July 2011 Archives

This week is definitely a killer when it comes to press announcements and it is not even Friday yet!

Codexis just announced an hour ago their detergent alcohols collaboration deal with technology and engineering firm Chemtex, a company owned by Italy's Gruppo Mossi & Ghisolfi (the same company that has a bio-butanediol collaboration with Genomatica).

The companies will develop and produce second generation detergent alcohols trademarked CodeXol made from cellulosic biomass. Readers might recalled the blog's post in March about Codexis' development in this sector.

Under the deal, Codexis will develop proprietary enzymes for use with Chemtex's PROESA pre-treatment technology. Chemtex will also provide design and engineering services for future commercial facilities. Codexis will have exclusive rights to PROESA technology for the production of detergent alcohols. Codexis will also market the products resulting from the collaboration.

 The companies said they expect to have a pilot production of the cellulosic-based alcohols in Chemtex's R&D facility in Rivalta, Italy, and scale it up to demo capacity level using Chemtex's 40,000 tonne/year cellulosic ethanol plant currently being built in Crescentino, Italy, which will be operational next year.

Chemtex's R&D facility is definitely getting crowded with Genomatica's bio-BDO and now with detergent alcohols.

Codexis' announcement coincide with the company's second quarter earnings result where revenues for the quarter was up 6% from $24.5m reported in Q2 2010. Collaborative R&D revenue of $2.5m was reportedly up by 198% compared to a year ago driven mainly by funded research in Codexis' carbon capture program.

I'm not really good at reporting earnings so I'll leave it to financial experts.

Another interesting news from the earnings press release, however, is Shell said to be shifting its focus from diesel fuel program into the cellulosic ethanol program. There's some sort of resource allocation mentioned but I have no idea what that means.

Another worth mentioning is the hiring of Pedro Mizutani, a current Raizen official to Codexis' Board of Directors. Raizen - Codexis' largest stockholder -- is the biofuels joint venture between Shell and Brazilian sugar/ethanol company Cosan.

I will check tomorrow if some of the analysts covering Codexis will put out juicy details from their earnings conference call.

Last post for the day, I hope, as I have to write an article about Mitsubishi Chemical's bio-chemicals strategies for ICIS Chemical Business' August 15 issue.

This one is all about Amyris' various activities this week. I must say I'm really impressed with their media relations department (and press agency) as the company churned out 4 press releases within two days.

First is the company's announcement of a commissioning of its second industrial-scale Biofene facility this time in Leon, Spain, owned by Antibioticos S.A. Amyris is already producing its Biofene molecule in Piracicaba, Brazil, owned by Biomin do Brasil Nutricao Animal Ltda.

As usual no fermentation capacity was disclosed although according to Antibioticos' website, which is one of the top penicillin producers in Europe, its Leon facility had 3.2m liter total fermentation capacity and 600,000 liter total chemical capacity.

Amyris currently has 5 production agreements in place worldwide including contract manufacturing with Antibioticos, Biomin, Paraiso Bioenergia Ltda., Tate & Lyle Ingredients Americas, and a joint venture with Brazilian sugar and ethanol producer Usina Sao Martinho.

Amyris has also established chemical finishing capabilities under a production agreement with Glycotech, Inc.

The second facility will definitely come in handy as according to Amyris, it has expanded its collaboration with Swiss company Firmenich for the development of a third ingredient targeting the flavors and fragrances market. Amyris said it has delivered the development of the first ingredient well ahead of schedule, and it expects to begin working on the second ingredient on schedule.

Don't you just love the vagueness of their press releases?  ;-). I remembered covering the essential oils market a long time ago and getting information from flavors and fragrances companies is like pulling teeth, very painful...

The companies did say that Amyris will manufacture and supply the ingredients to Firmenich, while Firmenich will handle the marketing and distribution exclusively to the flavors and fragrances market. Both parties will share the economic fruits of this collaboration.

Amyris also has a collaboration deal with another Swiss flavors and fragrance producer Givaudan, which the company announced in February. Givaudan is developing another derivative of Biofene as a building block for its fragrance ingredient. Givaudan expects to market and distribute the final product as early as 2012.

In terms of Amyris' biofuel projects, the company announced last week that it will begin supplying renewable diesel (which they locally called Diesel do Cana) to 160 city buses in Sao Paulo, Brazil, starting August, and another 20 city buses in Rio de Janeiro for a 12-month fleet test.

The Sao Paulo buses will run on a blend of 10% renewable diesel with a supply contract ending in 2012. The renewable diesel for the Rio de Janeiro buses will be blended at a 30% rate with petroleum-based diesel.

