Bio-Refinery and Processing
No other place in Europe has such versatile knowledge on bio-refinery processes as the Protein Competence Center (PCC). Knowledge partners of the PCC are in the absolute forefront on pre-treatment of bio-mass and industrial relevant separation methodologies. Our focus is on a mild, sustainable and profitable development of bio-refinery technologies.
Pilot plant
One of PCCs partners has a unique flexible pilot plant which can be set up in any possible way. It can accommodate your wishes and can be used for several bio-refinery tests simultaneously. Proteins can be produced on various scales.
Industrial processing
The utilization and valorization of biomass on an industrial scale requires insight into the pre-treatment and subsequent separation. Both steps are vital to develop an industrial robust and economical valid process. For pre-treatment several different technologies are available at the PCC knowledge partners, including enzymatic or chemical pre-treatments, (partial) hydrolysis and super-heated steam treatment.
For separation there is expertise on dry and wet separation, the latter includes expertise on membrane filtration as well as industrial chromatography (SMB).
Projects
PCC partners have been working together on several bio-refinery projects where they developed innovative methods to extract proteins from plant material, microalgae and insects. Their goal is to help provide alternatives in the increasing need for food. The following projects received grants from the technology foundation STW and the Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs:
- Progress - Proteins from green sources for use in both food and fish feed
- In2Food – Production and valorisation of high quality proteins from insects
- GreenProtein – Isolation of hydrophobic proteins from green plant materials
- LEAP – Increasing the utilization of low value leaves by use of new protein extraction methods
ALGAEPRO4YOU – Extraction and fractionation of functional proteins from microalgae for potential application in the feed of food industry