Maine BioProducts - About Us

Paul Nace founded Maine BioProducts, LLC, a technology commercialization and project development company working to build biorefineries in Maine and throughout the Northeast. The company developed a detailed co-location strategy to capitalize on underutilized industrial assets to produce very cost effective cellulosic biofuels and chemicals utilizing the Biofine technology. He recently joined Biofine Technology, LLC as Chief Development Officer.

Mr. Nace is also the Founder and Chairman of Econox Technologies, LLC, a company that develops and licenses combustion efficiency technology. The company recently licensed its fuel flow rate modulation technology to Carlin Combustion Technology, Inc. which is employing it in manufacturing significantly more efficient residential oil burners. This effort has provided Mr. Nace an in depth knowledge of the heating oil industry.

Prior to his 10 year involvement in the energy sector, Mr. Nace spent 25 years as a commercial real estate developer specializing in health care related development, mixed use projects and projects in complicated regulatory environments. Until its sale, he was the managing general partner of BioSquare, a 900,000+/- square foot biotechnology research based, mixed use real estate joint venture in Boston. He worked for many years on projects with Hyatt Development Corporation and remains a partner in a hospitality oriented development company serving the northeast. Mr. Nace has developed or managed the development of over 3 million square feet of mixed use development throughout New England. Early in his career, Mr. Nace pioneered the private financing and development of facilities for the then new and hard-to-finance HMO’s by creatively leveraging available tax credit programs and public credit enhancements.

Mr. Nace was recently appointed by Governor Deval Patrick to the governing board of the Massachusetts Renewable Energy Trust. Earlier in his career, during the first administration of Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis, Mr. Nace joined state government as Director of Outer Continental Shelf Development while the Commonwealth was exploring offshore oil and gas development. The interest stimulated by this introduction to the energy field blossomed again in his recent endeavors. He later served as Chief Secretary to the Lieutenant Governor and as Commissioner of the Metropolitan District Commission. He served a seven year term on the Board of the Massachusetts Port Authority from 1985 - 1991. He also served as a presidential appointee to the Board of the Cape Cod National Seashore and was a Trustee of The New England Aquarium.

In the early 1970s, Mr. Nace was a partner in the political consulting firm Matt Reese and Associates which was at that time the largest such firm in the country. In that capacity he was involved in campaigns for public office at all levels from mayor to president throughout the United States and around the world. Some of his more notable clients include Senators Claiborne Pell, John Glenn, Harry Reid, Chris Dodd and John Kerry.

Mr. Nace served as a junior officer in the United States Navy aboard a destroyer in the Atlantic, Mediterranean and Caribbean, and with the Mobile Riverine Forces on the Mekong Delta, RVN.

He holds a Masters of Business Administration degree from the Columbia University Graduate School of Business and a Bachelor of Science degree in Biology from Boston College.

NORM MACINTYRE

Partner

Norman MacIntyre focuses on Engineering and Operations issues for Maine BioProducts, LLC in Maine. His responsibilities include initial biorefinery site evaluation and acting as liaison between Maine BioProducts and state and local agencies as well as supporting contractors implementing the initial biorefinery siting project.

Mr. MacIntyre is also Principal of MacIntyre Consulting, a business development consulting group that advises start-up and emerging technology companies. In this role he assists companies develop and implement growth-oriented business plans and market development strategies. He also assists with technology road mapping and team building. He assisted Biofine Renewables, LLC when the company relocated a biomass fuel pilot plant from New York State to Gorham, Maine.

Prior to joining the Maine BioProducts team, Mr. MacIntyre served as the first Director of the River Valley Technology Center, one of Maine’s technology-based small business incubators. In this role he was instrumental in bringing focus to disparate embryonic efforts pursuing various biomass-related alternative fuel technologies. From these, Maine BioProducts emerged as a high potential venture.

As a former Board Member and Chair of the Maine Technology Institute, Mr. MacIntyre is very familiar with the economic development climate in Maine and particularly the challenges facing start-up companies and emerging industry clusters.

Prior to coming to Maine, Mr. MacIntyre was the founding CEO of a venture-financed high technology defense start-up focused on borosilicate glasses used as corrosion resistant and microwave absorbent coatings. After the successful sale of that company to a major defense contractor, he served in senior manufacturing and operational roles with companies producing high technology products ranging from gradient amplifiers for magnetic resonance imaging equipment to aircraft engine components.

Mr. MacIntyre has a broad background in power systems of all sorts, including steam, gas turbine and diesel. He has designed combined cycle power systems and was the Principal Investigator for a Maritime Administration-sponsored analysis of different boiler combustion improvement schemes aboard steam-powered high speed container ships. He served in the US Navy as an engineering officer aboard destroyers and was a junior officer onboard the USS Barry during her celebrated service off the coast of South Vietnam in 1965 and 1966. He was designated an Engineering Duty Officer, the Navy’s term for specialists in ship design, construction and operation. He is a certified naval steam generating plant inspector.

Mr. MacIntyre holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Engineering from the US Naval Academy and a Master of Business Administration degree from Southern Illinois University.

STEVE FITZPATRICK

Partner

Dr. Fitzpatrick is inventor of the Biofine cellulose conversion process and Managing Director of Biofine Technology LLC – a company set up to commercialize the Biofine “bio-refining” Technology. He is also President of Biometics Incorporated in Waltham, MA., a consulting, engineering and construction company focused on the biotechnology industry.

Dr. Fitzpatrick is a chemical engineer with a wide range of experience in the biological, pharmaceutical, chemical and petrochemical process industries in a variety of functions involving R&D, consulting, technology development, plant design and operation and management. Dr. Fitzpatrick has published several papers and book chapters on subjects ranging from renewable energy to biological pharmaceutical production. In 1999 Dr. Fitzpatrick was awarded the prestigious Green Chemistry Award by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for his work in development of the Biofine process. Dr Fitzpatrick is also Adjunct Professor of Chemical and Environmental Engineering at the University of Limerick, Eire.

Dr. Fitzpatrick gained his doctorate at University of Manchester for carrying out original research into catabolite repression kinetics of secondary product formation in fungi. Dr. Fitzpatrick’s early industrial experience included development of enzyme-based washing powder formulations and small molecule chemical pharmaceuticals. Through his involvement with Biofine, he has become a leader in the development and implementation of economically sustainable industrial processes. He has primarily focused on renewable fuels and chemicals from both biological and chemical routes.

Dr. Fitzpatrick’s biotechnology consulting has involved recombinant DNA processes using bacterial, mammalian, viral, transgenic and tissue therapeutic protein sources. He has been involved in development of large scale bioreactor technology and production scale chromatographic methods for purification of biochemicals, proteins and live virus. He has experience in bacterial fermentation based process optimization via computer modeling. He has developed, designed and optimized specific steps in the process surrounding chaotrope extraction and protein refolding. He has developed and designed processes involving a variety of mammalian cell types, including: human fibroblasts, human fetal kidney cells, various dendritic cell lines, hybridomas, CHO cells, and mouse 3T3 cells. Additionally, he has scaled up and designed processes for human tissue growth, human RBC decontamination, and cell/tissue processing for autologous,allogeneic, and xenogeneic transplantation.