[:it]Air Co, the magic of sustainable vodka[:]

[:it]ELISABETTA LUGLI

Transform air and water into vodka. Cleaning the atmosphere.

It seems like a joke, a joke to which anyone would respond: maybe! Instead it is a true story.

Stafford Sheehan and Gregory Constantine met in 2017 at a summit organized by Forbes and dedicated to the most talented under 30s in the world.

The first, a chemistry researcher at Yale University, was working on the possibility of recreating chlorophyll photosynthesis in the laboratory using carbon dioxide. The second was the marketing manager of Smirnoff vodka.

From that meeting the startup was born in Brooklyn Air Company who created Air Co, a unique vodka in the world: produced exclusively with air and water, it uses the CO2 present in the atmosphere transforming it into ethanol. No fermentation, and above all no pollution. Indeed, the production of each single bottle of Air Co cleans the air by eliminating 340 grams of carbon dioxide.

You may be wondering how this is possible. Even if you don't think so, it is very simple: a catalyst activated by energy obtained from solar panels captures the CO2 present in the air to produce ethanol, which at the end of the distillation process is dissolved in the water. 

The percentage of ethanol obtained with this process is lower than that obtained with the fermentation of potatoes (a method normally used to produce vodka), making Air Co a less alcoholic vodka than the others: around 25 degrees. But those who have tasted it say that it is also good, with a sweet and captivating taste. The most famous restaurants in New York were quick to snap it up: among the first, Eleven Madison Park and the Gramercy Tavern.

If you can't wait to taste it, the bad news is that you won't find it outside of New York: to be consistent with the principles of eco-sustainability that drove them to this incredible invention, the owners have decided to market it only in New York, minimizing the impact of distribution on the environment. 

You have to travel to be able to try the incredible vodka made of water, air and sun. Or you have to be content with imagining it, as you can imagine that in the future many other companies will follow the example of Air Company for their productions.

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