit to Deep Sky,” said Alex Petre, CEO of Deep Sky.
“How our technology performs in ongoing operation is crucial to the further development of our systems. The DACMA Competence Center allows us to feed experience gained during testing directly back into development. This enables us to base technical decisions on a broader set of data,” said Alexander Backs, Co-CEO of DACMA GmbH.
“Direct Air Capture is a pragmatic, readily implementable complement to efforts to achieve climate targets, with the potential for a very substantial impact. The DACMA Competence Center creates the conditions for further developing this proven technology and testing the integration of CO2 capture into downstream production processes. The negative emissions enabled by this technology could allow Hamburg to realistically achieve the targets set by its climate referendum without jeopardising jobs in Hamburg’s industrial sector,” explained Hanspeter Tiede, Managing Director of eFuel DAC GmbH. As part of eFUEL GROUP, the company specialises in investments in projects and technologies for capturing CO2 from ambient air.
“To produce eFuels, eSAF and eMethanol, we need to bring together renewable energy, hydrogen and suitable carbon sources. We therefore focus on integrating DAC into these production chains. Together with DACMA, we want to investigate the interfaces between CO2 supply and downstream processing,” said Lorenz Kiene, Managing Director of eFUEL GROUP.
PEGASUS – linking DAC and eMethanol production
In the PEGASUS project, DACMA, eFuel DAC GmbH and Hamburg University of Technology (TUHH) are investigating the integration of atmospheric CO2 into an eMethanol process chain. Experimental work on DAC technology is complemented by simulations that consider CO2 capture, hydrogen from renewable sources and methanol synthesis together. The project analyses how energy, heat and material flows can be coordinated and how this affects the efficiency and economic viability of the process chain.
The PEGASUS research project
The DACMA Competence Center’s activities also include the PEGASUS project, a collaboration between DACMA, eFuel DAC GmbH and Hamburg University of Technology (TUHH). The focus is on the experimental development of DAC technology and the investigation of its integration into an eMethanol process chain that uses atmospheric CO2 as its carbon source. Accompanying process simulations examine the interaction between CO2 capture, hydrogen from renewable sources and methanol synthesis. The aim is to identify opportunities to coordinate energy, heat and material flows, thereby improving the efficiency and economic viability of the integrated process chain.
