Decene, the C10 molecule, has been a prized feedstock for making synthetic lubricant base stocks since the early 1970s. Typically produced from petroleum hydrocarbons in a full-range linear alpha olefin (LAO) facility, decene is the perfect material for building into polyalphaolefin (PAO). However, the market for PAO base stocks has been increasingly tight in recent years, owing in part to limited investment in LAO feedstock capacity just as demand for synthetic lubes was beginning to swell.
Seeing this need, as well as forecasts calling for 3 percent to 4 percent annual growth in PAO demand, Elevance Renewable Sciences Inc. aims to plug the C10 gap with a plant-based oleochemical version. Beyond renewability alone, it promises to deliver performance advantages for transportation and industrial lubricants.
Located near Chicago, Elevance describes itself as a high-growth specialty chemical company that creates novel specialty chemicals from renewable feedstocks, making the products that industry and consumers use every day better. In its literature, it stresses that it takes its lead from nature, and has taken the bee as its corporate symbol. Like the bee, the idea is to take raw ingredients and repurpose them without depleting the source, and use natures own compounds to create something new.
The enterprise began with a grant from the U.S. Department of Energy in 2004, opened for business in 2007, and has grown into one of the leading companies in biochemistry. The investors and collaborators now backing Elevance read like an international Whos Who: Singapore-based agribusiness Wilmar International; French energy giant Total; Malaysian holding company and plantation owner Genting Berhad; U.S. food industry leader Cargill; private investment firms TPG and Naxos Capital. Link-ups have also been made with Arkema, Clariant, Stepan, the United Soybean Board and others.
The front office is stuffed with heavy-hitters, too. Recently appointed CEO and President Tony Parnell brought his more than 30 years of experience to Elevance in October, moving over from Albemarle, the specialty chemicals and custom synthesis company headquartered in Baton Rouge, La. Robin Weitkamp, who has more than 20 years of experience in chemical and petrochemical manufacturing, management and business development, is chief commercial officer. Andy Shafer, executive vice president, stategic partnerships, has more than 30 years of experience in specialty chemicals and plastics, and now focuses largely on developing opportunities for industrial products made from modified vegetable oils.
One of Elevances key assets is an exclusive license from the Swiss firm XiMo AG to use a patented metathesis catalyst technology, which earned inventors Robert Grubbs and Richard Schrock the 2005 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Metathesis allows complex plant oils to be rearranged into new materials such as unsaturated methyl esters and renewable-oil olefins, economically and on an industrial scale. Using XiMos molybdenum-based catalysts, Elevance can transform oils such as palm or coconut oil into high-value specialty chemicals, renewable olefins and a premium mixture of oleochemicals.
In a joint venture with Wilmar International, Elevance has built and now operates a 180,000 metric ton per year (approximately 400 million pounds) world-scale biorefinery in Gresik, Indonesia, which runs on palm oil. It has also acquired and begun converting a wholly owned biodiesel facility into a second, 310,000 t/y biorefinery located in Natchez, Miss. Meanwhile, Elevance has established tolling agreements with leading chemical industry players.
Among its trademarked offerings is Elevance Aria WTP 40, a synthetic, high-viscosity lubricant base stock that is Elevances bid to loosen conventional LAOs grip on the PAO market, as Greg Gerhardt told LubesnGreases during a visit to the companys headquarters in Woodridge, Ill. Gerhardt, who is commercial development leader, has worked in the specialty chemicals industry for more than 20 years, including with Cognis, S.C. Johnson Polymer and BASF.
WTP 40, he explained, uniquely combines the composition and properties of two synthetic base stock technologies – PAOs and esters – into the backbone of a single, high-performance product. Its viscosity is 40 cSt at 100 degrees C, and the material behaves much like a blend of esters and PAO, only more effective, he asserted. Its viscosity index is above 160.
This base stock, Gerhardt noted, can increase formulation flexibility through its unique molecular architecture. The ester functionality can eliminate the need for additives to aid solubility, he said, and lubricant performance is improved through increased film thickness and better lubricity. It also helps extend equipment life by reducing friction and wear while maintaining improved cleanliness, low foaming characteristics and excellent seal compatibility.