Amyris also announced this week that Boeing, commercial jet manufacturer Embraer S.A., and the Inter-American Development Bank will jointly fund a sustainability analysis of producing renewable jet fuel (by Amyris) from Brazilian sugarcane. The study, scheduled for completion in early 2012, will be led by ICONE, a research think-tank in Brazil and independently reviewed by World Wildlife Fund (WWF).

The study will include a complete lifecycle analysis of the emissions associated with Amyris's renewable jet fuel, including indirect land use change and effects. It will also include benchmarking of cane-derived renewable jet fuel against major sustainability standards, including the Bonsucro (formerly known as the Better Sugarcane initiative), the Roundtable on Sustainable Biofuels and the IDB Biofuel Scorecard.

Speaking of Bonsucro, the European Commission announced last week that its certification on sustainable production of sugarcane has reportedly been recognized by the European Union along with seven other EU certification schemes for biofuels. The certification schemes are said to provide guarantees on the environmental sustainability of biofuels that will be used in 27 EU member states.

Gevo is at full speed ahead for the development and commercialization of downstream products coming from its bio-isobutanol.

The company announced on Tuesday its agreement with Texas-based Arabian American Development Co. to build a hydrocarbon demonstration plant in Silsbee, Texas owned by its specialty petrochemicals subsidiary South Hampton Resources (SHR) Inc. According to SHR's website, the company accounts for 60% of North America's C5 solvents market.

The demo plant will process up to 10,000 gallons/month of Gevo's isobutanol into a variety of products such as jet fuel (for engine testing), isooctane for gasoline, isooctene and paraxylene for PET (polyethylene terepthalate). The products will be supplied to potential customers for evaluation and product qualification.

The demo facility is expected to be complete this year and the 2-year contract between two companies will have one-year extensions thereafter.

The blog will check again with Gevo next week after its second quarter earnings announcement.

[Photo of SHR's facility in Silsbee, Texas]

I like this photo of Croda Inc.'s new 305 kilowatt solar panel system installed at its Edison, New Jersey, US facility.  The system is anticipated to provide more than 50% of the power required for the facility, which is equivalent to powering 42 average sized homes or saving over 27,500 gal/year of gasoline, according to the company.

Croda said this is the first solar panel system installed at any of Croda's facilities worldwide.

"Croda is committed to being a responsible and ethical organization, and we have a global goal of obtaining 25% of our energy from non-fossil sources by the end of 2015," commented Kevin Gallagher, President of Croda Inc.

Mercury Solar Systems engineered, designed and installed the system and EnterSolar of Newark, NJ was the project developer.

Metabolix announced yesterday that it will form a joint development deal for its polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHA)-based C4 chemicals -- initially butanediol (BDO), tetrahydrofuran (THF), gamma butyrolactone (GBL) and polyester engineering resins (PBT) -- with Korea-based industrial biotechnology company CJ CheilJedang.

The blog posted in March about Metabolix's development in this area where the company said it was aiming to deliver product samples of its biobased C4s to potential customers before the end of the first quarter this year.

In its second quarter earnings report yesterday, Metabolix said it received favorable feedback on the biobased C4 samples provided to targeted customers. The company anticipates further sample shipments in the third quarter.

Under the non-exclusive joint development agreement, CJ will contribute fermentation assets and expertise to produce pilot quantities of dried whole fermentation broth containing raw C4 chemicals whole Metabolix will continue development of microbial strains and scale-up of its FAST recovery process -- said to be a low-cost, energy-efficient technology that recovers high-purity renewable chems directly from dried whole fermentation broth -- to produce the biobased C4.

The companies will also develop a detailed market and economic analysis as they assess investment options to commercialize the chemicals.CJ's division, CJ BIO currently operates global-scale fermentation facilities in China, Indonesia and Brazil producing a range of amino acids and nucleotides.

Metabolix said the C4 processing technology will be ready for commercial plant design by the end of this year. The companies are looking to potentially integrate Metabolix's processing technology into CJ's existing fermentation sites as well as in possible new sites.

Speaking of earnings, Metabolix reported a net loss of $10m for the Q2 2011 compared to a net loss of $9.5m in Q1 although the company said it continues to have no long-term debt. Q2 revenue was $200,000 versus $100,000 in Q2 last year.

In its bioplastic joint venture, Telles, with Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), Metabolix noted that its Mirel PHA-based bioplastic continues to expand in both Europe and the US primarily in the film and bag markets. Telles just announced on Tuesday that it has partnered with Sweden-based Tenova Bioplastics to launch new commercial line of biobased film solutions across Europe using Mirel P5001, a compostable, bio-based film grade resin for compostable bags and packaging.

