Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada 19 March 2014 -- CRIBE is partnering with GreenField Specialty Alcohols to test and develop a biorefining technology that could be applicable to pulp mills.

This is a natural extension to an earlier GreenField project supported by CRIBE, which focused on the conditioning and pre-treatment of a variety of biomass including underutilized northern hardwood such as poplar.

The practical application of this technology is to take GreenField’s patent pending equipment -- a modified twin screw extruder used to extract and recover clean sugars -- and apply it in a pulp and paper mill demonstration project at two mills, one of which is AV Terrace Bay Inc., in Terrace Bay, Ont. GreenField’s technology may be beneficial as the Terrace Bay mill moves towards converting the facility from conventional NMSK pulp to a dissolving pulp process. 

CRIBE is providing up to $1.3 million in funding to this project to leverage a total project cost of almost $2.7 million.

This project has 2 phases. Initial testing will be done at Greenfield’s facility in Chatham, Ont. with “streams”, i.e. wood chips and by-products of the pulping process such as sludge and white water, to be partially provided by AV Terrace Bay Inc. In phase two, a portable version of the modified twin screw extruder technology will be installed for testing in situ at the AV Terrace Bay mill.   

“GreenField is most appreciative of CRIBE’s support to advance and accelerate the development and commercial deployment of its extruder technology; and is pleased and excited to partner with CRIBE to adapt this technology for applications that will benefit the pulp and paper industry,” said Barry Wortzman, vice-president of business development, GreenField Specialty Alcohols Inc.

“This is the kind of project that CRIBE was created for,” said Lorne Morrow, CEO CRIBE. “By bringing companies from the north and south together the Ontario forestry industry can receive the benefits of knowledge clustering.”  

The Centre for Research and Innovation in the Bio-Economy is an independent, not-for-profit research corporation, with $25 million in funding provided by the government of Ontario, that partners closely with other relevant organizations to provide support to turn research results and innovative business opportunities into operational realities.

GreenField Specialty Alcohols Inc. is a Canadian specialty alcohols producer, with a focus on high purity medical and pharmaceutical alcohols, corn-based bulk industrial alcohol, packaged alcohol and fuel ethanol, as well as associated agricultural co-products. GreenField has developed a pretreatment technology which is the first key step to the commercially viable production of cellulosic ethanol and it plans to commercialize this technology over the next few years.