A new strategic partnership between Dutch companies Paques Biomaterials and Senbis Polymer Innovations has been announced. The companies will collaborate on the development of new applications for Caleyda, the PHA produced by Paques Biomaterials using organic waste streams as feedstock.
Paques Biomaterials started out an activity of Pacques, a family-owned global company focused on the production of industrial wastewater purification and biogas plants. It became a fully independent entity in 2021.
The Paques Biomaterials team has worked for over a decade on the production of PHA polymers using circular feedstocks. PHAs are produced by bacteria, which store it as reserve materials for carbon and energy, much as humans do with fat. Bacteria can accumulates PHA granules to levels as high as 90% of the cell dry weight, by consuming the organics in a wide variety of residual streams, such as industrial wastewater or solid organic wastes.
“Our background is in biotechnology,” said Joost Paques, founder of Paques Biomaterials. The new partnership with Senbis joins biotechnology with chemistry - ‘a formula for success for a biopolymer.’
Senbis Polymer Innovations is a chemical R&D company specialising in biopolymers. Its role will be to help Paques Biomaterials develop different PHA grades suitable for a wide range of applications, said Gerard Nijhoving, managing director of Senbis.
Paques Biomaterials Caleyda is biobased and highly biodegradable in all kinds of environments. It is made using waste streams and it does not use genetically modified bacteria.
“That makes it sustainable and natural on all sides. This involves a major challenge to deliver consistent quality, as for plastic processing purity is the key,” said Nijhoving. Senbis has all commercially available biopolymers in-house and has studied them, he added. The company knows what works where. Nijhoving said that the PHAs the company produces today need to catch up with other bioplastics in terms of mechanical and thermal properties. “If these properties can be improved, Paques’ PHA will soon be a serious player in the market, he said confidently.
The material also offers potential for the development of compounds, for applications
such as injection moulding, yarns, 3D printing or films, which may require a mix of bioplastics to achieve the approprate end properties. The new compounds would also open the door for new applications, said Nijhoviong, that Senbis could also offer to its customers.
A new circular value chain is already in the making. Paques Biomaterials has signed a memorandum of understanding with Kolon Industries and Kolon Global in South Korea, for the development of technology for the large-scale production of PHA from food waste. In Europe, the first full-scale plants using industrial wastewater, sewage sludge and organic waste streams (vegetable/fruit waste) as feedstocks for PHA production are also under development. In cooperation with five Dutch Water Boards and waste and energy company HVC, Paques Biomaterials has been optimising this process - two years ago, Paques opened a pilot plant with a PHA biomass production capacity of 25 kg per day in Dordrecht on the site of waste and energy company HVC.
With PHA biomass a reality, the next step will be the extraction and prification of the biomass into a clean biopolymer. The cooperation with Senbis who can provide the expertise and experience required in this next phase, is crucial to achieving this.