Public Funding for Promethean Particles Limited

Climate change, exacerbated by CO2 emissions from major industries and power generation facilities, threatens global sustainability. Current carbon capture and storage (CCS) solutions, like liquid amine scrubbers, are inefficient, expensive and spatially demanding, impeding their broad implementation. Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs), possessing exceptional efficiency and selectivity for CO2 capture, show significant potential as adsorbents. However, their widespread application has been limited by small-scale production and high associated costs. Promethean Particles has developed REMBRANDT, a revolutionary process that dramatically increases MOF production to industrial scales. Our patented process enables MOF production up to 25 tons per day, cutting current market prices from €15,000-60,000/kg to just €25-100/kg. Moreover, we have shown that a MOF-based CCS system requires 75% less energy for regeneration, while the system footprint is 90% smaller than other CCS technologies, making it appealing for smaller or space-constrained emitters. Our focus is on producing environmentally friendly and recyclable MOFs, promoting a circular economy. Furthermore, REMBRANDT's cost-effective MOF-based solution help companies to implement CCS, thus reduce their carbon footprint and aid compliance with EU regulations like the EU Emissions Trading System (ETS), Effort Sharing Regulation (ESR), and Renewable Energy Directive (RED), which impose penalties for excessive CO2 emissions. REMBRANDT capitalises on the exponential growth of the CCS and MOF markets, projected to grow at CAGRs of 19.5% and 22.5% respectively by the late 2020s. Our comprehensive forecasts place the total addressable market (TAM) for our offerings between €205 and €823 billion/year, considering the potential of MOFs for CCS. Our strategy emphasises supplying top-tier MOFs at competitive prices to the European and US markets, revolutionising the CCS industry, and leading the way in environmental sustainability.

This project will use existing technologies not previously combined to achieve components for public transport use that will: \*Incorporate proven anti-microbial materials that act as an effective barrier against bacteria and help reduce viral transmission (even eliminate them in some cases), helping both with public health and customer perception issues; \*Incorporate these materials into lightweight structural recyclable composite materials that will reduce the component weights by over 50%, thereby reducing emissions, improving performance and greatly enhancing environmental and sustainability credentials; \*Be able to produce these components in the UK at volumes and costs equivalent to the currently imported steel components; and \*Have components that can be installed on new vehicles, but that can also be easily and cost-effectively retrofitted into existing vehicles. This is a massive, game-changing opportunity to improve the acceptability of public transport post-Covid, and has huge domestic and export potential.

Awaiting Public Project Summary

The ongoing concerns and heightened regulation of perfluorocarbons and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFCs and PFASs), is driving the textile market to search for sustainable alternative chemistries. There is a clear demand for alternative, greener, durable water repellents (DWR) for textiles.The current state of the art that offers the highest level of repellency for both oil and water resistance has been achieved using highly fluorinated chemical substances. Unfortunately, the best performing PFCs, known as C8 due to the 8 carbon atoms in their backbone chain, also raise significant health and environmental concerns that surround the loss of fluorinated by products from textiles. The concern of toxic releases is throughout the life-cycle of the product, from production to end of life. The by-products are known to be bioaccumulative and extremely persistent in the environment/food chain and are possibly carcinogenic. Therefore, within the European Union (EU), perfluorooctanesulfonic acid (PFOS) is regulated to detectable levels of 1 µg per square metre in textile fabrics (European Union, 2006).The project objective will be to deliver cost-effective alternative treatment that will provide textile with durable repellent characteristics. This will be achieved by developing suitable molecular structures which incorporate both low surface energy 22 (mN/m) properties and suitable binding groups to facilitate chemical bonding to the fibre surface yielding a high-performance product. The research innovation of TWI, will provide low surface energy solution through the development of functionalised silica nanoparticles within an aqueous solution that can be incorporated into a water-based ink for printing on to textiles. Functionalised silica (silicon dioxide) nanoparticles play a key role in providing superhydrophobic properties by manipulating the natural surface roughness of the textile microstructure fibres with selectively designed surface chemistry. This provides the uplift required from superhydrophobic performance at the nanoscale level without the use of PFOS. The expertise of the consortium and the supply-chain in place will propel the development into the technical textiles market.Awaiting Public Project Summary

Icing represents a complex and expensive problem in different industrial and energy applications -- aircraft, wind turbines, power lines -- causing incidents and severe accidents. The main mitigation methods rely on mechanical breaking of the ice, electrical heating, and de-icing chemicals. These are expensive, inefficient, unreliable, and environmentally harmful. The aim of the ICELIP project is to develop a passive ice-repellent coating which also provides adequate durability for aircraft applications. This will have impacts not only in aviation, but also in other sectors (other transport: rail, maritime, automotive, and energy: wind turbines, power lines). The main benefits include: increased safety by 4%, more environmentally friendly products (avoiding discharge of 100 million litres of de-icing fluids and cutting emissions of 80million tonnes of CO2 by reducing aircraft weight and, thus, fuel consumption), more cost-efficient products (saving £7bn/year in fuel), and improved energy efficiency (e.g. increasing wind energy production by 20%). The ICELIP project is based on previous R&D work of part of the consortium, focused on the development of an ice-repellent coating comprising nano-additives incorporated in a standard aerospace clear coat. The coating system showed an outstanding combination of ice-repellency and durability (TRL 3-4) which will need further development and testing in order to be suitable for the aerospace market.

