For two years, it seemed CRIBE was almost as dormant as Thunder Bay's Sleeping Giant.
But evidently there's been plenty going on behind the scenes.
In a period of four months this year, the Centre for Research and Innovation in the Bio-economy (CRIBE) came alive with a burst of funding announcements for five leading-edge projects, valued at more than $5 million.
The biggest to date was contributing $3 million to hook up Lakehead University researchers with operators of an ethanol bio-refinery in Chatham.
“That was one I got creative on,” said Lorne Morrow, CEO of CRIBE, of the partnership that was in the works for a year. “We couldn't see how we could support a project in southern Ontario.”
G2 Biochem is a spin-off company for Greenfield Ethanol. In southwestern Ontario, it has built a $42-million demonstration plant in advance of constructing a full-scale commercial ethanol plant by 2014.
Andritz, a global pulp and paper equipment maker, is involved in the project.
It's precisely the kind of value-added forestry project that CRIBE has wanted to help spearhead since Morrow, a 30-year forest industry veteran, took over the reigns of the fledgling research centre in December, 2009.
With only two staff based out of Confederation College, CRIBE serves as a co-ordinating body that matches government funding with companies and post-secondary institutions. Retired Tembec president and founder Frank Dottori is its board chairman.
“CRIBE doesn't have any researchers and I'm thinking of building capacity in Northern Ontario,” said Morrow. “What if I had Lakehead University do the forest-related research and link them with a world-class demonstration pilot plant that matches them with an industrial partner?”
The Chatham plant will use different types of feedstock, including corn stover (corn leaves and stalks). Lakehead will provide sample-loads of wood chips to run through the plant.
CRIBE funds up to 50 per cent of a project in grants or loans. Proponents must finance 25 per cent in cash and the rest with either in-kind contributions or lever other funding sources.
Armed with a $25-million budget, the end result is to get new value-added forest products to the pre-commercial stage, then let private enterprise take over.
CRIBE has added a strategic development partner in FP Innovations, a national forest technical research institute, to establish a lab and demonstration plant. The facility extracts lignin from black liquor at the AbitibiBowater pulp plant in Thunder Bay.
It employs three people with plans for more hirings.
Lignin is one of the primary components that comes out of the wood pulping process. Once considered waste, it has enormous potential to be a feedstock chemical for adhesives, bio-based polymers and auto part composites.
The facilities are grafted onto the kraft mill process.
“We're making basically an oil drum-full a day now (about 200 pounds),” said Morrow.
The lignin is shipped out to a network of researchers across Canada to come up with those higher value applications.
“The hope is we get to a 50 ton-a-day commercial plant. We're making good progress along those lines.”
Morrow said CRIBE's mandate was to develop forestry research expertise in Northern Ontario, “and that's what this lab is going to do.”
In using AbitibiBowater as a research test bed, it offers a future glimpse of industry's potential.
There, they can work out the variables of characterizing types of lignins recovered from species of hard and softwood. From there they can create multiple products from many lignin streams.
The basic aims are to find green alternatives to petroleum-based products and build a business case for commercial uses of lignin.
“I think there is market pull,” said Morrow, “but right now I think we've got more push than pull.”
Though AbitibiBowater is an active R & D participant, Morrow admits he's “somewhat disappointed” there isn't more buy-in from the forestry sector. But the former Norampac mill manager is a realist given the tough times in forestry.
“We're going forward with Thunder Bay but it's been a long, hard struggle,” said Morrow. AbitibiBowater only cleared CCAA bankruptcy protection a year ago and is understandably cautious about controlling costs. “I think they're being pragmatic and fair about it.”
CRIBE is in the second of a four-year mandate, but Morrow expects they will have an extended shelf life and an expanded role. He hopes to make the rounds into northeastern Ontario and the Ottawa Valley this fall looking for potential project partnerships, particularly those who received fibre through the province's wood supply competition.
