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Calgary-based company SixRing Inc. is set to scale up biofuel production thanks to a $1.4-million grant from the federal government. SixRing’s parent company, Fluid Energy Group, is matching the funding.
The company has developed several patented processes to create ultralow-carbon biofuels using crop and forestry waste.
The funding, announced Tuesday, comes from the Agriculture Clean Technology Program, and will help SixRing scale up production and develop specific fuel types and products, specifically sustainable aviation fuel (SAF). However, Markus Weissenberger, chief technology officer for SixRing, says the potential is far greater.
“There’s enough biomass available as base products to get completely independent from oil,” he said. “The input material is available worldwide . . . the question is, how are you able to convert it in a way that you don’t put more energy into reconversion than you get out, and the SixRing process can provide this.”
Francis Drouin, parliamentary secretary to federal Agriculture Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau, said the program was oversubscribed and that projects had to be chosen that were feasible and with a strong connection with agriculture.
“What SixRing is developing here really connects not only Calgary with energy, but also agriculture,” he said. “This is really a truly Canadian story.”
SixRing is developing its technology to use with a wide range of inputs, from unused straw and corn husks, to bark, wood chips and pine beetle-infested wood.
The process operates at ambient temperatures and pressures, creating minimal emissions, and can be easily integrated into existing biomass industrial infrastructure. Weissenberger said other biofuel technologies require greater amounts of energy. He said SixRing’s process is well below the green technology threshold of 50 grams of Co2 per megajoule.
“We’re exceeding this now already by 60 per cent,” he said. “So we expect to be far better.”
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The process creates two byproducts — liquid Lignin-Hemicullulose-Deolymerization-Organis (LHDO), which is used directly in SAF, biofuels such as gasoline, fine chemistries, petrochemicals and bioresins; and solid cellulose, which is used in cellulosic ethanol, cellulose microfibres, concrete and adhesives, micro-crystalline cellulose paper, food, pharma and packaging, as well as paints, coatings, cosmetics and other applications.
The funding will help the company scale up over the course of two years and further develop new products and increase production. It will partner with other companies on venture operations to expand their portfolio, and potentially licence the technology in the future.
One partner already on board is the Calgary Airport Authority, as it works to develop sustainable aviation fuel.
SixRing Inc. has also previously received $240,000 in grants from Invest Alberta.
The company, which currently employs 40 people but could expand to as many as 100, aims to convert between 200,000 and 400,000 tonnes of input into biofuel.
SixRing is a new division of Fluid, a Calgary-based chemical company with products in a number of different sectors with a mandate for minimal environmental effect.
Twitter: @JoshAldrich03
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