What if we could convert waste into fuel? What would it mean for our future? Genus Bioenergy, based in Skokie, Illinois and led by F. Lee Simmons, is using Stochiometric Decomposition Recombination (SDR) technology to simultaneously create clean energy and jobs. Genus Bioenergy is a company that provides waste management solutions and offers resource recovery, remote secure system communications, and agricultural services. Its Stoichiometric Decomposition and Recombination nanotechnology is used for the conversion of waste in a modular compact system that delivers sustainable solutions for fuel, energy, electricity, telecommunications, organic plant-based nutrients, soil regeneration, and production of potable water and desalination.

From Sub-micron to Nanotechnology

Simmons has been a nanotechnology pioneer for years. He worked in industrial research labs at Northwestern University and in engineering with sub-micron technology, on everything from thermal barrier coatings to jet engines. As Simmons’s work went from sub-micron to nanotechnology, he saw it as a renaissance period; corporations wanted to see what nanotechnology was and could do and researchers wanted to know what issues corporate America faced.

During the George W. Bush Administration, Simmons worked in a group of scientists striving to use nanotechnology to help America save lives. One of the technologies Simmons developed at this time was a way to decompose harmful chemicals like Anthrax, which can be spread through ventilation systems, with the goal being to convert these harmful chemicals to benign or harmless states. Under the Obama administration, Simmons was tasked with creating a device that could deliver soldiers fuel while in the desert. He took the technology he previously developed and accelerated it to see how he could sufficiently separate the constituents of waste and produce something that was usable for these military bases abroad.

Simmons and his group of engineers took this technology and created Genus Bioenergy. The team is made up of 35 people who also work at universities including Alcorn State, Ohio State University, and North Carolina State. Simmons’s goal is to “to provide sustainable, uninterrupted continuous net zero CO2 energy generation, biomass conversion and reduction in water scarcity.”

From Waste to Fuel, Aiding Low-Income Countries

Simmons is excited about this technology and its ability to improve communities and the lives of millions. Genus Bioenergy has a generous grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and has applied for international aid grants to help Bioenergy grow as they begin partnering with the governments of Rwanda, Ghana, Libya, and Nigeria to turn waste into clean energy. Specifically, these countries are interested in the removal of hydrocarbons from their water. The SDR technology cannot only clean the water by separating out the hydrocarbons but can also turn the hydrocarbons into propane or other fuel.

Genus Bioenergy’s innovative SDR technology can create sustainable fuel, energy, and potable water using the process of stoichiometric decomposition and recombination of molecular substances. This process allows the rapid liberation of constituents such as hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, and carbon from biomass, raw sewage, manure waste lagoons, digesters, brackish water, and hydrocarbons, which then recombine the constituents to produce potable water (H2O), CH4, diesel fuel, jet fuel, and fertilizer without using electrolysis or reverse osmosis process methods.

The SDR technology is remarkable, but it does not stop there. Genus Bioenergy has an education and revenue sharing model that they make available to the communities using their products. Genus Bioenergy does not sell the SDR technology. Instead, they set up operations within 5-7 days and they teach those in the community how to run it. Genus Bioenergy is also sharing profits with communities. When a community signs up to give a certain amount of waste to Genus per year, and that waste is turned into hydrogen, fuel or even electricity, Genus then sells this output to others and shares the profits with the community that provided the waste.

Their dual system can convert a waste stream inputting 48 tons of waste into an output of 2 megawatts of power per hour. To put that into perspective, a 2-megawatt wind turbine can provide electricity to about 400 homes. Genus Bioenergy is even able to help set up proper infrastructure for communities to use the SDR technology and system only needs a space of about 10,000 square feet. Countries can use Genus Bioenergy to help build the grid necessary to use the output that the SDR is creating.

Simmons’s technology does not release greenhouse gasses and only creates clean energy. With Simmons at helm, Bioenergy is focused on improving the world by creating clean energy and jobs.

F. Lee Simmons is a member of the USGLC Illinois Advisory Committee.