Thursday, August 11, 2011

MOxST lands $6M to scale up lightweight metal for automakers

By Michelle Lang

Metal Oxygen Separation Technologies Inc. (MOxST) has won a $6 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy Vehicle Technologies Program to scale up the company’s MacGen1000 magnesium production process. New fuel efficiency standards, adopted by the Transportation Department and the Environmental Protection Agency in July, pointed to magnesium as a key metal to making lightweight vehicles with improved fuel efficiency.

MOxST said in a news release that the award will help it provide MagGen1000 equipment for three years at commercial pilot plant scale. MagGen1000 is the company’s process of making magnesium metal from readily available magnesium oxide.

According to the company, a car with 630 pounds of steel and aluminum may replace those parts with 340 pounds of magnesium alloys by 2020 and save up to two miles per gallon of fuel.

MOxST was co-founded in 2008 by MIT alum Steve Derezinski and Adam Powell. In June 2009, the company landed $100,000 in funding from the National Science Foundation, and it pulled in DOE awards totaling $1.1 million by May 2010, in addition to angel funding.

MOxST’s Derezinski told Mass High Tech last year that the company’s goal is to become a manufacturer of the capital equipment that will be used to produce the magnesium metal for autos.