Telles also announced its partnership with US-based Cortec Corporation for a new line of film products using Mirel P5001 film grade resin. Cortex is said to be launching EcoOcean for marine biodegradable markets, and Eco Works AD, which is designed to meet demands of anaerobic digestion systems.

Cortec's new biodegrable films will be available in more than 70 countries worldwide. Metabolix also noted during its earnings conference call that Telles has at least 50 active customers and that at least 15 of Telles' trial customers are taking repeat orders of Mirel.

As for Metabolix's C3 program (particularly bio-acrylics), the company said it is in early stage discussions with potential partners.

Footnote:
Speaking of PHA resins, US-based bio-resin manufacturer DaniMer Scientific reportedly begun production of PHA-based hot melt adhesives (said to be the first of its kind in the world) and plans to ramp up commercial volumes by October, according to an article from PlasticsNews.com.

DaniMer announced its plans at the Bioplastek 2011 conference in New York in late June. DaniMer and its sister company Meredian are said to be retrofitting an existing plant in Bainbridge, Georgia, for a pilot plant to produce 30m pounds/year of PHA resins. 

The pilot plant is expected to start next year and that Meredian is reportedly planning to construct a 200m lb/year PHA plant at the Bainbridge site as well by the fourth quarter of 2012. Meredian plans to have a PHA production capacity of 630m lbs/year in 2016.

Their target PHA price is $1/lb, according to the article, compared to the current $2.5/lb. One big difference about their PHA, according to Meredian, is that their feedstock is based on fatty acids and not sugar.

My colleague Andy Brice had a recent interview (ICIS subscription only) with Metabolix and the company pointed out that for its entry level products (especially biobased chemicals) to generate attractive returns, oil prices needed to be above $60-70/bbl, and $80-90/bbl for the larger-volume materials. The company said it is working aggressively to drive competitiveness at even lower oil prices.

No comments however on the Meredian PHA price points.

As mentioned in the blog yesterday, Shanghai, China-based bio-butanol producer Cathay Industrial Biotech filed an S-1 form last week with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) hoping to raise up to $200m in an initial public offering (IPO) on the NASDAQ stock exchange.

I can't explain the company's corporate structure but maybe this diagram will help:

Cathay Industrial Bio currently produces corn-based n-butanol for chemical applications at its 100,000 tonnes/year biorefinery in Jilin Province, China. The facility, which uses the acetone-butanol-ethanol (ABE) fermentation route, started production in 2009 of about 65-70% butanol, 20-25% acetone and 5-10% ethanol.

The company claimed to be the world's largest bio-butanol producer based on active production capacity this year (backed by report from consulting firm CMAI). It's n-butanol is currently used as an industrial solvent and as a chemical intermediates for the production of paints, resins, coatings, plasticizers, herbicides, pharmaceuticals and food grade extractants.

The blog also previously mentioned the company's bio-dibasic and dicarboxylic acid businesses via fermentation of paraffins. In its S-1 form, the company said they are producing long chain diacids (LCDAs) at its13,500  tonnes/year facility in Shandong Province, China. The facility is expected to increase production to 15,000 tonnes/year by the end of 2011, and 20,000 tonnes/year by the end of 2012.

Their LCDAs, which are used as chemical intermediates primarily for the production of nylon, plastics, adhesives, fragrances, lubricant and powder coatings are reportedly sold to a broad base of customers that includes Du Pont, Evonik Industries, International Flavors & Fragrances (IFF), Arkema, Novo Nordisk A/S, and major China-based companies. (Pretty impressive resume here...).

The company also intends to produce LCDAs using vegetable oil and bio-based oil although the S-1 reported risks in economics and regulatory factors for sourcing vegetable oil, while "there are currently only a limited number of suppliers who have the capability to produce bio-based oils and they may not be able to meet our quality, quantity and cost requirements."

As for competitors in the LCDA sector, the company cited US-based Invista; Germany-based Evonik and Japan-based Ube Industries (all petro-based LCDAs). Cathay Industrial Bio also reportedly competes with China-based LCDA producers who also use bioprocess similar to theirs.

Check out the S-1 filing for more on the LCDA market. Butadiene is said to be the feedstock for petroleum-based LCDA, and the blog's readers already know how tight the butadiene market is right now.

