Agriculture your username April 5, 2021 Kurita America Inc., a Minnesota corporation, claimed in a Northern District of Illinois complaint on Thursday that BASF sells products that use its patented technology used for preventing and clearing build-up on machines that turn crops into ethanol. Kurita America, which was formerly called U.S. Water Services Inc., explained in the complaint that it sells water treatment and purification equipment and that much of its business includes selling products to ethanol plants. The technology involved in the lawsuit deals with “fouling,” a term for the build-up of deposits on equipment that is used to process ethanol. The fouling reportedly causes the machine to be less efficient because it prevents some heat transfers.