Grant: Applied Research and Development Grants - Level 1

Established in 2012, Aduro Energy is an Ontario-based technology solutions company that leverages the unique properties of water to upgrade renewable oils, waste plastics, rubber, and Bitumen into higher-value petroleum and specialty chemical products - cheaply, quickly, and with significant environmental benefits. For Aduro to move on to the next stage of commercialization, the company needs to build a revenue-generating pilot-scale unit to process and demonstrate the companies patented Hydrochemolytic Plastics and Hydrochemolytic Bitumen Upgrading (HPUTM & HBUTM) technology. The collaborative project with Lambton College will focus on testing Aduro energy's process and provide a proof of concept to move to demonstration scale. To achieve this, data for process and scale-up will be obtained as well as the optimization of their bench-scale unit. The unit will then be converted to a continuous pilot-scale unit for the technology to be ready to advance to the demonstration scale. The goal of this project is to prove the technology in continuous operation at pilot scale. Once the proof of concept is accomplished at the pilot-scale, Aduro will move onto building the demonstration facility. Having a demonstration unit located at the Sarnia-Lambton Western Research Park would allow Aduro to conduct trials, testing, and optimize technology on several feedstocks including heavy oil and end-of-life plastics. The technology has the potential to co-process raw MSW with plastics or Bitumen feedstock thereby reducing the need for landfill sites while reducing possible GHG. The collaboration with Lambton College presents an opportunity for the training of students for future employment at Aduro Energy and the improvement of the Lambton College curriculum. It is also estimated that the demonstration plant will generate $1.5M in revenue and create 4-6 new full-time positions.