The future of Canadian forest extractives for specialty chemicals: value identification

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Western Canada's softwoods are rich in extractives such as terpenes, which can be used to meet the global**demand for sustainable alternatives to petroleum. These molecules can be used for cosmetics, flavours,**fragrances, and food additives or upgraded via catalysis to new high-value drugs, herbicides and/or pesticides.**This collaboration with Nanaimo Forest Products (NFP) will identify and quantify extractives contained in**steam condensates produced from NFP's furnish in order to evaluate the commercial value of these molecules.**This project, Value Identification, represents the first phase of NFP's effort to develop high value products to**complement their current business. Success in this project will lead to a second phase in which process**simulations will be used to identify separation technology to recover target molecules for commercial offering.**NFP will provide steam condensates generated from their fibre basket. A suite of integrated analytical**techniques will be used to identify and quantify the extractives contained in these condensates. Existing**applications and markets for the identified molecules will be assessed. Dr. Trajano, biomass deconstruction**and characterization specialist, and her team will collaborate with NFP's Production Manager, Bart Howey.**Mr. Howey is committed to developing NFP's new business opportunities and will meet with the UBC team**twice a month to review project results. The entrepreneurial leadership of NFP is excited to translate this**research into value-adding products manufactured in British Columbia. These products will be a competitive**advantage for regional producers that cannot easily be displaced by international rivals. This new commercial**activity will create significant new job opportunities at NFP's employee owned facility and enable NFP's**continued support of local community infrastructure such as hospitals and schools.