Interestingly enough, sebacic acid (or decanedioic acid) was also noted as one of Cathay Industrial Bio's products. Sebacic acid is used in several low volume applications such as polyamides, plasticizers, adhesives, lubricants and cosmetics and more than 90% are produced in China. I've covered sebacic acid before as the raw material is based on castor oil.

BUTANOL MARKET OVERVIEW

Returning to bio-butanol, the company expects to begin pilot stage testing of a biomass-based n-butanol production (using corn cobs and corn stover) by the end of 2011, adjacent to its current biobutanol production. Cathay Industrial Bio plans to expand its biobutanol (and co-products) manufacturing facility to 200,000 tonnes/year - 130,000 tonnes/year specifically for biobutanol - in the future.

N-butanol, by the way, is a little different from Gevo's/Butamax's isobutanol although both can be used for fuel (according to Cathay Industrial Bio). Other biobased n-butanol producers/developers include Cobalt Technologies, TetraVitae Bioscience, METabolic EXplorer, Green Biologics and Jilin Jian New Energy Group, according to the S-1 filing.

Here are some nice graphics from the S-1 filing about the butanol market in general.

The S-1 Filing also noted China's butanol market where it is said to be the largest worldwide with a capacity of 1.047m tonnes in 2010 compared to 525,000 tonnes in 2005. According to consulting firm Nexant, demand for butanol in China is expected to grow to 1.35m tonnes in 2015. Effective butanol production capacity in China last year was 550,000 tonnes.

I'm trying to find out why the production is so low but one thought that pops in my mind is because of the energy/electricity issue last year in China which led to several manufacturing facilities across China cutting down operating rates.

By the way, Cathay Industrial Bio also noted this risks in their S-1:

"We use a significant amount of utilities such as electricity, steam and water during our production processes. The cogeneration plant at our biobutanol production facility is operated by us, and we purchase coal to operate this plant, whereas the cogeneration plant at our LCDA production facility is owned and operated by a local utility company. We cannot assure you that we will not experience supply disruptions for electricity, steam or water. We may also require increased supplies of electricity, steam and water due to increasing production activities and may not be able to obtain such increased supplies.  Coal prices have also increased significantly in recent years. Continued increases in utility prices or shortages of utility supplies will increase our costs of production and may materially and adversely affect our results of operations."

So back to the butanol market, China is said to be a current net importer of butanol and is expected to continue to remain so through 2015. More than 70% of the current petroleum-based n-butanol's cash cost is related to propylene pricing, hence Chinese n-butanol and propylene prices are highly correlated, according to the company.

I've been checking out ICIS Pricing's reports on Chinese n-butanol and current price is in the range of $2,020/tonne ex-tank, south China compared to last year's $1,697/tonne (of course, you have to factor in currency exchange values). Domestic prices for n-butanol in China are actually going down a bit because of weak demand from downstream butyl acrylate (BA) and butyl acetate (BAC) markets.

CATHAY'S INDUSTRIAL BIO BIZ

So back to Cathay Industrial Bio, the company said its industrial biotech platform integrates strain development, fermentation scale-up and purification. In the biobutanol product, the company uses corn starch instead of dry milled whole corn, which acccording to them:

"..allows us to efficiently capture all co- and by-products produced during the bioprocess including co-products bioacetone and bioethanol, and corn and biogas by-products, thereby reducing production costs and capturing additional revenues"

In cellulosic biomass feedstock, the company said it has developed a proprietary inhibitor tolerant strain that is able to use crude biomass hydrolysate as feedstock (no idea what this means, sorry...). Cathay Industrial Bio also did not mention when they will specifically start commercialization of cellulosic-based n-butanol, which the company said, will enable them to reduce production costs and therefore could lead them to enter the biofuels market as well.

However, the company said they historically been able to complete lab testing in 3-6 months, pilot plant testing in 3-4 months and commercial production engineering in 9-12 months.

In terms of China's cellulosic biomass industry, Jilin Province in northeast China reportedly produced around 18m tonnes of corn in 2010. Corncobs are collected in Jilin Province on a commercial scale for cellulosic biomass based production of xylose, an intermediate of xylitol, a sweetener, and furfural, a specialty chemical intermediate.

"As such, we have ready access to established infrastructure and logistics for the collection, storage and handling of corncobs near our biobutanol production facility in Jilin Province. Based on our technology parameters as of March 31, 2011, we expect to require less than 0.7 million metric tons of cellulosic biomass if we produced 100,000 metric tons of ABE from cellulosic biomass in our production facility in Jilin Province, which represents approximately 3.9% of the cellulosic biomass produced in Jilin Province in 2010, assuming one ton of cellulosic biomass is produced for every ton of corn."

