Water-Based Tech Converts Biomass into Food Ingredients – Renmatix and Cargill Sign Joint Development Agreement

by Helena Tavares Kennedy (Biofuels Digest) Functional food ingredients from unused plant materials is just what Renmatix and Cargill are aiming to explore with their new joint development agreement, but what makes this breaking news even more fascinating is that Renmatix is using their proprietary Plantrose Process which uses only water, heat and pressure. So take Cargill’s feedstocks to make functional food ingredients, add Renmatix’s Plantrose Process and you’ve got something special, like a delicious chocolate chip cookie.

What this means for food and beverage manufacturers looking to meet consumer demand for great-tasting, label-friendly ingredients is that they may have new options in the near future.

As part of the JDA, Cargill will also contribute its food applications expertise and market access to better understand the technical and commercial potential of these new ingredients. The process will be tested at Renmatix’s facility in Kennesaw, Georgia. The food applications work will happen at Cargill’s Vilvoorde and Minneapolis R&D facilities. These materials will then be market tested by Cargill’s leading customers. Both parties will then review findings. Interestingly, they are already into month 2 of the 6 month JDA, according to an exclusive Digest interview with Renmatix and Cargill.

Mike Hamilton CEO of Renmatix said, “Renmatix uses different forms of plant based feedstocks and put through our Plantrose process to make functional food ingredients. Renmatix is currently selling a product called Nouravant, which is made through the plantrose process. With Cargill, we’ll use the Plantrose process using their preferred feedstock to make food ingredients.”

So how does this happen? Water left in its normal states (ice – liquid – steam) does not efficiently dissolve plant structures, or reduce them to the point where they can be separated into their most basic parts. Yet, Renmatix’s chemical engineers have given water superpowers to do just that by applying a distinct combination of heat and pressure to achieve a unique state, called Supercritical. Water in this special state, in essence, dissolves biomass into those simple, valuable, component parts.

Just in the past 2 months there has been news of other companies and researchers looking at water in a whole new light and coming up with innovative ways to use H2O.

As reported in The Digest earlier this month, Yale researchers developed a catalyst that converts carbon dioxide and water into methanol using electricity. It’s a type of catalyst called a heterogeneous molecular electrocatalyst — “heterogeneous” because it’s a solid catalyst material operating in a liquid electrolyte, and “molecular” because the active site of the catalyst is a molecular structure.

In October, the Digest reported that Ecover is using InBev waste alcohol and water from alcohol-free beer to produce detergents. Both the water and ethanol in Ecover’s “Too Good to Waste” detergent line come from InBev’s beer making process, making up at least a quarter of the overall content. Ecover sees waste as a major opportunity for its business and products moving forward and is currently looking at what it can do with waste CO2 as well.