LUX-ON’s technology, developed by Bio-on, envisages using carbon dioxide as a zero-cost raw material. Bio-on already produces PHAs from sugar beet and sugar cane molasses, fruit and potato waste, carbohydrates, glycerol, and waste frying oil.
The companies plan to build laboratories and a production plant for the technology by the end of 2019 near Bio-on’s plants in Bologna. The facility will include carbon capture plants and renewable solar energy.
Gruppo Hera will hold a 10% stake with an option to increase the holding to 49.9%.
“We are extremely pleased to work with HERA,” says Bio-on S.p.A. Chairman and CEO Marco Astorri. “The great technological innovation used at Lux-on enables us to increase the industrial sustainability of a new production concept. We are particularly proud to realize humanity’s dream to capture CO2 from the atmosphere and produce innovative materials like our PHAs biopolymer. We are ready to face this new challenge, which will further extend our client base in the coming years, consolidating Italy’s global leadership in high quality biopolymer production.”