Who actually owns the technology.
In gasification, the name on the project is rarely the name on the process. Most “gasification companies” are integrators or project developers licensing someone else’s reactor. For a buyer or a lender, the distinction is the difference between owning a plant that works and owning a contract with a company that may not exist next year.
§ Owners vs. integrators vs. operators
| Role | What they hold | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Technology owner | The process, reactor and IP they engineered themselves | MHI, Hitachi Zosen, Kobelco, Klean |
| Integrator / developer | A licence to package, build and run someone else’s process | EPC contractors, project developers |
| Operator | A contract to run a plant, often an incinerator | Veolia, Suez, Covanta/Reworld |
§ The ownership map
| Owner | Reactor | Feed | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hitachi Zosen (Kanadevia) | Pyrolysis-gasification & grate | MSW | Owned |
| Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHIEC) | Fluidised-bed gasification-melting & reforming | MSW | Owned |
| Nippon Steel Engineering | Shaft-furnace gasification-melting | MSW & mixed waste | Owned |
| Klean Industries | Continuous gasification-melting | Tires, plastics, shredder residue, WEEE, biomass | Owned |
| Kobelco Eco-Solutions | Fluidised-bed gasification-melting | MSW | Owned |
| Ebara | Fluidised-bed gasification & ash-melting | MSW, ASR, plastics | Owned |
| JFE Engineering | Shaft-furnace gasification-melting | MSW | Owned |
| Andritz | Fluidised-bed gasification (Carbona) | Biomass | Owned |
| Valmet | Biomass gasification | Biomass | Owned |
| Sierra Energy | FastOx partial-oxidation | MSW / RDF | Owned |
§ Why ownership clarity is the first filter
Several of gasification’s best-known names no longer own a viable business, and with them their technology’s future is unresolved: Enerkem (insolvency protection, 2025), EQTEC (going-concern doubt, pivoted to mining in 2026), the trio of waste-to-jet ventures — Fulcrum BioEnergy, Red Rock Biofuels and Velocys — all lost to bankruptcy, foreclosure or acquisition, and the Alter NRG / Westinghouse plasma platform (sold into a Chinese group after its Teesside scale-up failed). A buyer licensing from a company in distress inherits an orphaned process — nobody left to support the reactor line, no clear title to the IP. Every company in the top tier owns its own process and has operating references behind it. That combination, not the logo, is the safe bet.
Vetting the IP behind a gasification offer?
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