Bio-On (Italy) and Moore Capital (Brazil) have signed a license agreement to build the first Brazil-based facility to produce Polyhydroxyalcanoate (PHA) from sugar cane co-products. PHAs are bioplastics that can replace a number of traditional polymers currently made with petrochemical processes using hydrocarbons. The PHAs developed by Bio-On guarantee the same thermo-mechanical properties with the advantage of being completely naturally biodegradable.
Bio-On S.p.A., an Italian Intellectual Property Company (IPC), operates in the bioplastic sector conducting applied research and development of modern bio-fermentation technologies in the field of eco-sustainable and completely naturally biodegradable materials. Bio-On has developed an exclusive process for the production of PHAs from agricultural waste (including molasses and sugar cane and sugar beet syrups). Bio-On PHA biodegradability has been certified in Europe by Vincotte and in the US by USDA (United States Department of Agriculture). Bio-On‘s strategy envisages the marketing of licenses for PHA production and related ancillary services, the development of collaborative R&D programmes with universities, research centers and industrial partners, as well as the realization of industrial plants designed by Bio-On.
Moore Capital is an investment holding company founded in 2005 whos strategy is to be involved in the whole investment process from the selection and analysis of opportunities to the direct management of each invested company to ensure strong growth.
The two companies, operating in sustainable biochemistry and in the development of eco-sustainable industrial solutions, will work together to build a production site with a 10,000 tons/year output, in the state of São Paulo and/or Acre State. Requiring an 80 million Euro investment, the facility will be the most advanced biopolymers production site in South America. The new production hub will create 60 new jobs plus allied industries, helping to meet the high demand for this revolutionary biopolymer already coming in from numerous companies that transform or produce conventional plastic in Brazil.
“We have decided to use Bio-On technology,” says Otávio Pacheco, Management Partner of Moore Capital, “because it represents an exceptional opportunity for industrial development in Brazil. This is why we have decided to invest 5,5 million Euro in acquiring the production license and another 80 million in constructing the first facility”. Moore Capital also has an option to build a second plant in Brazil.
“We will create Brazil’s first PHAs production facility with a company attentive to ecology and sustainability – two key ingredients of the chemical industry of the future,” explains Bio-On S.p.A. chairman Marco Astorri. “We will also work towards studying how to further develop the business of the high-performing biopolymers produced in Brazil with Bio-On technology” in South America.
A first agreement of the like was signed in July 2015 with French sugar beet processing cooperative Cristal Union, ranked n°4 in the EU for this activity. Cristal Union and Bio-On announced they would build together a PHA production plant with an initial capacity of 5,000 tons/ year, extendable to 10,000 tons/year. The 70 million € investment will allow the creation of 50 direct jobs on one of Cristal Union’s 15 production site in France, most likely in the Champagne area where Cristal Union is a key partner of the BRI plant based chemistry complex of Pomacle-Bazancourt, North of my native town Reims.
RELATED ARTICLES
- What are Bioplastics and Biopolymers?
- Bioplastics Brands
- Bioplastics Awards
- What is the Difference Between Biodegradable, Compostable and OXO Degradable?
- The History and Most Important Innovations of Bioplastics
- What are Drop-In Bioplastics?
- History of Cellophane
- The History of Elephant Grass Bioplastics
- Bioplastics Companies
- Top Bioplastics Producers
- Polylactic acid or polylactide (PLA)
- What is Bio-BDO?
- McDonalds and the Polystyrene Connections
- The Future of Polystyrene
- Bioplastic Feedstock 1st, 2nd and 3rd Generations