Triangle Company Helping Turn Trash into Fuel
by Kerstin Nordstrom (News Observer) …A Triangle-based company has now come up with a way to turn that trash into treasure. Well, fuel.
The secret is using enzymes. Novozymes, a company with its North American headquarters in Franklinton, develops and supplies enzymes – biological molecules that speed up chemical reactions. Some of Novozymes products remove stains, some keep bread from going stale.
Now scientists at the North Carolina lab have developed enzyme technology that can convert trash into ethanol. They have partnered with Fiberight, a biofuels company in Baltimore, to demonstrate the concept at an industrial scale.
Fiberight has built a plant in Lawrenceville, Va., north of Lake Gaston, and expects to be in full production in the fall.
… When trash arrives at the Fiberight plant, the company will separate out the glass, metal and plastic, reselling and recycling what it can. The rest of the solid waste is paper, textiles and bits of plant material, which will be turned into a pulp. This “biopulp” is about half of the total waste received.
The biopulp is then digested, meaning the cellulose that makes up the fibers in the pulp is broken down. READ MORE
