Fine Chemicals

Slicker Recycling, a waste oil collection company, uses Hydrodec's hydrogenation refining technology to re-refine used and contaminated waste oil. This company applies proprietary technology to re-refine used and contaminated waste oil to produce high-quality industrial oils for reuse. The technology removes detectable levels of PCBs from used transformer oil. The high-quality industrial oils produced include emission-free and cost-effective SUPERFINE™ transformer oil and naphthenic base oil. The process is highly efficient, with a recovery rate of 99% and near zero emissions.

Production of natural ingredients through microbial fermentation processes with engineered microbes. This company produces natural ingredients through microbial fermentation with their unique and proprietary engineered microorganisms. Their products include fermented vitamins and plant-derived bioactives. They aim to replace the chemistry and unsustainable agriculture involved in food production with biology. The concentration of active ingredients in natural sources, such as plants, is very low, resulting in a fragile, expensive, and environmentally invasive supply chain.

Renewable source chemistry for the production of biosolvents and fine chemicals. This company's bio-based products have a wide range of applications, such as solvents, catalysts, modifiers, and industrial intermediates. Viridisol M® is their ultra-high-quality 2-methyl tetrahydrofuran brand that increases process yields and selectivity in certain chemical reactions, more specifically, organo-metallic chemistry. This product has low water solubility, eliminating the need for an extraction step with another solvent. It also cleanly separates from water, enabling easy recovery for recycling.

Production of chemical commodities through chemo-enzymatic cascade reactions. These chemo-enzymatic cascade reactions use a combination of chemical and biological catalysts for the production of basic and fine chemicals. They perform screenings of different biocatalysts to find which enzymes work best for each customer and optimize the selected enzyme to maximize sustainability and minimize cost. They also obtain substrates from renewable sources.

 

Synthesis of biodiesel and NOBS (advanced bleaching system). This company's biodiesel comes from multiple sustainable feedstocks, including inedible corn oil, used cooking oil, degummed/crude soil oil, beef tallow, and pork lard. These feedstocks do not compete with food production. This company produces 89 million gallons of biodiesel per year and has an on-site liquid waste treatment facility. NOBS is a bleach activator that performs in cold water. Traditional stain removal ingredients, such as sodium hypochlorite, contain chlorine, which corrodes washing machines and destroys fabrics.

Bio-based, multipurpose solvent. Cyrene™ is a bio-based solvent that outperforms toxic, petroleum-based solvents. Cyrene™ is a sustainable and superior alternative to toxic solvents such as NMP and DMF. Cyrene™ has been proven to outperform NMP and DMF in 20-30% of applications trialled to date. This solvent is low-toxic, environmentally benign, biodegradable, biocompatible, recyclable, circular, scalable, and bio-based with low water usage and low carbon emissions. During decomposition, there are no harmful NOx and SOx emissions.

Develops and scales continuous processes using flow chemistry technology. Continuous flow reactors save energy through increased efficiency, development speed, selectivity, and flexibility compared to conventional batch reactors. Utilizing microreactor technology also increases efficiency by decreasing mass, heat transfer length, and reaction volume. Continuous flow reactors also require fewer operational steps, improving worker safety. 

Liquid bromine-based antimicrobial. This stable liquid bromine-based antimicrobial is safer and easier to apply than traditional chlorine or other solid bromine-based products. These conventional products are highly volatile, reactive, and hazardous. The use of liquid makes this novel product easy to feed and control. It has better performance at high pH, is more persistent than chlorine, and has fewer reactions with organic contaminants. The product also has low volatility, resulting in lower halogen feed rates, less odor, better tower fill fouling prevention, and lower air emissions.

Producing phenol from waste nitrous oxide. The adipic acid manufacturing process produces large amounts of nitrous oxide gas as waste. Nitrous oxide gas has high global warming potential and contributes to the depletion of the ozone layer. This process takes waste nitrous oxide gas and reuses it as a reagent in hydroxylating benzene to phenol. This reduces nitrous oxide gas waste and reduces the raw materials involved in phenol production. 

Polyester polyols made from byproduct of the phtahlic anhydride process. Byproducts from the phthalic anhydride process are usually disposed by incineration. Using these byproducts to manufacture polyester polyols reduces waste and its associated environmental impacts.