What started out as a university exercise in an entrepreneurship class has turned into a full-fledged business finding a creative use for olive pits: plastics.
In just seven years, a trio that met at Istanbul Technical University has created a commercial-scale operation that recycles olive pits, which are actually seeds, into a bioplastic can be used in a variety of products.
Ahmet Ayas is sales manager and co-founder of Biolive Biyolojik ve kimyasal teknolojiler san tic a.s., the Istanbul-based company formed to bring olive pit-based plastics to market.
What started out as a just an idea during class in 2017 eventually grew to lab scale and then a pilot project before becoming a commercial operation about 18 months ago.
The company has a current capacity to handle about 800 metric tons, or 880 short tons, of pits each month. Current production is around 250 tonnes, so there is room for the company to grow into the facility, Ayas said.
That's a lot of olive pits to collect and process, but Ayas said the company's location in the Mediterranean places it in the heart of olive production as Turkey is one of the world's largest olive producers.
Biolive has developed relationships with olive processors, reclaiming large amounts of pits that would otherwise be burned for fuel or buried as waste and using them as a raw material.
A specialized process using temperature and pressure transforms the pits into a material that can then be used to make bioplastics, which can then be used on their own or in conjunction with other traditional plastics to increase sustainability, the co-founder said.
Ayas does not want to discuss the company's process in great detail, fearing the information could invite competition. But this is what he had to say about the technology: "We have some pressure- and temperature-based reactors. At first, we destroy pits, pits parts, and we are making [a] kind of new material. ... What is the result of this? It's kind of mostly cellulose-based materials but not cellulose because materials are very suitable for other plastics."