Waste energy company Enerkem to form energy research centre with City of Edmonton and Alberta Energy Research Institute

8 July 2009

Enerkem, a waste-to-biofuels and green chemicals technology company, is to jointly form an advanced energy research centre with the City of Edmonton and the Alberta Energy Research Institute (AERI).

The research centre will focus on the development and demonstration of novel catalytic conversion processes to produce advanced biofuels and green chemicals from non-hazardous industrial waste (generated by the oil and gas, agricultural, forestry and other industrial sectors) as well as from municipal waste.
It will be adjacent to the planned commercial waste-to-biofuels production facility which is ready for construction and has already been announced by Enerkem.

‘Enerkem is a proud partner in this novel project which focuses on innovative technologies and research for tomorrow’s carbon constrained reality,’ said Vincent Chornet, president and CEO of Enerkem. “This research center will become an important component in furthering our company’s dedication to innovation, allowing us to attract some of the country’s brightest minds.’

Construction of the research center is scheduled to be completed in the first quarter of 2010. Enerkem will develop the center in collaboration with the City of Edmonton. AERI is contributing CAN$9m to the project.

The research center is part of a waste-to-biofuels initiative between the City of Edmonton, Enerkem, and the government of Alberta, through AERI. In addition to the research center, this initiative includes the 36-million litres per year commercial waste-to-biofuels production facility and a municipal waste processing facility being built by the City of Edmonton. Enerkem announced in May 2009 that the commercial waste-to-biofuels production facility has successfully completed the necessary environmental regulatory process and had been granted a permit to commence construction.

Enerkem is headquartered in Montreal, Quebec, and has engineering offices in Sherbrooke, Quebec. It has a pilot plant, in operation since 2003, in Sherbrooke, Quebec.

Enerkem’s first commercial-scale plant is based in Westbury, Quebec. The company is also involved in the development of a municipal waste-to-biofuels plant in Edmonton, Alberta, and recently announced the development of a second-generation biofuels production facility to be located in Pontotoc, Mississippi.

Enerkem is a private company, financed by US venture capital firms Rho Ventures and Braemar Energy Ventures, the Canadian investment fund BDR Capital and the Company’s management.

In May of this year, Enerkem, was granted a permit to commence construction of a biofuels and green chemicals facility in Alberta, Canada, following a environmental regulatory process.

Copyright © 2009 NewNet

Tags: biofuel, biomass, R&D, waste, waste energy

This story was published on Wednesday, July 8th, 2009 at 9:48 am and is filed under North America, biomass/biofuel, companies. You can follow any responses to article entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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