Vaperma Opens Centre to Test New Clean Energy Technology

Today, Vaperma Inc. officially opened its new 22,000 square-foot research and technology centre for the development and pilot testing of clean energy gas separation membranes. Vaperma’s innovative hollow fiber membrane is a proprietary, made-in-Canada technology that represents a new “dewatering” process for the production of fuel ethanol. The technology also has strong potential for the dehydration of natural gas.

It is expected that Vaperma’s membrane technology will be an attractive solution to large ethanol refining plants in both North America and Brazil to meet the growing demand for bioethanol as a gasoline additive. In addition, testing of Vaperma’s membrane technology for the dehydration of natural gas will begin in October 2007. Dehydration of natural gas is required to purify this clean-burning petroleum fuel.

Vaperma’s pre-commercial membrane spinning facility is scheduled to go online during August 2007. The pilot line will spin enough fibers to enable testing at large demonstration scale.

Over the past 18 months, Vaperma has successfully built the company and its assets, which have taken Siftek™ membrane technology from the lab into the demonstration phase, by partnering with potential customers such as Greenfield Ethanol and EnCana Corporation.

"Vaperma is positioning itself to become a leading Canadian supplier of advanced membrane systems for the production of fuel-grade ethanol and for natural gas treatment. Funding support from Sustainable Development