Kelowna company gets $3.8 million boost for green technology

A Kelowna-based company that turns non-wood fibre into pulp has been given a major boost.

Red Leaf Pulp received $3.8 million in funding from Sustainable Development Technology Canada, a federal foundation supporting companies that create technology that can solve some of the planets most pressing environmental challenges.

“Innovative clean technologies are good for the economy and critical to solving the twin crises of climate change and nature loss,” Minister of Natural Resources Jonathan Wilkinson announced Thursday said in a press release.

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“Kelowna’s own Red Leaf Pulp is demonstrating this, using agricultural by-products with no previous end-use as inputs for their products, creating value where there was none and turning organic matter into recyclable products.”

The company has developed a process for turning agricultural residues, like wheat straw, into high-quality cellulose pulp, which can be used in recyclable consumer products like packaging, moulded cups and plates, tissues and towels, and printing and writing paper.

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“Red Leaf Pulp’s technology enhances the utilization of existing annual feedstocks by optimally converting agricultural residues into a fully sustainable pulp product for tissue, packaging and moulded product suppliers,” explained Martin Pudlas, CEO of Red Leaf Pulp.

“This funding is allowing us to gain momentum in the global pulp marketplace while supporting Canada’s agricultural sector by providing growers with diversified revenue from existing crops.”

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This environmentally conscious pulping method is being touted as a “game-changer in the paper industry.”  In addition to conserving Canada’s forests, which are a vital stabilizing force for the global climate. Red Leaf Pulp will soon open its first operating plant in Saskatchewan, where it will use wheat straw with no previous high-value end-use as the raw material to produce pulp.

Clean technology companies currently employ more than 211,000 Canadian workers.