There are a lot more interesting information on both bio-butanol and renewable based LCDAs which you can read in the S-1 filing.

So in conclusion after all these wonderful information, the company plans to use the proceeds for the IPO to further develop, commercialize and expand its biobutanol; construct a facility for the commercialization of I+G (Disodium Inosine-5′-monophosphate and Disodium Guanosine-5′-monophosphate - a food flavor enhancer that complements monosodium glutamate); expand production capacity for LCDAs; and expand/strengthen other R&D infrastructure and activities.

Morgan Stanley, Deutsche Bank Securities, and Jefferies & Co. are the lead underwriters on the deal.

Another renewable-based chemical company, this time based in China, entered the IPO scene. Bio-butanol producer Cathay Industrial Biotech filed an initial public offering with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on July 19 aiming to raise up to $200m.

The company plans to list on the NASDAQ under the symbol CBIO. We will post more about the company, which the blog covered before. I'm not sure we can talk to Cathay Industrial Bio's VP Paul Caswell again during its IPO period but I'm sure the S-1 filing will bring a lot of information.

In the meantime, here are this week's news roundup:

Amyris' subsidiary Amyris Brasil will begin supplying sugarcane-based diesel to 160 city buses in Sao Paulo, Brazil. the buses will run on a blend of 10% renewable diesel starting August. The supply contract runs through the end of 2012. Amyris said it expects to achieve $10-12m in annual diesel sales.

Elevance raises $50m in private offering
Elevance Renewable Sciences has raised $50m in private offering as reported in a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. The company declined to say what it plans to do with the money.

UK-based plastic bottler recycler ECO Plastics has raised GBP 24m ($39m) to help finance its expansion plans at its Hemswell recycling facility. The funds will support the construction and operation of an expansion to ECO Plastics' existing plastics processing plant, as well as the investment required to build and operate the Joint Venture business that will supply rPET to Coca-Cola Enterprises over the next ten years.

Japan-based Toray Industries established its Green Innovation business in fibers and textiles division, which will integrate the functions of the polylactic acid fibers business management and marketing as well as that of fibers and textiles recycling business. The new business will focus on warm and cool materials that assist energy-saving efforts and 3GT and PLA based on biomass as well as acceleration of development and commercialization of new products.

Showa Denko expands Li-ion materials capacity
Japan-based Showa Denko (SDK) will expand its production capacities for materials used in lithium-ion rechargeable batteries namely, artificial graphite-based anode material (SCMG), additive in anodes and cathodes (VGCF) and aluminum laminated films for packaging. SDK will expand the capacity of its SCMG™ plant at Omachi, Nagano Prefecture, by stages from 1,000 tons/year to 3,000 tons/year by the middle of 2012 through debottlenecking. As for VGCF™, SDK will add a new production line at its Kawasaki Plant, Kanagawa Prefecture, increasing the production capacity from 100 tons/year to 200 tons/year by the beginning of 2012.

US-based Metabolix expects significant interest and investment in bio-based materials over the coming years as players continue to struggle with volatile oil prices, the company's CEO and president Richard Eno.

Synthos is confident its newly-formed strategic partnership with French industrial biology company Global Bioenergies will allow it to start pilot production of bio-butadiene within three years.

Plastic bag bans in Brazil spark debate.

The Dow Chemical-Mitsui biopolymers joint venture has created a lot of buzz in the chemical, renewables and business communities given that:
a) this is Dow's biggest investment in Brazil (even though the company did not disclose any financial info),  
b) this is Dow's biggest and largest investment in renewables,  
c) this follows the previous Dow-Crystalsev biopolymers collaboration that fell through, and  
d) Braskem's green polyethylene investments are getting successful (according to Braskem).

According to Dow's press release, the JV (pending regulatory approval) will operate a sugarcane plantation, build a sugarcane-to-ethanol facility and then all of these will be integrated into a biopolymers facility producing sugarcane-based polyethylene plastics for use in high-performance flexible packaging, hygiene and medical markets.

Mitsui will acquire a 50% stake in Dow's 100% subsidiary Santa Vitória Açúcar e Álcool Ltda ("SVAA") with initial investment of $200m. Dow already grows sugarcane on around 42,000 acres in Brazil. The JV could also expand to other sugarcane-derived chemicals aside from plastics, according to Mitsui's press release.

The blog has been able to get information from Dow spokesman Greg Baldwin who said that the biopolymer products will be mostly linear low density polyethylene (LLDPE) and high density polyethylene (HDPE).

