“What’s really difficult for a company like ours is you can’t do this type of processing in your garage,” said Susan MacKay, president of Cerahelix, which is one of several private companies eager to advance its work at The University of Maine’s new Technology Research Center. “You need access to a facility and access to equipment you simply cannot have access to in a small start up. Partnering with the University of Maine has really enabled us to have access to the type of equipment which we can’t afford on our own or build in a small laboratory up in Orono.”

Cerahelix, which has received R&D funding for a new filtration nanotechnology to make more efficient the ability to take sugars from biomass, is ready to scale up production and testing of its technology at TRC.

TRC connects private industry with UMaine researchers in the Forest Bioproducts Research Institute (FBRI) in order to validate, demonstrate and help commercialize developing fuel, chemical and advanced material technologies from forest bioproducts at an industrially relevant scale. TRC opened today in Old Town, Maine.

Congressman Mike Michaud and other dignitaries tour the new UMaine lab.

“Today’s opening is an exciting step forward for new technologies that have the potential to revitalize Maine’s economy,” said U.S. Rep. Mike Michaud, who was among the speakers during the morning ceremony in the TRC lobby. “That’s what it’s all about, revitalizing Maine’s economy and finding new ways of doing things, and this center is going to be at the center of that. The research and production performed here not only have the potential to create new economic opportunities, but to help Mainers reduce our dependence on foreign oil, which has become extremely painful, particularly in Maine during the winter months.”

TRC will serve as a one-stop shop for processing and analysis of technologies. The 40,000-square-foot, high-bay facility, located on the grounds of Old Town Fuel & Fiber, features state-of-the-art process control and process information systems.

Experiments underway at the new UMaine Laboratory in Old Town

Many of the projects already in development in the lab and ready for pilot trials are the result of public-private partnerships, with investment from federal agencies such as the U.S. Department of Energy, U.S. Defense Logistics Agency, National Science Foundation and U.S. Department of Energy, and collaboration with private companies, including Maine paper companies, land management companies and small entrepreneurial start-ups.

“This is a remarkable partnership among the university, private industries, our municipalities, our federal and state delegation,” University of Maine President Paul Ferguson said. “When they come together in this kind of public-private partnership, it can mean great things for Maine and great things for the nation.”

FBRI was created in 2006 with a $6.9 million research infrastructure improvement grant from the National Science Foundation’s Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (NSF EPSCoR) and a 50 percent match ($3.45 million) from UMaine through the Maine Economic Improvement Fund, the state’s appropriation for university R&D, bringing the total investment to $10.35 million. At the time, it was the largest NSF EPSCOR grant ever awarded to UMaine.

Scott Eaton, a UMaine Ph.D. candidate and the co-founder and director of science and research for SeaChange Group LLC, shows onlookers some of the work the UMaine lab is doing

The TRC facility and equipment were capitalized in 2009 with a $4.8 million grant from the Maine Technology Asset Fund (MTAF), which was started by the Baldacci administration.

The TRC has the ability to handle any cellulosic feedstock, from forest residue to switchgrass to municipal solid waste. From those feedstocks, companies could experiment on dozens of bioproducts, including precursors for drop-in fuels such as gasoline, diesel and jet fuel; nanocellulose fibers and carbon fibers; and high-value industrial chemical byproducts and coproducts.

The facility is capable of biomass size reduction and screening through physical processes; biomass pretreatment through chemical processes; extraction of sugars and fibers for pulping; fermentation, distillation, liquid-liquid extraction, and microfiltration to separate complex liquids; and biomass pelletizing. The FBRI analytical capabilities available to TRC include chemical and physical testing for pilot-scale campaigns, gas and liquid chromatography, atomic and molecular spectroscopy, wet chemical characterization, analytical method development, and in-process and final product material characterization.