Francesca Zampini
Area 01 — Product & Strategy

Ahti.

A phytoplankton-based carbon capture system for industry.

for: James Dyson Award 2025Product DesignStrategy
Team
Francesca Zampini, Sara Labidi
My role
Concept, problem solving, technical development, interviews
Status
In development
Year
2025
Ahti modules installed on a building facade, glowing green among street trees.
Overview

Overview

Ahti brings one of nature's most efficient carbon sinks onto the walls of industrial buildings. Its modules, filled with phytoplankton, capture CO₂ from flue gases and combine to fit each facility. Submitted to the James Dyson Award 2025, it is now being developed with engineers within the YIELD Programme, an international startup incubator.

Front and back of an Ahti module: the glass body filled with phytoplankton, and its internal components.
01

Problem

Industry produces roughly a quarter of global greenhouse gas emissions. Traditional carbon capture is expensive, energy-intensive and hard to adapt from one site to another. One standard machine rarely fits the reality of a specific plant.

02

Insight

No two industrial sites need the same solution. So the answer could not be a single machine: it had to be a system each company can configure around its own needs.

The engine for it already existed in nature. Phytoplankton absorb CO₂ through photosynthesis, and microalgae fix carbon far more efficiently than land plants.

Diagram: flue gases enter the Ahti modules, phytoplankton turn CO₂ into biomass, and the biomass has five possible uses: ocean, supplement, 3D filament, fabric, biofuel.
03

Solution

Ahti is a modular photobioreactor mounted on the facades of industrial buildings and connected to their flue gases. Inside each module, phytoplankton turn CO₂ into biomass and release oxygen.

Modules can be added and combined, so the system matches the scale and configuration each company needs, working with existing infrastructure instead of replacing it.

Nothing goes to waste: the biomass could become a supplement, 3D printing filament, fabric or biofuel, or return to the ocean. These uses are still under evaluation.

Close-up of Ahti modules arranged in a diamond pattern.
Diagram: small, medium and large sites use a growing number of Ahti modules.
Illustrative configurations.
Solution

A self-regulating system

Sensors track pH, temperature, O₂, chlorophyll and CO₂ in every module. When a culture saturates or an algal bloom starts, an AI-IoT control unit dilutes it into neighbouring modules.

Render of the module's internal electronics: control board, sensors and LED ring.
Diagram: sensors monitor every module, the control unit detects a saturated culture, and the culture is diluted into neighbouring modules.
04

Process

I led the concept, much of the technical problem solving and the interviews with biologists and engineers that shaped the project.

We ran culture tests on phytoplankton, comparing growth over time and different nutrient mixes. Today we are reviewing the technical calculations with engineers to bring Ahti to a working prototype.

Phytoplankton culture tests in two containers, labelled one week and three days.
05

Where it's going

Ahti is now part of the YIELD Programme, an international startup incubator. Next step: a working prototype, backed by validated engineering.

Designed with Sara Labidi.

Next projectWaterless Processes for Post-war Reconstruction