COUNTLESS_project

COUNTLESS project at key European conference on biotechnology. At #BIOKET2025 in Brussels, delegates can learn about COUNTLESS at the booth of VITO, our project coordinator, where our exploitation manager Roel Vleeschouwers is ready to answer all questions, or the Circular Bio-based Europe Joint Undertaking (CBE JU). Tomorrow, VITO will welcome participants of BIOKET on a site visit to #LignoValue pilot plant ????, where the core process of COUNTLESS takes place: the industrial scale continuous depolymerisation of lignin. Our project partner Beatriz Kiss from Braskem took the stage in the plenary session today, joining a distinguished panel of industry experts on sustainability assessments ????. She emphasised the importance of LCA in product development, where it can not only show sustainability, but point out key areas of improvement. Also present at BIOKET are Fibenol and CLIB - Cluster Industrielle Biotechnologie, connecting with biotechnology experts and businesses in the sector. #Sustainability #Innovation #Biotechnology #Bioeconomy #CircularEconomy #Lignin

This is how it looks like when our project partner from Utrecht University receives samples. Thomas Dezaire, a PhD student from the Organic Chemistry and Catalysis (OCC) research group, is unpacking tubes filled with different types of lignin that he received from our partner Fibenol in Estonia.?????? Next, he will analyse the samples and use them as standards for his chemometric analyses. What is chemometrics? To be continued… ?? #Sustainability #Innovation #CircularBioBasedEconomy #EUprojects? Circular Bio-based Europe Joint Undertaking (CBE JU)

Our project partner Bloom Biorenewables is #hiring - what an opportunity for a lignin enthusiast wanting to drive the building of a FOAK plant forward!

COUNTLESS ?? present at the 11th Biorizon Annual Event on Bio-aromatics ??, organised by Biorizon Shared Research Center ??. What better event to discuss all things bio-aromatics ?? than in Antwerp today. COUNTLESS coordinator Kelly Servaes (VITO) co-organised the event and met experts in the field of lignin-to-bioaromatics from across Europe ??. Project partners Antoine Duval from SOPREMA France and Tatjana Schwabe-Markovi? from CLIB - Cluster Industrielle Biotechnologie ?? also attended the Biorizon event to communicate about the project's aims ?? and reach out to stakeholders. #countless-project #lignin #biorizon #Bio-aromatics

How to make our lignin depolymerisation experts happy? Give them (even more) lignin to depolymerise! ???? ??Milestone?? reached: All required lignin stock available and delivered for demonstration activities at VITO VITO received 100 kg of lignin from the project partner Bloom Biorenewables last week. This shipment of material from Switzerland to Belgium, together with the earlier shipment of lignin from Fibenol, Estonia, means that there is sufficient material for our scientists ???????? at VITO to carry out the planned demonstration activities. They have already started solubilization tests and will now move to the continuous depolymerization of lignin in the demo plant. ?? #Sustainability #Innovation #Lignin #BioBasedChemicals #CircularBioBasedEconomy #EUprojects Circular Bio-based Europe Joint Undertaking (CBE JU)

Some thoughts of our partner Braskem on the importance of bio-based innovations to support our transformation to a sustainable society.

?? Milestone achieved for the COUNTLESS project! Our coordinator VITO, who has brought the LignoValue Pilot Plant and demo site online, has just shipped the first samples to application developers, marking an exciting step forward. Our project partners at Soprema Group, VTT, Daren Labs, Braskem, and Kastamonu Entegre will now use the material to start creating novel intermediates for a range of applications, unlocking new possibilities in sustainable production. ???? This is a key moment in our project, toward enlarging the bio-based intermediates portfolio. #Sustainability #Innovation #CircularBioBasedEconomy #EUprojects Circular Bio-based Europe Joint Undertaking (CBE JU)

Greetings from Estonia - as our consortium meets today in Tallinn, hosted by our project partner Fibenol The main focus of this consortium meeting at month 13 of the COUNTLESS project is a workshop on sustainability assessment, value chain definition, and exploitation. Miet Van Dael from VITO prepared an interactive workshop, where all partners laid out their value chains on cards, moving them as needed. The open discussion allowed us to visualise all value chains towards the products aimed for in the project. This will prepare the way to collect the data necessary for life cycle analyses and techno-economic analysis. It also laid the basis for exploitation plans and stakeholder mapping. Also on the agenda: updates from the lignin producers (Bloom Biorenewables in addition to Fibenol), the lignin analysts (Universiteit Utrecht), and the lignin depolymerisation team at VITO Yesterday, we had the chance to visit Fibenol's plant in Imavere, the SWEETWOODS biorefinery. They supply one of the lignin streams for the project. It was impressive to see this large installation up and running and we thank the team at Fibenol, especially Kait Kaarel Puss and Signe Reinum?gi, for their hospitality! #innovation #lignin #bio-based #bioeconomy Circular Bio-based Europe Joint Undertaking (CBE JU)

??? One year ago, our consortium gathered for the kick-off meeting in Mol, Belgium. Since then, we’ve been making significant progress ??: ? The demo site at VITO is up and running, utilities installed, units delivered, and the first lignin depolymerisation reactions have been successfully completed! ???? ?? Our feedstock partners, Fibenol and Bloom Biorenewables have sent their first samples and are building a stockpile of lignin to feed the next depolymerisation campaigns at the LignoValue Plant. ?? Our academic collaborators at Universiteit Utrecht are diving into the analysis and modeling of lignin samples and fractions. ?? Sustainability groundwork is being prepared by ifeu - Institut für Energie- und Umweltforschung Heidelberg gGmbH and VITO. Next up: a workshop on sustainability and exploitation, together with CLIB - Cluster Industrielle Biotechnologie at our next consortium meeting. ?? Application developers are ready to receive samples soon. Exciting times ahead, and we’ll continue to keep you posted! #Sustainability #Lignin #Innovation #COUNTLESSProject #CircularEconomy #GreenChemistry

Congrats to the Circular Bio-based Europe Joint Undertaking (CBE JU) team on their achievements so far! Funded by CBE JU, we will work to continue technology transfer and scale-up to create more bio-based chemicals and help realise the #bioeconomy.