American Science and Technology Bio-Refinery Scale Up Moving Forward

CHICAGO - Oct. 2, 2014 - PRLog -- American Science and Technology, an emerging technology company in the biochemicals and renewable materials sector, is one step closer to its goal of scaling up its Wausau, WI bio-refinery pilot plant with the purchase of its main digestion reactor from Northland Stainless, Inc. The new scaled-up plant will increase AST’s processing capacity to 2 tons of cellulosic biomass per day.

For more than 35 years, Northland Stainless has been serving the Chemical, Pharmaceutical, Biotechnology, Defense, Paper, Food, Beverage, and Dairy industries. Investments in head forming equipment, electro-polishing, automated mechanical polishing, in house X-Ray, and half-pipe application equipment all contribute to streamline fabrication, improved process controls, and quality fabrication.

“We had very specific requirements for the construction of our reactor which presented some new challenges along the way,” said AST President and CEO, Dr. Ali Manesh. “The team at Northland Stainless worked with us, every step of the way, to overcome each challenge in order to meet all of our requirements. We’re excited to get past this stage of the process and move forward on the scale up efforts.”

Based out of Chicago, IL, American Science and Technology Corporation has been utilizing its complete and integrated biorefinery facilities to develop a highly sustainable and economically viable organosolv process to convert non-food cellulosic biomass into highly refined fermentable sugars, high purity lignin, high quality pulp, and organic solvents. AST's cellulosic sugar and lignin are key intermediate products in supply chains for producing bio-chemicals, plastics, bio-fuels, and nutritional supplements for food. As a result of its ongoing collaboration with the University of Wisconsin - Stevens Point (UWSP), AST and UWSP were awarded approximately $2.8 million in November of 2013, as part of a $22.5 million initiative by the University of Wisconsin System institutions, to help scale up AST’s bio-refinery pilot plant. The new pilot plant is scheduled to come on-line in late 2015.

For more information, please visit www.amsnt.com.