Grant: Applied Research and Development Grants - Level 1

Many technology companies around the world have been actively developing cellulosic sugar conversion technology, however no commercial process has been developed that is capable of producing sugars of high quality suitable to the commercial chemicals industry to date. These companies are pursuing a variety of purification alternatives in search of a solution that is technically and economically viable for this purpose. While ion exchange (IX) is a commonly used technology for purification, Uninterrupted Ion Exchange (UIX) is the only IX system in the world offering uninterrupted resin regeneration, continuous operation with no moving parts, and tolerance for unclarified feed streams. Benefits versus conventional IX are: lower total treatment cost by 20-40%, fully continuous operation, simplicity of no moving parts, smaller footprint & lower maintenance, tolerance of dissolved and suspended solids leading to less pre-treatment requirements, reduced waste volume, reduced fouling & scaling risks and high product recovery & quality. UIX changes the operating, maintenance, and cost profiles of IX, offering bottom line advantages to end users, thereby making it a significant innovation. This project would be undertaken in partnership with Bioindustrial Innovation Canada (BIC), which is currently evaluating, developing, and physically validating the conversion of biomass to sugars and co-products for commercial scale-up application. BIC's objective is to establish an economically viable, full-scale, commercial cellulosic sugar plant (~125,000 dry tonnes/year cellulosic mixed sugars) in Southwestern Ontario by 2018. This plant will serve as an anchor for the development of Bio Hybrid & Chemistry cluster in the region, allowing bio-based feedstocks such as agricultural residues to create value along the chemistry food chain.