Dr Vlatko Materic
Founder and CEO, Hot Lime Labs

Biography

Dr Vlatko Materic is the Founder and CEO of Hot Lime Labs, a company developing systems to boost the yields of large-scale hydroponic greenhouses with CO2.

Hot Lime Labs technology allows recovering clean, renewable, CO2 from the combustion of wood and agri-waste which can then be released into the greenhouse to improve crop yields by 10-20%.The technology enables greenhouse growers to operate at optimal yields, increase food production while increasing the use of renewable fuels for heating/CO2 in the industry.

Vlatko had been researching and developing CO2 capture systems for power plants for over 10 years at Industrial Reseach Limited, the predecessor to Callaghan Innovation. The technology worked well but it turned out there was no economic driver for customers that could justify the costs of capturing CO2.

Fast forward a decade and Vlatko accidentally discovered the vast unmet demand for CO2 in the greenhouse industry, and quickly found that both technology and commercial drivers were well aligned.

This realisation led him to found Hot Lime Labs and lead the company from ideation to the commissioning the first prototype plant with a leading New Zealand commercial grower.

CO2 Capture Systems

Hot Lime Labs will discuss their system developed that extracts clean, safe CO2 from renewable biomass to increase greenhouse crop yields. The lower cost of operation compared with natural gas will allow commercially-viable high CO2 enrichment, improved grower margins and reduced carbon footprint.