After 18 months of design and construction, Iowa State University on Wednesday will dedicate a new pilot plant facility to produce bio-polymers from soybean oil. The new $5.3 million Bio-Polymer Processing Facility is located at Iowa State’s BioCentury Research Farm just west of Ames. The facility was built by Argo Genesis Chemical LLC, a sister company to Seneca Petroleum Co. Inc. of Crestwood, Ill. The facility was turned over to Iowa State University on July 31. The goal of the facility is to lower the risk for companies that want to eventually replace petroleum-based polymers in their asphalt paving products to asphalt with biorenewable polymers. To read an ISU story on the project, click here. To read a related Business Record article on bioplastics, click here.