Låkril Technologies

Some of the largest chemical companies in the world—Arkema, BASF, Cargill, Dow, and LG Chemical among them—have attempted to make acrylic acid via a biobased route. It stands to reason that they would. The product is the key raw material for making the superabsorbent polymers found in diapers and incontinence products, which have a reputation for generating a lot of waste. Acrylic acid is also ubiquitous in acrylic paints and adhesives. To make it from renewable raw materials rather than fossil fuels would be a big win.“The market has desired a biobased acrylic for quite some time, 20-some-odd years at this point, and no one’s ever made the economics work,” says Christopher P. Nicholas, president and cofounder of Låkril Technologies.Nicholas thinks Låkril has the catalyst that will allow the firm to succeed where others have failed.The conventional process for making acrylic acid is the oxidation of propylene into acrolein, followed by another oxidation into acrylic acid. This petrochemical pathway is responsible for nearly all the 7 million metric tons (t) of acrylic acid produced annually around the world.Companies have attempted two main routes to a biobased alternative, both involving dehydration of a monomer made via sugar fermentation. One—tried by firms such as BASF, Cargill, and Dow—starts with 3-hydroxypropionic acid (3-HP). The other is based on lactic acid, a pathway that Cargill is investigating with technology licensed from the diaper producer Procter & Gamble.The lactic acid route has its appeal. 3-HP is not made in significant quantities, whereas lactic acid has