With all due respect to Woody Guthrie and the Dropkick Murphys, sustainable technology firm Novomer Inc. is shipping up to Boston.
Novomer will move the 20 miles from its office in Waltham, Mass., to Boston on July 27. The new office is designed to meet the expanded demands of the company's growing bio-based chemicals business, officials said in a news release.
The larger office space will provide room to grow and more space for collaboration, they added. "This move is about access," CEO Jim Mahoney said. "Greater access to public transportation for our employees and the closer location to Boston Logan International Airport will make it more convenient for partners, customers, and vendors to visit Novomer headquarters."
Novomer is working to commercialize polypropylene carbonate resins and other competitively priced bio-based chemicals and polymers from ethanol and low-cost carbon monoxide. The firm's PPC technology was developed by researchers at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y.
In addition to its new headquarters, Novomer operates R&D facilities in Rochester, N.Y.
And of course "I'm Shipping Up to Boston" is the name of a swell tune written by folksinger Woody Guthrie. It's become a Boston sports anthem after being recorded in 2005 by Boston punk band Dropkick Murphys and featured over the opening credits of the 2006 movie The Departed.
In the song's lyrics, a sailor is returning to Boston to find his lost wooden leg. If that sailor wanders by the Novomer office, he'd find out that a PPC leg weighs less and would last longer, in addition to finding a good use for renewable carbon dioxide feedstocks.