Newlight Signs Supply, Collaboration, And Technology License Agreement With IKEA

IKEA SUPPLY AG and Newlight Technologies announced today that they have entered into a supply, collaboration, and technology license agreement that will supply IKEA with AirCarbon from Newlight’s commercial-scale production facilities and enable IKEA to produce AirCarbon thermoplastic under a technology license.

Under the agreement, IKEA will purchase 50% of the material from Newlight’s 23,000 tonne per year plant in the United States, and subsequently IKEA has exclusive rights in the home furnishings industry to use Newlight’s carbon capture technology to convert bio-based greenhouse gases, first from biogas and later from carbon dioxide, into AirCarbon thermoplastics for use in its home furnishing products. Both the companies will work together to identify and select the low cost carbon sources and development of the technology to use a range of renewable substrates, with a long term goal to develop capacities up to 453 KTA or 1 Billion pounds per year. The AirCarbon plants are initially intended to run using biogas from landfills as their sole carbon feedstock inputs, with expansion into other AirCarbon feedstocks over time, such as carbon dioxide.

Minh Nguyen Hoang, Category Manager of Plastics at IKEA of Sweden says: “IKEA wants to contribute to a transformational change in the industry and to the development of plastics made from renewable sources. In line with our sustainability goals, we are moving away from virgin fossil based plastic materials in favor of plastic produced from renewable sources such as biogas, sugar wastes, and other renewable carbon sources. We believe our partnership with Newlight has the potential, once fully scaled, to be an important component of our multi-pronged effort to provide IKEA’s customers with affordable plastics products made from renewable resources.”

Added CEO of Newlight, Mark Herrema: “IKEA’s partnership with Newlight marks an important shift in how the world can make materials: from fossil fuels to captured carbon, from consumption to generation, from depletion to restoration. IKEA is a leader in the concept of harnessing its operations to improve the world, and we are proud to be a part of that effort.”

IKEA’s long-term ambition is for all the plastic material used in their home furnishing products to be renewable or recycled material. The company is starting with their home furnishing plastic products, representing about 40% of the total plastic volume used in the IKEA range.

About IKEA Group

Our vision is to create a better everyday life for the many people and we offer well designed, functional and affordable, high quality home furnishing, produced with care for people and the environment. The IKEA Group has 333 stores in 28 countries. In addition there are more than 40 stores run by franchisees outside the IKEA Group. The IKEA Group had 771 million visitors during FY15 and 1.9 billion people visited IKEA.com

About Newlight

Newlight Technologies is a sustainable materials company using carbon capture technology to produce high-performance materials that replace oil-based materials on a market-driven basis. Newlight was founded in 2003 with a question: why can’t we use carbon that would otherwise go into the air as a resource to make materials? Over the course of 10 years of research and development, Newlight developed a biotechnological process to produce a material called AirCarbon: a family of high-performance polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA)-based thermoplastic materials made from carbon emissions that are able to match the performance of a range of oil-based plastics while out-competing on price. Today, Newlight is using greenhouse gas to produce materials used in the production of packaging, furniture, electronics accessories, caps, and a variety of other products. Following commercialization in 2013, AirCarbon was named “Biomaterial of the Year” by the Nova Institute in 2013, “one of the 100 most technologically significant innovations of the year” by R&D Magazine in 2013, and 2014 “Innovation of the Year” by Popular Science.