Skokie biotech company LanzaTech uses bacteria to recycle carbon emissions from industrial pollution into usable ethanol [Video]

SKOKIE, Ill. (WLS) — A biotech company in north suburban Skokie is hoping to change industrial pollution by capturing carbon emissions and transforming them into usable products by using billions of bacteria.

LanzaTech labs in Skokie has 100 different stations testing different methods to meet a growing need to capture carbon on an industrial scale.

“We want it so every child in the world can pick up a crayon and color the sky and have that crayon that they pick is blue, right, and today that’s not the reality for every kid around the world,” said Chief Science Officer Zara Summers.

Large scale bioreactors are installed at steel mills and oil and gas refineries around the world, piping carbon emissions directly to the bacteria, which in turn grow and give up usable raw material.