Carbon8 Scoops Kent Innovation Challenge Award
Carbon8 Systems Ltd, a major spin-out company from the University of Greenwich, has scooped the prestigious Kent Innovation Challenge.
The award of £25,000 plus business support will help Carbon8 Systems, founded by Dr Paula Carey and Dr Colin Hills, of the University of Greenwich at Medway, with Professor Stefaan Simons, of University College London, launch their first pilot plant at Viridor (Allwaste), Medway, and develop new markets being opened up in Canada.
Carbon8 Systems uses accelerated carbonation technology (ACT) to treat hazardous wastes and remediate contaminated soil. The process produces inert secondary aggregates, which can be used in construction and engineering projects, together with significant quantities of waste carbon dioxide, the key greenhouse gas, which is locked into the new material.
The company, which was formed early in 2006, is being supported in its bid to take its techniques to market by Medway Enterprise Hub, led by Ray Wynne, and Business Link and has been supported by South East Proof of Concept Funding.
The Carbon8 Systems team was presented with award by Robert de Fougerolles, Kent Innovation Challenge Chairman and guest speaker Tim Campbell, former winner of the "The Apprentice" BBC television challenge, at the Kent 2020 Vision Business Show at Kent Showground, Detling, on Thursday (April 26)
Dr Paula Carey, of Carbon8 Systems, said: "This is acknowledgement of our success in creating a green solution to handling hazardous waste materials and the contribution we are hoping to make to the regeneration and the development of the Thames Gateway.
"Our first pilot plant is currently being built in Medway and will be up and running very soon. Our technique not only renders polluted waste and soils inert but it is low cost and extremely fast – taking just minutes rather than the days and weeks required by other methods.
"If widely adopted, this could be responsible for capturing more than one million tonnes of waste carbon dioxide and meeting five per cent of the UK carbon emission reduction target for 2012."
Wastes successfully treated by Carbon8 Systems include slag from steel manufacture, galigu from soap production, contaminated soil from firework manufacture, North Sea oil drill cuttings, cement kiln residue and water treatment sludges.
This is the fourth major award for Carbon8 Systems. In past year the team was named Kent Environmental Business of the Year, gained the Green Chemical Technology Award from the Institution of Chemical Engineers, and won the Business Link Innovative Climate Change Technology Award.
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Caption: from left Kent Innovation Challenge Chairman Robert de Fougerolles, Dr Colin Hills and Dr Paula Carey of Carbon8 Systems and guest speaker Tim Campbell
For further media information, broadcast, photographic and interview opportunities, please contact:
- University of Greenwich at Medway Public Relations, tel: 020 8331 9420
- Delphine Houlton, Andrew Metcalf or Jez Durrant, at Maxim, tel: 01892 513033