Get to know our Adipic Acid project

Just the gist

Short on time? Here’s what you need to know for this update:

• 🌬️ Fighting climate change with nitrous oxide abatement — Check out the welcome letter from our adipic acid project partner and learn how they're destroying a greenhouse gas 265× more harmful than CO₂
• ⚙️ Making adipic acid production more efficient — Learn about the special equipment used to make adipic acid, how this process reduces nitrous oxide emissions, and how technologies are kept up-to-date

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🌬️ Fighting climate change with nitrous oxide abatement

ClimeCo, the team behind our Adipic acid nitrous oxide abatement project, is on a mission to reduce greenhouse gases through scalable abatement projects. Here is Dan Linsky’s letter to Wren:

Hello Wren Members,

We are grateful for your support of our work to reduce greenhouse gas emissions at nitric and adipic acid plants.  Particularly, these projects reduce nitrous oxide (N₂O) emissions.  N₂O is a very powerful greenhouse gas, 265 times more potent than CO₂ in trapping heat in the atmosphere.  The Florida project, which started in 2021, has already reduced millions of tonnes of CO₂e.

Realizing the impact that this type of project could have, ClimeCo proposed the US Adipic Acid Protocol to the Climate Action Reserve in 2019.  Through collaborative working groups, public comments, education and a year of focused effort, the protocol was approved for use, and made publicly available.

ClimeCo undertakes the development of these difficult, voluntary projects because of the permanence of the results.  The N₂O is destroyed, broken down into N2 and O2, which are natural elements of the air we breathe.  Thus, there is no risk of the N₂O being emitted in the future.

The project site creates nylon 6,6, a high-performance engineered plastic found in many products you see every day and even some that you don’t.  These products include cable ties, food packaging, toothbrush bristles, military and first responder uniforms, parts for fuel efficient and electric vehicles, airbags and others.

Overall, ClimeCo believes that all efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions are needed in the fight against climate change.  Nature based projects alone, which ClimeCo also develops, aren’t enough to get us to the warming limits set out in the Paris Agreement.  Scalable industrial projects, like the project that Wren and you are supporting here, make a meaningful contribution to reaching those goals.

We hope to hear your stories about your emission reduction successes, and how supporting this and other Wren projects have helped you in your quest to do your part in the fight against climate change.

Sincerely,
Dan Linsky, SVP Voluntary Markets at ClimeCo.

⚙️ Making adipic acid production more efficient

Making adipic acid at the Cantonment, Florida, plant previously involved sending the waste into a Selective Catalytic Reduction (SCR) unit. The main purpose of this machine was to reduce pollution so that the plant could meet Clean Air Act standards. However, the SCR unit wasn't equipped to also deal with nitrous oxide (N₂O).

One way to abate N₂O emissions is to use a Thermal Reduction Unit (TRU). This equipment destroys N₂O using reducing flame burners with pre-mixed methane or natural gas. Some emissions are still generated during this process, so it is important to make sure TRU technology is up-to-date as more efficient methods are developed over time.

Recently, our project has installed a new TRU that is even more efficient than their last. This new unit can handle more waste, significantly increasing the amount of N₂O we can destroy. The older TRU is now serving as a backup system.

To ensure these emissions reductions are real, permanent, and additional, the project has issued its first 2023 carbon credits through the Climate Action Reserve, which is a respected offset registry. They set rigorous standards for measuring and verifying carbon emissions reductions.

We’re proud to partner with reductions projects that are not only significant but also have environmental integrity and transparency.

That's all for this update! As always, thank you for your support.
— the Wren team 🧡