In New York, Danimer Scientific has successfully completed expansion of its Rinnovo® bioplastic demonstration plant located in Rochester.
Rinnovo is a type of polyhydroxyalkanoate synthesized using a thermocatalytic process, which Danimer believes can be produced at a lower cost than PHA produced via fermentation. The Rinnovo platform also boasts unique properties relative to currently marketed PHA materials, including enhanced barrier properties, increased elongation and a lower melting temperature. Danimer expects the capital cost to build out future commercial capacity of Rinnovo will be significantly less than commercial plants using fermentation processes to produce other types of PHAs.
When operated continuously, the expanded demonstration plant can produce 20 metric tons annually, which marks an approximate 20x scale up from the previous production capacity. Key features of the expansion project include a larger carbonylation reactor, installation of three additional fractional distillation towers, a larger polymerization reactor and a polymer drying unit. The demonstration plant also features enhanced controls and data collection that will support additional process condition testing and optimization of the commercial plant design.