The first phase of the project includes the construction of a new sugarcane-to-ethanol production facility with a capacity of 63m gal/year (240m liters/year) in Santa Vitória, Minas Gerais. Construction is expected to commence in the third quarter of 2011.

Baldwin said engineering and design assessments for the ethanol to ethylene and polyethylene production facilities are expected to commence in the second half of 2011, and construction is expected to begin in 2012 although he did not disclose when the biopolymer facility will start production. Several news reports indicate around 2013.

Dow Chemical also did not disclose how much capacity the biopolymer facility will have but said that it will be a "world-scale plant." According to several news reports, capacity could be around 350,000 tonnes/year - the same as the original plans from the Dow-Crystalsev announcement in 2007.

The blog, of course asked Dow about this, and the company refused to comment.

When asked how the JV expects to compete against Braskem, which is already producing sugarcane-based PE at its 200,000 tonne/year plant in Rio Grande do Sul since late last year, Dow's Baldwin said there is plenty of market for biopolymers "where consumers are more and more turning to sustainable solutions."

Not to mention that Dow's planned biopolymers facility will be back integrated into sugarcane ethanol production unlike Brazil's current green PE facility.

Braskem, however, is also planning to build a world-scale green PE plant that will be fully integrated into sugarcane ethanol facility, according to an ICIS news article in April (subscription only).

Braskem's second green PE facility could be completed by late 2014 to 2015 with a capacity in the range of 900m lbs/year (408,000 tonnes/year).The facility will likely be in the middle of a large sugarcane field, according to Braskem.

[Photo from Dow Chemical]

I wrote an article (subscription only) for ICIS Chemical Business (published on June 6) about the increasing development of recycled plastics being used as energy source or alternative chemical feedstock. Companies included in the article are Dow Chemical, Agilyx, JBI Global, and comments from the American Chemistry Council's Steve Russell, VP of the ACC plastics division.

Dow Chemical announced on May 23 that  it was able to successfully recovered 96% of available energy - an equivalent to 11.1 million Btu's of natural gas - after incinerating 578 pounds of used plastic (linear low density polyethylene scraps) in a kiln at one of dow's waste treatment facilities. Dow's plastics sustainability leader Jeff Wooster said that the project started in 2010.

"The project began after value chain partners expressed interest in how energy recovery for plastics could help them capture the embedded energy value in their products. The results of the trial provide a better understanding and first-hand knowledge of how plastics can be used for energy recovery." - Wooster

Dow said it is studying opportunities for this technology and will be conducting additional trials to learn more.

"There are two types of companies that could benefit from this technology. One is large energy users such as cement kilns. The second type of company is one that has plastics with recoverable value that can't be recycled. The ideal situation would be when both companies collaborate." - Wooster

Speaking of Dow Chemical, I just received new information about their recently announced Dow-Mitsui bioplastic joint venture, which I will post separately.

Back to waste plastics, Brazilian chemical company Braskem actually announced today that it has invested Reais (R$)25m (about $16.1m) to help build a plastic recycling unit in Bahia owned by Novaenergia. The recycling plant will initially produce 1.4m liters/year of naphtha, which Braskem will use as chemical feedstock for its basic petrochemicals units in the Camacari Complex.

Braskem said the recycling plant will process 450 tons of waste/day, For every 36 tons of waste, 30,000 liters/day of light oil will be produced to be used by Braskem to make naphtha as well as fuel oil and diesel oil with low sulfur content.

Startup of the recycling plant is expected by the end of 2012.

In my ICB article, ACC's Russell noted increasing use and development of innovative energy-recovery technologies but unfortunately the US is still lagging behind Europe and Asia in the use of these technologies.

US consulting firm 4R Sustainability published a report in April (which was funded by the ACC) about the progress of plastic-to-fuel technology developments in North America. According to the report, there are 86 waste-to-energy facilities in North America that process nearly 30 million tons/year of solid waste, recovering enough energy to power 2 million homes and enough to save the equivalent of 30 million barrels/year of oil.

"The opportunities for tapping into the embodied energy of non-recycled plastics are tremendous. Industrial scrap and municipal solid waste are cost-effective, abundant sources of energy for businesses or communities," said ACC's Russell.

According to the ACC, the US is lagging behind because other countries incorporate these in their laws and regulations, and that the cost of landfilling waste is much less expensive in the US compared to other countries.

"We are optimistic that energy recovery - including WTE and newer conversion technologies, such as plastics-to-fuel - will catch on in the United States." - ACC

The report identified 25 companies in the US currently dealing with plastic-to-fuel technologies which were mostly using pyrolysis (where plastic waste goes through thermal treatment and sometimes pressure before being converted into a fuel product).

