Recordpub.com - Strickland in Portage: Governor tours Brimfield recycling center

By Mike Sever

Record-Courier staff writer

BRIMFIELD — Developers of a process to transform plastic waste into oil got the chance to put their plans before Gov. Ted Strickland during a stop Friday at Portage County’s recycling center.

The stop was the third and last for Strickland on a day devoted to discussing advanced technology and job growth in Ohio.

Strickland talked with principals of Vadxx Energy LLC, who are developing a process to take plastic refuse and other petroleum-based waste and turn it back into synthetic crude oil and natural gas.

The Portage County Solid Waste Management District and Vadxx are exploring a public-private partnership to turn plastics into fuel, with the district supplying the raw material and capital and Vadxx operating a pilot plant at the recycling center site on Mogadore Road. Portage County’s is the largest publicly-owned recycling operation in the state, said director William Steiner

The district and Vadxx then would share profits from sales of oil and natural gas. The cost to build a plant has been estimated at $2 million.

James W. Garrett, Vadxx CEO, said a full-scale unit has the potential to produce eight gallons a minute, up to 90,000 barrels annually, of synthetic crude oil, selling at about 80 percent of natural crude’s price.

“That’s why private industry is so interested in this,” Garrett said. There are still technical hurdles to overcome, Garrett said.

Vadxx has a pilot project in Akron and is looking for funding to launch larger-scale projects in northeast Ohio. The system is modular and expandable and Vadxx and an Alliance manufacturer have formed Akros Equipment Co. to build them in Akron.

Garrett said he had an offer of funding from China.

“We turned down a grant from China to build our units there. We said no,” Garrett said.

“Well, let’s applaud that,” Strickland said.

Strickland sounded impressed by the presentation.

“If this technique works as you say it will, I see no downside,” he said. “It will cut oil imports, we’ll have a cleaner environment and create jobs.”

Strickland was making his final stop after talks in Lorain and Medina counties.

Strickland also pushed for renewing Ohio’s Third Frontier program. “It’s a proven job creation program. It’s the most effective job creation tool the state of Ohio has,” he said.

Created in 2002, Ohio’s original $1.6 billion Third Frontier initiative was aimed at building world-class research programs, to grow emerging businesses and enhance technology for existing Ohio industries.

Strickland is leading the charge to pass Issue 1 on the May primary ballot.

Issue 1 would allow the state to extend the Third Frontier to 2016 by issuing $700 million in bonds.

Strickland and others are trying to get out the message that the Third Frontier initiative has helped bring hundreds of new jobs, retain others and grow new industries in Ohio.

The Ohio Department of Development lists 332 projects as coming from the Third Frontier program.

In Portage County, the Third Frontier has helped companies such as Kent Displays, which uses new flexible liquid-crystal display technology, and AlphaMicron, which makes LCD-based digital goggles and face shields.