Improving the energy landscape with molecular filtration for industrial processes
Chemical separation processes that use thermal-based methods account for approximately 12 percent of US energy consumption, with distillation and evaporation making up the majority of that number. These traditional separation and chemical purification processes are used to derive materials like polymers for plastic products, active pharmaceutical ingredients for drugs, and nutrients for food products.
Via Separations' CEO and co-founder, Shreya Dave likens the procedure to separating the water from a pot of pasta by boiling it off rather than using a strainer. It’s inefficient, expensive, and wastes a tremendous amount of energy. So why are we still using the same purification techniques developed during the Industrial Revolution? Following through on the analogy, Dave explains that in a chemical environment you need a colander that is small enough and fine enough to separate different chemicals, while being sufficiently durable to handle aggressive chemical environments (e.g., very high heat, extreme PH levels).
“Today, we use as much energy separating different materials from one another as we do in all the gasoline in all the cars and trucks in the US every year,” she says. “At Via Separations, we’ve developed a molecular filter with the potential to save 90 percent of the energy expended on chemical separations.” That’s roughly $20 billion in energy savings unlocked by Via Separations proprietary analytics and technology platform.
At Via Separations, we’ve developed a molecular filter with the potential to save 90 percent of the energy expended on chemical separations.
Via Separations’ VIA NUfiltration platform uses a membrane filter made from a derivative of graphite called graphene oxide. It’s an oxidized version of graphene, a material often referred to as “the miracle material.” A one-atom-thick sheet of graphite arranged in the form of a honeycomb, graphene is stronger than a diamond, more conductive than copper, and more flexible than rubber. For some time, a commercially viable, scalable application of graphene has been considered the holy grail. "What's unique about this technology is the chemical durability combined with the ability to select between different molecules,” says Dave’s co-founder and CTO of Via Separations Brent Keller. It’s a versatile platform capable of separating a host of different chemicals in the manufacturing sector. "There's never been a material before capable of doing this type of separation," he says.
Despite operating on a smaller margin of profit than many other process industries, the food and beverage industry has already adopted membrane filter technologies for many separation and purification processes, from dealcoholization to juice processing. However, Dave points out that there are significant limitations to the membranes being used, not least of which is the ability to clean them. "The chemical durability of our technology means you can clean our membranes more aggressively, clean them faster, reduce downtime, and improve the actual physical purification of the product at the same time." Dave and Keller are focusing their initial efforts on the food and beverage industry, partly because they see it as the fastest path to revenue. "Companies like ours have a long life cycle between development, scale-up, and ultimately selling product. Getting there sooner allows us to prove our product while creating the fastest path to revenue and benefitting our investors," she says.
Beyond food and beverage, Via Separations' revolutionary technology has applications across industries, including pharmaceutical manufacturing, semiconductor manufacturing, and oil and gas dehydration. "There are so many applications that we can scale-up towards to save energy," says Dave. "For example, we’re able to improve energy efficiency in the paper industry, where thermal separations are responsible for 3-5% of all US energy consumption. Name your sector, and there are processes that we can improve.”
Dave and Keller both did their PhDs with MIT Professor of Materials Science and Engineering and Via Separations’ third co-founder Jeffrey Grossman. In fact, Dave and Keller were Grossman's first experimental material design students, and Via Separations' technology was originally Dave's PhD thesis. Since its founding in 2016, Via Separations has grown into a nimble team of 12 talented chemists, chemical engineers, and manufacturing-related scientists. By Dave's admission, they are a very technically focused team that continues to learn the ins and outs of business on the fly, guided by a host of savvy advisors and mentors helping them to scale their revolutionary technology.
With lead investment coming from the Engine, MIT's venture fund established to support tough tech, Via Separations continues to benefit from the entrepreneurship ecosystem built up around MIT. "MIT has been a huge part of our company history, not only in terms of the initial research but also considering the support of the Technology Licensing Office and the Engine," says. Keller. Last year Via Separations outgrew their offices at the Engine and moved into Greentown Labs, which allowed them to scale-up production and the size of their team. By 2020, Dave expects Via Separations will be field-testing their first pilot.
"The MIT entrepreneurship community has been a valuable resource, allowing us to talk to fellow startup founders, practice our pitches, and identify organizations that are interested in funding this type of technology," she says. And ILP is great at trying to solve the impedance mismatch that often exists between startups and large organizations. There are awesome opportunities for us to function as the innovation arm for some of these larger companies," she says.
We're in the business of augmenting our customer's infrastructure, not necessarily replacing it.
With Dave steering decisions as CEO, Via Separations is on the lookout for organizations interested in maximizing their manufacturing process and those that are open to discussing the economics and the physical requirements of their process with a desire to scale-up. "We're in the business of augmenting our customer's infrastructure, not necessarily replacing it," says Dave. "We've invented a new material; we don't need to invent the manufacturing process. Looking ahead, we're interested in long-term partnerships with chemical companies and chemical manufacturers to identify where we can help them best. We're motivated by changing the world in a way that nobody has done before."