Agilyx is one example where the company is already processing recycled plastics to crude oil at its Oregon facility. Here is a video that I got from them, which was just uploaded by the company a week ago:

Other waste conversion technologies include incineration (as used by Dow), gasification, hydrolysis, anaerobic digestion and other chemical feedstock recovery. Average recommended commercial-scale plastic-to-fuel facility capacity is between 7,000 and 10,000 tonnes/year with the average costs of systems within a range of $4m-5m, according to the report.

I am still waiting for Dow Chemical officials to answer my questions regarding their announcement today about their joint venture with Mitsui on sugarcane-based plastics in Brazil.

In the meantime, let's talk about France-based Global Bioenergies, which also announced today their collaboration with Poland-based rubber manufacturer Synthos on the development and commercialization of bio-based butadiene for rubber manufacture.

Global Bioenergies said it will receive from Synthos R&D funding, multi-million euro development fees and royalty payments on sales of bio-butadiene for the manufacturing of rubber. Synthos also plunked EUR1.4m ($1.98m) for a 3.6% stake in Global Bioenergies.

Butadiene is a one of the major building blocks on rubber manufacture where 10m tonnes/year are used to produce synthetic rubber (accounting for 2/3 of total butadiene use). The rest are used to produce nylon, latices, ABS (acrylonitrile butadiene styrene) plastics and other polymers. Global Bioenergies estimates current global butadiene market at $30bn and noted that spot price has recently rocketed to over $3/kg.

For more on why butadiene market has been increasingly tight, read this February post about the C4 challenge on  ICIS' Asian Chemicals Connection blog.

Back to Global Bioenergies...so what is this company all about?

The blog first heard of the company's successful development of bio-isobutene in October last year but just began investigating when Global Bioenergies filed for its own IPO in Paris' NYSE Alternext stock market (part of Euronext) in June, where it was able to raised EUR6.6m (around $9.3m).

According to Thomas Buhl, Global Bioenergies' head of business development, most of the IPO funding will be used to industrialize their bio-isobutene production process. Part will also be used to replicate their success on isobutene on other molecules, bio-propylene being their next target (although at this point, the company might now be busy on bio-butadiene - but this is just my opinion...).

Global Bioenergies was founded in 2008 by Marc Delcourt, a biotech veteran (according to sources) and Philippe Marliere who is reportedly a pioneer in the domain of synthetic biology. The company is based in Evry, south of Paris, and employs a staff of around 20 mostly involved in R&D.

The company's target platform molecules are in light olefins namely isobutene, propene, ethene, linear butenes, isoprene, butadiene. The company said this market exceeds $200bn in value. As mentioned, Global Bioenergies' first target is isobutene because it is the only molecule, according to Buhl, that has fuel applications (dimerization to iso-octane) and also addresses the rubber market (butyl rubber and isobutene converted to isoprene).

"Global Bioenergies has achieved a laboratory prototype producing isobutene and is now moving towards industrialization of the process, the next step consisting in performing tests in a pilot plant and further optimizing the process (enzyme engineering, strain engineering,..). The company is not yet producing isobutene at quantities usable for commercial applications." - Buhl

Right now, the only companies developing bio-isobutene (as far as the blog knows) is Gevo/Lanxess. I've interviewed both for my bio-based rubber chemicals article, which will come out in August 1 on ICIS Chemical Business.

According to Global Bioenergies, isobutene has a present market of about $15bn but is limited by the complex access of the molecule from oil cracking. Isobutene is a starting material for various intermediates and final products including in synthetic rubber manufacture and fuel (iso-octane).

The company said it has engineered bacterium strains that convert glucose to isobutene via artificial metabolic pathway that passes by 3-hydroxy-isovalerate (I'm not a chemist so pls. don't ask me anything about this pathway). Maybe this video will enlighten those who speak French (wish it has caption in English though...)

The company has now entered the second phase of its bio-isobutene development and plans to optimize the process and construct a pilot laboratory to further develop the fermentation process and gas treatment process. Milestones expected for its bio-isobutene would be to have an industrial pilot plant (about 10 tonnes/year capacity) to test its isobutene process by 2013, a demonstration plant by 2015 and start of commercial production by 2017/18.

I tried to translate some of the text in its IPO prospectus from French to English and it noted that the only competition it has on bio-isobutene is Gevo and its partner Lanxess, although Global Bioenergies said that Lanxess' indirect process would be more energy and cost-intensive than their direct fermentative route to produce isobutene.

