C-CJCBERI has been successfully awarded $4.5 Million Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI) 2017 Innovation Fund. The fund will mainly support the building of new labs and equipment for the Centre to conduct biomass and bioenergy research on UBC campus. The design and construction will start in early 2018.
The award was announced by the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, Jody Wilson-Raybould, on behalf of the Minister of Science, Kirsty Duncan, at UBC on Oct 13th. UBC has received more than $67.5 million through the CFI’s Innovation Fund this year. This investment will help put the right tools in the hands of Canada’s top scientists so they make discoveries, innovate and train their students for the jobs of tomorrow. By doing so, scientists are contributing to building a bolder, brighter future for all Canadians.
A quote from our Director Dr. Xiaotao Bi was included in UBC news:
"Biomass residues are abundantly available in Canada, especially in British Columbia. They can potentially contribute to more than 10% reductions of BC's greenhouse gas emissions by displacing fossil fuels for district heating, transportation, and aviation. UBC researchers have been developing biomass pretreatment, gasification, torrefaction, pyrolysis, catalytic upgrading, fermentation and clean burning technologies to facilitate the transformation of biomass residues to bioenergy and biofuels, in collaboration with researchers in Canada and abroad. This new CFI funding will enable us to work closely with domestic and international industrial partners to transform those technologies from lab to pilot scale to facilitate the demonstration and commercialization of these novel technologies. We believe that the successful bioenergy utilization of Canada's abundant biomass resources will play a critical role in helping Canada to meet its 2030 greenhouse gas emission reduction target and helping Vancouver to achieve its 2050 Renewable City (100% renewable energy) target."
A full list of the funded projects and stories about the facilities are available online at Innovation.ca.