PDC News #5
We are PDC. We help create a lower carbon footprint and a more sustainable process industry. With this newsletter we collect and share news and updates around our industry and collaborative projects.
Mevaldi is accelerating
Mevaldi B.V., the dutch startup in bio-based chemicals, has recently closed a new investment round with High-Tech Gründerfonds and ICIG Ventures, giving the company the resources to scale its bio-based platform from pilot to demonstration level.
Mevaldi’s innovation, 3MPD or Pentonext, is a sustainable building block for high-performance polymers, polyurethanes, coatings, and elastomers, made from renewable feedstocks like sugars and wood residues instead of fossil resources.
This milestone follows support from the EU’s Circular Bio-based Europe programme and highlights the growing momentum behind Europe’s transition to a circular, bio-based economy.
The company’s technology is a key part of the NEXT-STEP project, an EU-funded initiative demonstrating new bio-based chemical platforms and polymers. By advancing sustainable building blocks, NEXT-STEP aims to reduce reliance on imported fossil resources while creating environmentally friendly materials for industrial applications. As part of the consortium, PDC is contributing expertise in process optimization, sustainability evaluation, and scale-up coordination, helping turn these innovations into industrial reality.
Mevaldi’s latest funding reinforces the promise of NEXT-STEP, showing both technological progress and commercial confidence in Europe’s bio-based future.
PDC at Bio Innovations Midwest
Following our presence at World Bio Markets in the Hague, we also went to the Bio Innovations North America in Omaha, NE to present to the bio manufacturing community our expertise and experience in process design for developing and producing bio-based chemicals and products.
Among many meetings and introductions, we participated in the panel discussion on the topic AI - A tool U.S. industrial biomanufacturing cannot ignore, to outline our development of Prosyn.ai software.
Bio Innovations North America is a leading two-day international conference advancing the bioeconomy through industrial biomanufacturing. It unites producers, investors, brands, and technology providers to foster partnerships and accelerate the shift to sustainable, fossil-free solutions. Aligned with the mission of “making bio the new normal,” the event connects commercialized bio producers with customers, supports startups and scaleups, and drives adoption of bio-based solutions at competitive prices—all through curated meetings, discussions, and sector engagement.
MECALO advances CO₂-free metal production with carbon looping
The MECALO project is developing a breakthrough process for producing critical raw materials like silicon and manganese without CO₂ emissions. By using renewable hydrogen to convert captured CO₂ into methane and then solid carbon, the project replaces fossil coal in metallurgical furnaces—cutting emissions by up to 95 percent.
Process Design Center (PDC) plays a key role in designing and evaluating the full process chain, ensuring technical feasibility and economic viability from carbon conversion to final metal production. Early trials have already demonstrated the production of several hundred kilograms of manganese using this innovative approach.
With strong progress on catalyst development, carbon quality, and pilot-scale validation, MECALO is paving the way toward large-scale deployment of climate-neutral metal production in Europe.
We are PDC. We are an international team of conceptual process design experts with a strong reputation in the industry. Our mission is to help create a lower carbon footprint and a more sustainable process industry.
As a process design innovator with close to 40 years of experience, PDC understands how to support and lead teams through the uncertainties of the conceptual process design flow to reach innovative solutions. The methods we share have, over the years, helped us quickly and effectively design solutions to a wide range of challenges.
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