The Woodridge headquarters contains a series of laboratories working on different phases of its business. Here, lubricants technology and licensing manager Jonathan Brekan and others are engaged in creating new products and components. This research includes oligomerization and high pressure hydrogenation, as well as new catalysts and processes. The team also works on new molecule synthesis, scale-up efforts, formulations and application testing.
Brekan is proud to list the analytical capabilities, which include all of the expected tools – flash point, viscosity, pour point, density and so on – plus the latest and greatest in instrumentation: nuclear magnetic resonance, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, high pressure gas chromatography, to name a few. There is also an advanced rheological laboratory to study all of the viscometric implications of product development.
The labs work on everything from detergent formulations to candle wax, Brekan said, and do a great deal of work aimed at lubricants, such as additive chemistry including friction modifiers, metalworking fluids, fuel additives, lubricant additives, grease components and even future needs for functional fluid families.
One result of these efforts debuted in 2014, trademarked as Elevance Concert GC-350. This is a grease processing aid that addresses the time- and heat-intensive process of making complex lithium soap greases. By reducing the time needed to complete each batch while lowering the process temperature during the soap-making reaction, it enables grease manufacturers to save energy and increase the capacity of their production lines by up to 30 percent. Containing dibasic acid ester, it improves the ease of blending and is used at low treat rates of 0.5 percent to 2 percent, Gerhardt says.
Asked for a deeper look at WTP 40, Gerhardt says its a versatile product which offers numerous advantages in one renewable, high viscosity index base stock: additive solvency, friction and wear control, elastomer compatibility, parts cleanliness and foam resistance.
To demonstrate the improved additive solvency, Gerhardt compares samples of a GL-5 gear oil made with WTP 40 versus ones made with PAO or a conventional PAO-ester blend. Only the WTP 40 sample is clear; the other two products have varying degrees of haziness, indicating that the gear additive package was not completely soluble.
He went on to show other benefits: In friction and wear tests, a comparison of WTP 40 and a PAO-ester blend using a Micropitting Rig shows reduced micropitting, as evidenced by zero horizontal and diagonal wear scars when rolling at 2 meters/second and 1Gpa contact pressure. In elastomer compatibility tests, WTP 40 shows improvements in all areas including tensile strength, seal swelling characteristics and elongation, versus the PAO-ester blend of the same viscosity. Parts cleanliness, as measured in the L-60 Gear Oil Oxidation Test, also was better, and foam control was also improved using WTP 40 – without added foam inhibition, Gerhardt emphasized.
Not all of Elevances eggs are in the lubricants basket, though. Other renewable-based products are targeted to high-value personal care and cleaning applications. These include:
Cleaning ingredients that are partial replacements for such products as d-limonene or VOC-exempt degreasing products;
Plant-based emollients used in personal care applications such as lotions, creams, cosmetics and hair care products;
Products for the cosmetics field, which provide thickening and improved feel for hair (this thickening technology may be a plus for certain lubricant products such as drawing and forming oils that are formulated to be environmentally compatible);
Natural waxes, which can be used to create premium candles targeted to consumers who want to avoid petroleum waxes.
Each of these target markets offers opportunities to displace petroleum-based products with renewable ones. But its urgent to focus on lubricants, because rival decene and polyalphaolefin capacity is coming, and soon.
The last grass-roots, low-viscosity PAO facility was built back in the 1990s, so it has been quite a while since a new source has been brought onstream. Existing PAO facilities have been expanded and debottlenecked – typically in 5 to 20 percent increments – which allowed additional capacity to be made available in the marketplace.
On the high-vis side, new PAO plants were opened by Chemtura in 2013 and ExxonMobil Chemical in 2014; Chevron Phillips Chemical and Ineos Oligomers have added volumes as well.
Upstream, both Chevron Phillips and Shell Chemical now are building new LAO plants to make decene, which will allow PAO supplies to grow before the decades end.
That raises the question of who can bring their new volumes to market first – the incumbents or the newcomer? The Natchez biorefinery originally was due to begin operating in 2016, but an exact opening date has not been disclosed. Like Gresik, it will make decene.
The need for more PAO has never been greater, and Elevance knows it needs to move forward quickly before this window of opportunity shrinks or even closes. As baseball great Satchel Paige once said, Dont look back; something might be gaining on you!