All, this is some more info relevant to LENP, accumulated this last weekend.
1) I haven't yet been able to find an estimate on the market potential for Lenox resins in the plywood, chipboard, etc. market. But, I did find an estimate of the potential in the foundry market: 800,000,000 lbs. yearly, worldwide. Of course it would vary a lot depending on the world economy.
The compressed wood products market dwarfs the foundry market, but I don't have anything more precise on the potential there. Then there's the plastics market....
2) On the deal with Titagarah Paper Mills Co. of India. No recent news. (This was announced about a year ago. The press release can be found at the Lycos site by searching the symbol LXPYF.) Titagarah apparently sent some of their black liquor to Lenox; Lenox converted it to the resins desired, and sent it back for testing. There's been time to complete the testing, but, afaik, no word from Titagarah. We can only speculate about what the holdup is. BTW, it is not uncommon for a lot of these prospective deals to fall through. Don't expect every one of them to fly. There was an earlier deal with a division of Raytheon. Then Raytheon sold that division to another company and the new company wasn't interested in the process as, apparently, their focus was elsewhere.
3) I've been educating myself a bit more this weekend about black liquor, lignin, and the scientific interest in it. In the process, I've learned some things that you may find interesting and helpful. Some of the things were definitely news to me.
a) Biodegradability. Not surprisingly, since it's a wood product,
Lenox lignin is biodegradable. (Another advantage in those uses where it would replace plastics.) The process by which it biodegrades has received and continues to receive a lot of scientific attention. Basically the process is the one that breaks down wood known as white rot decay and is associated with certain specific microorganisms.
b) Abundance. I knew lignin was common, but now HOW common. Here are some ways to look at it. It is the most abundant renewable aromatic polymer. It constitutes about 25% of woody plant cell walls. Among naturally occurring polymers it is second only to cellulose in abundance. I believe the figure I saw put cellulose at 41% of woody plant cell walls. (Didn't write that one down.)
c) I'm still looking into some of this, but I've discovered that some pulp mills are finding other uses for their black liquor besides burning it. In some places black liquor is sprayed on gravel and dirt roads to keep the dust down. It apparently also is being put into some cattle feeds(!) (Well, since they put ground-up sheep brains into cattle feed, maybe I shouldn't be surprised.) A third use I ran across is as a filler in concrete.
d) One company, Tembec, a Canadian forest products company, has been selling/using some of its black liquor in a resin application in plywood-type situations. Their process for converting their black liquor into the useful glue involves *adding* formaldehyde to it.(!) This is the closest thing to a competitive product I've been able to find.
Nothing here, afaics, alters the case for LENP.
4) I have confirmation that another company that I believe I mentioned earlier, Ligno-Tech, does not compete with LENP. Joe Peters talked with one of their executives and this is what he learned: Ligno-Tech processes black liquor but none of the uses of its products are targeted for, nor are they applicable to, foundry uses, compressed wood products uses, or plastics uses. Not only did they know of Lenox, they even have a working agreement with Lenox, so they may collaborate on some future projects. They seemed to think very highly of the Lenox process.
I think that is very good news.
FWIW.
-DT
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