Ice formation on aircraft, wind turbines and power lines is a major cost to industry and an ongoing cause of fatal air crashes and accidents from ice-shedding. Current ice-mitigation technologies rely on mechanical breaking of the ice, electrical heating or application of de-icing chemicals. These are expensive, inefficient, unreliable, and damaging to the environment. The aim of the ICEMART project is to develop a novel passive ice-repellent coating that will prevent ice formation and adhesion without the need for active ice-management. This development will have far-reaching impact across a wide range of sectors, including aviation and energy where it could save hundreds of lives, eliminate the discharge of over 100 million litres of aircraft de-icing fluid, contribute to annual savings of £7bn in fuel and 80Mtonnes of CO2 from aviation and improve wind generation efficiency by 17%. ICEMART technology is based on a novel patented technique for obtaining multi-functional additives that can be incorporated into coating resins making them highly repellent to water and ice, whilst providing a tough and durable coating.

With an ever ageing population, there are an increasing number of patients requiring medical devices, such as artificial joints and dental implants to enable everyday activity. An improvement of current implants will offer tremendous benefits. In particular, there is an urgent need for technologies to improve the fixation of implants/devices in bone without infection occurring. These will contain doped nano-sized bioactive glass to enable strong integration with bone and anti-microbial properties. The proposed project has 4 key deliverables: 1- Synthesis of novel nano- materials by state of the art manufacturing processes; 2- Development of optimum formulations with these novel materials; 3 Selection of optimum coating technique for application onto implant substrates and 4- Biological testing of coated implant prototypes.

The textile and clothing industry in Mexico has experienced a major productivity transformation thanks to the implementation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) between Mexico, USA and Canada. Introduced in 1994, NAFTA has had a positive effect on employment and also exports from Mexico. Currently the textile industry, which is over a century old in Mexico, represents the fourth largest manufacturing sector and is experiencing strong jobs growth. Since 1994, it is also a source of foreign currency earnings due to being the second highest industrial sector for exports. Textile and clothing enterprises are found throughout Mexico (Coahuila, Durango, Chihuahua, Aguascalientes, Mexico, Puebla, Guanajuato, Yucatán and Tlaxcala). The sector sustains around 18% of national employment - 1,300,000 jobs in total. The implication of current geopolitical trends in the Americas are a good reason for the Mexican sector to move up the value-added chain, and the ACTIN project will assist the sector to do this. ACTin is a collaboration between Mexican and UK companies and research institutes for the development of durable anti-microbial textiles for the healthcare industry. This is a strategically important focus area in both countries due to the significant economic and social impact of healthcare acquired infections which lead to extended stays in hospitals, higher healthcare costs, and thousands of deaths globally each year. This project builds on previous collaboration in the successful CuVito project (EU-Mexico collaboration funded by the European Commission's FP7 programme and CONACYT) and will develop novel copper-based and functionalised-silica based treatments for textiles. Innovative methods for incorporation of the active agents via inkjet printing and also a patented melt-mixing process will be used. The project aims to deliver value-added products for the SMEs involved in the project both in Mexico and the UK, which will help them leverage this novel technology for competitive advantages in the healthcare industry and also open the doors for further collaboration between UK and Mexico. Some partners may also be able to pursue licensing opportunities after the project. The health of the population is an essential element for the economic development of any country, and it constitutes a priority for public policy in Mexico also, with an ongoing search for novel technologies that can improve public health. In Mexico, the health sector is one of the major economic activities and one with strong growth in recent years. Specifically in 2014, the health sector was equivalent to 5.7% of the national economy in Mexico. In addition to the social benefits of improved healthcare via reducing HAIs, novel antimicrobial textiles, especially those based on copper, can provide Mexican textiles businesses with a distinct value-added high-tech product which will differentiate their product offer from the low-cost imports from Asia in the textiles market. The ultimate impacts of these activities will be to assist the UK’s ODA effort and support three of the UN’s sustainable development goals, i.e. goal 9.3 (promote inclusive and sustainable industrialisation), goal 9.5 (enhance scientific research and upgrade technological capabilities of industrial sectors), and goal 9B (support domestic technology development, research and innovation). Research into HAIs is particularly relevant to developing countries and hence adds value to ODA ; a recent World Health Organisation report stated that in low- and middle-income countries the frequency of ICU-acquired infection is at least 2 to 3 times higher than in high-income countries.

Printing equipment and formulation expertise are not available resources at PP. Ink formulation can be a time-consuming iterative process without guaranteed success. A formulation expert will accelerate the process to develop a formulation which can be aimed at a particular printing technique (e.g. flexo). We also need to measure the electrical properties of the deposited film (e.g. sheet resistivity) which provides crucial marketing information for attracting new business.