Stopford and AESI Partner to Accelerate PLASMERGY™ Technology for Industrial Waste Recovery

Stopford and Advanced Extraction Systems Inc. (AESI) are working together to accelerate PLASMERGY™, a microwave-induced plasma gasification technology designed to convert difficult industrial waste streams into valuable resources, including hydrogen-rich syngas, recoverable heat, and potential chemical feedstocks.

The partnership brings together Stopford's expertise in developing and scaling emerging process technologies for industrial applications and AESI's engineering, manufacturing, and process development capabilities, with ongoing development and testing taking place at AESI's facility in Prince Edward Island, Canada.

Addressing the challenge of difficult industrial waste

Industries worldwide generate significant quantities of waste materials that are difficult, costly, or environmentally challenging to treat and dispose of. These include petroleum-based residues, refinery sludges, contaminated organic materials and other carbonaceous by-products generated by industrial operations.

The Canadian oil sands industry represents one prominent example. As one of the world’s largest oil reserves, oil sands extraction generates substantial volumes of tailings, bitumen residues and other waste materials that can present long-term environmental and operational challenges. Among these are some particularly challenging carbonaceous waste streams that remain costly to manage using conventional treatment and disposal approaches. At the same time, operators face increasing pressure to improve resource efficiency, reduce environmental liabilities, and support decarbonisation objectives.

As regulatory requirements continue to evolve, there is increasing interest in technologies that can treat difficult waste streams while also recovering useful products and reduce reliance on traditional disposal routes.

Turning waste into useful resources

PLASMERGY™ is being developed to address these challenges by using microwave-induced plasma gasification to convert carbonaceous waste materials into a hydrogen-rich synthesis gas.

At the heart of PLASMERGY™ is a high-temperature, microwave-induced plasma gasification process that breaks down carbonaceous materials and converts them into a synthesis gas consisting principally of hydrogen and carbon monoxide. Depending on the composition of the waste stream and the configuration of the overall process, this gas could be used to generate heat and power or undergo further processing to produce hydrogen and other chemical feedstocks.

Rather than treating these materials solely as waste requiring disposal, the technology seeks to recover value from them through the production of:

·        Hydrogen-rich syngas

·        Recoverable heat

·        Potential chemical feedstocks for further processing

Additional opportunities may exist to convert the resulting synthesis gas into higher-value products, including hydrogen and synthetic fuels, through established downstream technologies, creating further pathways for resource recovery.

By treating waste at or near its source, PLASMERGY™ has the potential to reduce off-site transportation, minimise disposal requirements and support more circular approaches to industrial resource management.

For oil sands operators and other industrial organisations managing challenging waste streams, PLASMERGY™ offers the potential to reduce reliance on landfill and off-site disposal, recover energy and useful products, lower waste-management costs, and support broader decarbonisation and ESG objectives.

A modular approach to industrial waste treatment

PLASMERGY™ is being developed as a modular, transportable system capable of being deployed alongside existing industrial operations.

Each module is designed with a nominal processing capacity of up to 1,000 tonnes of waste material per annum, allowing operators to scale capacity through the deployment of additional units as requirements grow.

The modular design is intended to provide flexibility across a range of industrial applications, including the energy, petrochemical, manufacturing, and waste-management sectors.

The system is being developed to maximise the recovery and utilisation of energy generated during the gasification process, helping support efficient operation while creating opportunities for integration with existing industrial facilities. Recoverable heat and hydrogen-rich syngas may be returned to host operations, further supporting process efficiency and resource recovery objectives.

Moving towards industrial deployment

PLASMERGY™ has progressed through laboratory development and testing in simulated operational environments and is now advancing towards field deployment and industrial application.

Stopford and AESI are continuing to develop and refine the system, evaluate integration opportunities, and assess how the technology can be applied to real-world industrial waste challenges.

The partnership is now seeking collaboration with organisations interested in exploring potential applications for PLASMERGY™, particularly within the energy, petrochemical, manufacturing, and waste-management sectors. The Canadian oil sands industry represents one area of particular interest, particularly for difficult carbonaceous waste streams where conventional treatment and disposal routes remain challenging.

Prith Rajendran, Managing Director of Stopford, commented:

"PLASMERGY™ turns multi-million-dollar waste liabilities into an asset. By breaking down complex waste at the molecular level, our technology eliminates disposal costs, generating recoverable feedstocks and hydrogen-rich syngas to power your operations on-site."

Al Goodwin, COO of AESI, commented:

"Our partnership with Stopford has allowed us to take an innovative technology and work towards turning it into a practical industrial solution. The development and testing we are carrying out here on PEI is helping us understand how PLASMERGY™ performs, refine the process, and establish its potential for treating difficult waste streams.

"We now want to take that work into real industrial applications, working directly with operators to demonstrate what the technology can achieve and the value it can deliver."

Interested in exploring a potential application for PLASMERGY™ connect with Prith Rajendran or Al Goodwin

Or contact us via email at enquiries

Follow our journey as we explore how PLASMERGY™ can reshape the relationship between waste, energy, and resource recovery.

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Look out for our campaign launching this week, see images below for a teaser.