Norway-based biochemicals company Circa Group AS and Finland’s energy solutions provider Valmet Oyj have signed a Heads of Agreement to realise and optimise Circa's proprietary Furacell production process at scale within the scope of the ReSolute project. The funding from this consortium-based European project has made it possible to work towards the realisation of Circa’s first industrial scale plant for the production of its proprietary biosolvent, Cyrene, via the Furacell process.
Circa’s Furacell technology was developed in 2009 and subsequently fine-tuned over ten years across five pilot plants. Ultimately, the company aims to have 80,000 tonnes of capacity in place by 2030. This will be achieved through the development of deployable 10-15 thousand tonne per annum (ktpa) Furacell modules capable of operating separately or in multiples, depending on local feedstock and supporting infrastructure availability.
Valmet, which has wide experience in fluidised bed boilers and biomass-to-energy systems, will be the main process technology and equipment supplier. It aims to be the equipment and process supplier for the biomass handling, pyrolizer and energy production portions and plant automation of Circa’s future commercial-scale plants.
The present agreement follows a six-month period during which the companies collaborated on the design scale-up of the €50m ReSolute plant to a capacity of 1,100 tonnes of Cyrene per year, using energy supply from biochar created in the process.
The upgraded ReSolute plant will very closely resemble a small-scale version of the planned commercial scale FC6 plant.
The Furacell technology developed by Cica uses lignocellulosic biomass as feedstock for the process. This consists of cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin. The Furacell process uses the cellulose component and produces the platform molecule levoglucosenone (LGO), char, and water. The process is feedstock tolerant, as a wide range of waste cellulose is suitable.Although biomass pyrolysis often produces unwanted chemicals, the Furacell process is highly selective, with minimal by-products, reducing downstream separation costs and minimises waste disposal. Circa’s bio-based solvent Cyrene, derived from LGO, offers a low-toxicity, sustainable alternative to fossil-based solvents used in paints, coatings, battery and textile applications, among others.