Megan Tatum: From MIT Technology Review, I’m Megan Tatum. This is Business Lab, the show that helps business leaders make sense of new technologies coming out of the lab and into the marketplace.
Today’s episode is brought to you in partnership with the Michigan Economic Development Corporation.
Our topic today is launching a technology startup in the US state of Michigan. Building out an innovative idea into a viable product and company requires knowledge and resources that individuals might not have. That’s why the Michigan Economic Development Corporation, or the MEDC, has launched an innovation campaign to support technology entrepreneurs.
Two words for you: startup ecosystem.
My guest is Dr. Denise Kay, the co-founder and CEO at Enspired Solutions, a Michigan-based startup focused on removing synthetic forever chemicals called PFAS from water.
Welcome, Denise.
Dr. Denise Kay: Hi, Megan.
Megan: Hi. Thank you so much for joining us. To get us started, Denise, I wondered if we could talk about Enspired Solutions a bit more. How did the idea come about, and what does your company do?
Denise: Well, my co-founder, Meng, and I had careers in consulting, advising clients on the fate and toxicity of chemicals in the environment. What we did was evaluate how chemicals moved through soil, water, and air, and what toxic impact they might have on humans and wildlife. That put us in a really unique position to see early on the environmental and health ramifications of the manmade chemical PFAS in our environment.
When we learned of a very novel and elegant chemistry that could effectively destroy PFAS, we could foresee the value in making this chemistry available for commercial use and the potential for a significant positive impact on maintaining healthy water resources for all of us.
Like you mentioned, PFAS is referred to as a forever chemical because it is so resistant to break down. It does not break down naturally in the environment, so it just circles around and around. This chemistry, which would break that cycle and break the molecule apart, could really support the health of all of us.
Ultimately, Meng and I quit our jobs, and we founded Enspired Solutions. Our objective was to design, manufacture, and sell commercial-scale equipment that destroys PFAS in water based on this laboratory bench-scale chemistry that had been discovered, the goal being that this toxic contaminant does not continue to circulate in our natural resources.
At this point, we have won an award from the EPA and Department of Defense, and proven our technology in over 200 different water samples ranging from groundwater, surface water, landfill leachate, industrial wastewater, [and] municipal wastewater. It’s really everywhere. What we’re seeing traction in right now is customer applications managing semiconductor waste. Groundwater and surface water around airports tend to be high in PFAS. Centralized waste disposal facilities that collect and manage PFAS-contaminated liquids. And also, even transitioning firetrucks to PFAS-free firefighting foams.
Megan: Fantastic. That’s a huge breadth of applications, incredible stuff.
Denise: Yeah.