Wilson Fibre Development
The Wilson System® and Wilson Fibre® are leading the way towards sustainable development and contributing to green energy demands.
Research & Development Projects
Sustainable Aviation Fuels
Waste to Wings
Waste-to-Wings, a project to future-proof and scale up the production of greener jet fuel by using circular economy practices and aerospace industry derived waste as the primary feedstock to manufacture sustainable aviation fuel (SAF).
Partnering with Clariant, HSSMI, and the University of Nottingham, the Waste-to-Wings project explores how SAF can be produced from bioethanol.
The SAF project has impressed the judging panel of the Energy Institute Awards and secured Wilson Bio-Chemical ltd a nomination in the Low Carbon Category at the Global Energy Institute2021 Awards. Wilson Bio-Chemical Ltd was also awarded with the runner up prize in the Sustainability and Energy category for Make UK Manufacturing Awards.
Sustainable Viscose Rayon
Clothing for the masses
Wilson Bio-Chemical is developing a project to create an environmentally sustainable source of viscose rayon, nanocellulose and graphene by using Wilson Fibre® as the feedstock.
Partnering with the University of York, the aim of the project will be the production of quality viscose rayon manufactured using the Wilson Fibre® produced from the biogenic portion of municipal solid waste.
Newton Bhabha Fund
Production of Citric Acid
The £1.8M project, sponsored by the Newton Bhabha Fund, brings together UK, Indian companies and academics to work in partnership to reduce industrial waste and generate innovation in industrial biotechnology.
The project partners will share knowledge and expertise to develop methodology to use the sugarcane processing waste streams as feedstocks for the production of the valuable bio-based chemical, citric acid.
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When successful, the partners expect to provide enough proof-of-concept data to attract further investment for scaling-up these pilot-scale methods to commercial manufacture.
Bio Based Science Research Council iCase Student
PhD student Aritha Dornau
Through the BBSRC and The University of York, Wilson Bio-Chemical sponsored a PhD Student, Artia Dornau to carry out an investigation into the best microbes to feed on Wilson Fiber®.
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Her thesis discussed the characterisation of Wilson Fiber, the optimisation and evaluation of Wilson Fibre® hydrolysate, the evaluation of eight microbial species for the ability to ferment Wilson Fibre® hydrolysate, and lastly the optimisation and scale-up of triacylglycerol production from Wilson Fibre® hydrolysate.
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Dr Dornau's work proved to be successful in that a strain of Rhodococcii was found to be suitable for the production of triacyl-glycerol from Wilson Fibre® which is a vital pre-cursor to biodiesel and used in Pharma and Food industries. WBC are credited with an exclusive license to the use of this species.
Bioenergy Sustaining the Future 2
Waste to Butanol & Hydrogen
Through BESTF2, there was a call for proposals on the topic of Bioenergy demonstrations of the European Industrial Bioenergy Initiative.
WBC was awarded £1.9 million towards a £5 million project titled ‘Production of butanol and hydrogen by fermentation techniques using steam treated municipal solid waste (MSW’). The call invited proposals for transnational demonstration projects from consortia led by industry. Partners involved from large industry and/or SMEs, stakeholder associations, universities and/or research organisations.
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The consortium has proven that producing butanol and hydrogen from autoclave pre-treated MSW by fermentation could be an economically attractive alternative to produce fuels from renewable resources.
Innovate UK Clean Coal
Creation of Wilson Bio-Coal/Char
Through the ‘Cleaner, More Efficient Conventional Fuels Feasibility’ study, WBC was awarded a grant from Innovate UK worth £40,000 towards a project cost of £144,000 to carry out a practical feasibility study for the production of bio-char from MSW and commercial waste.
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The Project was titled, ‘Co-firing waste derived torrefied biogenic fibre with coal’ and demonstrated the suitability of torrefied pellet produced from the biodegradable fraction of municipal solid waste (BioSW) as an alternative fuel source for use in co-firing in coal-fired power stations. Bio-char is a “coal-like” substance similar to charcoal which can be co-mingled with coal as a fuel and the material behaves in a similarly without creating any further environmental impacts than burning coal on its own.
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WBC proved the benefits of creating bio-char from waste using the Wilson System® as the preparation process followed by torrefaction and successfully achieved End of Waste status on the product thus allowing its use in all solid fuel burners without the need for a Waste Incineration licence.
ERDF Funding
Micro Autoclave Fibre Production Plant
In 2014, along with the Biorenewables Development Centre, WBC requested funding from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) in order for Wilson to achieve its key business plan to be at the forefront of conversion of solid wastes (primarily MSW and C&I) into a low cost biogenic raw material for high value chemicals production.
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This grant included £64,000 towards the cost of building a 50 kg capacity steam autoclave system for treating a variety of wastes for the manufacture of high value chemicals. The pilot rig is used as a research and development tool which is housed in the Bio-Renewables Development Centre (BDC) at the University of York where WBC can carry out work into the conversion of MSW into bio-fuels and a variety of high value organic chemicals.