Mantra Venture Group Ltd. has secured an ERC demonstration project with Lafarge Canada Inc.
Lafarge North America Inc., together with its subsidiary, Lafarge Canada Inc., is the largest diversified supplier of construction materials in North America. Over the course of the project, Mantra, Lafarge and its wholly owned subsidiary Systech Corporation, will build and deploy a 100 kg Electrochemical Reduction of Carbon Dioxide (ERC) pilot plant at one of Lafarge's North American cement plants. The project is expected to further advance Mantra's ERC technology for large-scale applications and demonstrate the effectiveness of Mantra's ERC technology in converting CO2 into valuable green chemicals.
John Russell, VP of Technology, commented: "This is a tremendous opportunity for Mantra's ERC technology – the benefits of which are twofold. Firstly, Mantra will gain valuable experience and exposure through its first-ever North American ERC pilot demonstration project. Secondly, Mantra may have the opportunity to deploy commercial-scale units across multiple Lafarge sites upon completion of the project."
Randy Gue, Director of Resource Recovery and Business Development at Lafarge Canada Inc., noted: "Lafarge is continuing to look for new and innovative ways to reduce our carbon footprint and make our operations even more sustainable. We are excited to be involved in this trial and are hopeful the Mantra Energy technology can prove to be a commercially viable option for utilising the CO2 in our cement plant stack gases."
Larry Kristof, CEO of Mantra, added: "ERC could potentially reshape the way industry mitigates CO2 emissions, and industry leaders such as Lafarge are starting to recognise the economic and environmental potential contained therein. Lafarge's commitment to sustainable development is particularly admirable, and we look forward to helping the company achieve their corporate and social responsibility objectives."
The project is scheduled to begin in the first quarter of 2011, and further details will be announced as they become available.
About ERC
The ERC process, "the "Electrochemical Reduction of Carbon Dioxide," combines captured carbon dioxide with water to produce high value materials, such as formic acid and formate salts, which are conventionally obtained from the thermochemical processing of Fossil Fuels. However, ERC has an advantage over the established thermochemical methods for converting carbon dioxide to green chemicals, new chemicals beyond formic acid, building products and liquid fuels.
While thermochemical reactions must be driven at relatively high temperatures that are normally obtained by burning fossil fuels, ERC operates at near ambient conditions and is driven by electric energy that can be taken from an electric power grid supplied by hydro, wind, solar or nuclear energy (forms of clean or renewable energy).
Mantra, through its group of sustainable energy, carbon reduction and consumer product subsidiaries, is active in the green technology marketplace with an innovative, multi-faceted approach focused on profitability through sustainability.