Oakbio Makes Bioplastic at Cement Plant using
CO2 from Flue Gas and Electricity
Milestone for cement industry
and renewable products
SUNNYVALE, CA (July 10, 2012) - Today Oakbio Inc.
announced the successful production of bioplastic
polymers in their bioreactor systems. Oakbio's
system creates bioplastic using inputs of cement
plant flue gas and electricity. The technology
uses bioreactors driven by non-toxic microbes
to capture CO2 and convert it to a variety of
sustainable products directly from the plant's
gas emissions.
This is the latest development from an on-site
research collaboration at Lehigh Southwest Cement
Company's Permanente cement manufacturing
plant in Cupertino. Lehigh Southwest is part of
Lehigh Hanson, Inc., the North American operations
of the Heidelberg Cement Group, a world leader
in construction materials with approximately
52,000 employees in more than 40 countries.
Chief Scientist Brian
Sefton stated, "Our carbon conversion process
yields over 50% bioplastics in microbe biomass
by dry weight from inputs of raw flue gas and
electricity. The type of plastic we make is not
only renewable, but biodegradable as
well.
"The effective conversion of captured CO2 into
a valuable bioplastic product represents an
important technical achievement for potential
large-scale bioplastics production. This result
also points the way to a new method for
greenhouse gas capture, making emissions
gas CO2 a feedstock for mass scale manufacturing."
CEO Russell Howard added:
"At Oakbio we see industrial CO2 as a carbon
resource. By converting virtually unlimited amounts
of low cost CO2 available from various industries
worldwide into sustainable products like biodegradable
plastics, Oakbio's technology can answer multiple
needs: full scale chemicals production without the
use of petroleum oil or agricultural feedstock;
replacement of petroleum oil-derived plastics
with bio-degradable renewable products; and
the capture of CO2 to prevent greenhouse gas
accumulation. The ability of our microbes to
perform their magic in cement flue gas is an
important step toward achieving this vision".
About Oakbio, Inc.
Oakbio is a private
technology-based company in Sunnyvale dedicated to sustainable production of
specialty chemicals using novel microbial production processes that combine GHG
reduction with manufacture of sustainable specialty chemicals (see www.oakbio.com).
Contact:
Russell Howard, CEO,
Oakbio, (408) 930-7004; [email protected]
Comments