Shares of bioplastics developer, Metabolix, Inc. (Nasdaq: MBLX) surged as much as 18 percent in morning trading on Wednesday after the company announced the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved its plastics products Mirel F1005 and F1006 for use in food contact applications.

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“With the Clinton plant now in operation, and this FDA clearance, we now can move forward with brand owners’ requests to use Mirel in their injection molded food packaging applications,” said Richard Eno, CEO of Metabolix in a statement. “These applications, which currently consume billions of pounds of petroleum-based polymers per year, offer considerable opportunity for growth of our biobased, biodegradable polymer, Mirel.”

Metabolix shares are up 54 percent over the past three months