Florian Birner — CO2 Capture at Industrial Scale, Why AI Won't Save the Planet
Jul 21, 2026 · 48 min · 18 segments
Florian Birner is the co-founder and managing director of Planeteers, a Hamburg-based climate tech startup developing a scalable, end-to-end CO2 capture and storage solution based on accelerated…
Florian Birner is the co-founder and managing director of Planeteers, a Hamburg-based climate tech startup developing a scalable, end-to-end CO2 capture and storage solution based on accelerated natural limestone weathering — essentially speeding up a 1,000-year natural process into seconds, and releasing the result safely into rivers and oceans. Before Planeteers, Florian trained as an electrical engineer at Bosch, moved into large-scale industrial plants at Linde Engineering, then co-founded and successfully exited a HealthTech startup — before promising himself, and his wife, never to do it again. Too many bottles of wine later, Planeteers was founded in December 2022. In our in-depth conversation, we discuss: 🔹 From Bosch to HealthTech to CO2 capture — the winding road to Planeteers 🔹 How their plug-and-play reactor works, and why simplicity is their biggest competitive advantage 🔹 Why AI won't solve the climate crisis — "the physical molecule still needs to come out of the air" 🔹 The €40B addressable market hiding in plain sight across European industry 🔹 Tipping points, cascading effects, and staying optimistic as a climate tech founder 🔹 Winning the Hamburger Gründerpreis, securing EIC backing, and what's next for the Series A Hope you enjoy episode 4. Links in comments down below. Where to find Florian: \- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/florian-birner/ \- Planeteers: https://planeteers.de/en/ Hamburg's climate tech & deep tech ecosystem Florian name-drops several Hamburg-specific initiatives worth exploring. \- Hamburger Gründerpreis (the award Planeteers won): https://www.hamburger-gruenderpreis.de \- Hamburg Sustainability Conference: https://www.hamburg-sustainability-conference.de \- Impossible Founders (mentioned in the episode): https://www.impossible-founders.de Where to find found: \- Newsletter: https://www.foundhamburg.com \- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/foundhamburg \- Whatsapp community: https://chat.whatsapp.com/Frz6bNqYGkKG37dG4Z30uJ?mode=gi\_t \- Kyrylo's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kyrylokorsun \- Hugo's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hugopaquin For inquiries about sponsoring the found podcast, email kyrylo@foundhamburg.com In this episode, we cover: 00:00 Intro 01:31 Meet Florian Birner & Planeteers 03:01 Founder journey: Bosch, Linde & a HealthTech exit 07:11 What Planeteers does: end-to-end carbon capture 11:17 The business model: plants + carbon credits 12:51 What's slowing climate tech from scaling 16:15 Do companies really put money where their mouth is? 19:04 Co-founder roles & lessons from past ventures 21:29 Project ELIX: the first real reactor 23:40 Europe's emissions & the market opportunity 25:20 Scaling solutions, red tape & getting founders in action 27:04 The scale of the problem: gigatons & tipping points 31:36 Geopolitics & global cooperation 34:33 EVs, China & the European industry dilemma 36:33 Staying optimistic: resilience as a founder 40:00 Wins from the last six months & the EIC grant 42:47 Support orgs & the Impossible Founders network 44:06 The Hamburg startup ecosystem 47:41 Wrap-up
Florian Birner is the co-founder and managing director of Planeteers, a Hamburg-based climate tech startup developing a scalable, end-to-end CO2 capture and storage solution based on accelerated…
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