New technology that removes carbon from the ocean - in a similar way to capturing bubbles from a fizzy drink - is operating on England's south cost.

The pilot project called SeaCURE is funded by the UK government as part of its search for carbon reduction technologies.

Around a quarter of carbon dioxide - CO₂ - emitted into the atmosphere is absorbed by the ocean. SeaCURE researchers say they have found a way of removing the carbon from seawater, storing it, then pumping the water back out to sea to absorb more carbon dioxide.

The system makes use of renewable energy to remove carbon from seawater, then releases that seawater back to the ocean where it naturally replenishes the lost CO₂ by sucking carbon from the atmosphere.

The project is led by the University of Exeter, with Plymouth Marine Laboratory, Brunel University London and industrial partner Eliquo Hydrok, with a demonstration plant operating at the SEA LIFE centre in Weymouth.

The SeaCURE team says carbon capture is not an alternative to urgent global carbon reduction - but removing existing emissions is also vital to the climate change fight.

Project leader professor Paul Halloran, of the University of Exeter’s Global Systems Institute, said, “We are really excited to have the opportunity to test this technology in the real world, and be part of the solution to one of the biggest challenges facing our planet.

“The demonstration plant will process 3,000 litres of seawater per minute, removing an estimated 100 tonnes of CO₂ per year. The aim is to find out what barriers there might be to scaling this up, ultimately to a similar magnitude to current global carbon emissions.

“Because it uses seawater and could be positioned offshore, SeaCURE would not compete with other land uses, so there is the potential for it to operate at a scale that matches the size of the challenge climate change presents. However, we have a lot of work to do and questions to address before that.”

Professor Tom Bell, leading Air-Sea Exchange research at Plymouth Marine Laboratory, said, “SeaCURE is an incredibly exciting project to be a part of.

"Our initial trials have shown that a substantial amount of carbon can be efficiently removed from seawater using relatively small amounts of renewable energy. This opens up an incredible opportunity to deliver a solution that can make a genuine positive impact.

"We are delighted to have received funding to assess the potential barriers to success of the SeaCURE system when operated at scale, and see this as a potential game-changer in how the climate crisis may be combatted.”