"Additionally, our process has the advantage that the microorganism produces a gas, which spontaneously evaporates from the liquid production medium, thereby not accumulating and reaching toxic concentrations for the producing microorganism." - Buhl

In July 5, Global Bioenergies was able to get a new funding of around EUR 475,000 from French innovation agency OSEO to help its bio-isobutene project. The company's business strategy is to grant application-specific licenses such as bio-isobutene for butyl rubber application. Production and marketing would then be carried out by those licensees that are already producing or consuming isobutene today, said Buhl.

"Global Bioenergies is looking for licensing partners in the rubber/tire domain interested in converting our isobutene into butyl rubber or isoprene. It will be our responsibility to provide a production process yielding isobutene with the specifications such as in terms of purity required by the partner." - Buhl

The company said it's process as of today is already cost-competitive at the predicted production yields. Buhl added that the projected oil price increase in the next few years in addition to fast-development in fermentation technologies and biomass feedstock availability will further result in lower cost for any fermentation processing as opposed to petroleum oil-based chemical production.

The blog's colleague Nigel Davis wrote a recent insight about chemical companies racing to enter the lithium ion batteries market.

Nigel pointed out BASF's recent announcement of a three-digit million euros investment in to R&D and production of battery materials over the next five years. BASF's first electrolyte formulations for Li-ion batteries will be on sale by the end of this year. The electrolytes are complex mixtures, based on organic carbamates, that are needed to transport charge inside the battery and help improve performance.

BASF is constructing a plant to produce a range of battery materials in Elyria, Ohio, in the US. Part of its multi-million Li-ion investment will be the $50m earmarked for Li-ion battery cathode production, which is due to start in 2012. In May, BASF formally entered the electrolytes for lithium ion batteries market with the formation of its global electrolytes team in its intermediates division.

In the same week that BASF announced its investment, Dow announced the formation of a joint venture with Japanese chemical company Ube Industries in the manufacture and marketing of formulated electrolytes for lithium ion batteries. The 50-50 JV named Advanced Electrolyte Technologies, is expected to be finalized this year and its first manufacturing facility is expected to be built at Dow's Michigan Operations' site in Midland for startup in 2012.

The blog both mentioned BASF and Dow's growing investments in lithium since October last year. Nigel also mentioned German chemical company Evonik as well as Japanese chemical companies Mitsui Chemical, Kureha and Itochu as all have been investing in the lithium ion market as well.

Today, Huntsman announced its own plans to meet the needs of the global lithium ion battery market by expanding its Ultrapure solvent electrolytes production capacity in Conroe, Texas, and to also investigate a new North American integrated carbonates plant to produce cyclic and linear carbonates.

Huntsman Performance Products currently has 80 million pounds of carbonates capacity at its Conroe plant.

According to a February Clean Technologies report from US investment firm Jefferies & Co., the automotive market for lithium ion batteries is forecasted at an incremental $35b market opportunity by 2020 - exceeding the size of existing global automotive battery market (<$20b) and almost doubling the size of the current global battery industry.

Lux Research, meanwhile, reportedly forecasted a catastrophic supply and demand imbalance in the lithium-ion battery sector over the next decade (as according to Alt Energy Stocks blog). On the supply side Lux Research predicts that global manufacturing capacity will ramp to about 21,000 MWh by next year and climb to almost 30,000 MWh by 2015.

On the demand side, Lux's optimistic case based on $200 oil predicts annual battery sales of about 6,000 MWh in 2015 ramping to 22,500 MWh by 2020. Under their more conservative $140 oil price scenario, demand won't hit 6,000 MWh until 2020.

Other recent announcements in the lithium-ion batteries include International Battery forming a collaboration and license agreement with Hydro-Québec to further develop water-based manufacturing processes of lithium-ion batteries, and General Motors and the U.S. Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory reached a worldwide licensing agreement to use Argonne's patented composite cathode material to make advanced lithium-ion batteries that last longer between charges and can charge at higher voltages.

My biobased rubber chemicals article for ICIS Chemical Business will soon be published on August 1 and it turned out better than I expected if I do say so myself.

As part of that article, I will soon post in the blog my Q&A with France-based renewable chemicals developer Global Bionergies, which is currently developing bio-isobutene. For now here are this week's news roundup:

Codexis has scaled up its cellulase enzymes production to 20,000 liter at Fermic S.A. de C.V., a contract fermentation and synthesis company in Mexico City, Mexico. This represents the first manufacture of an enzyme product using the Codexis CodeXporter(TM) enzyme expression system. The enzymes are used to convert non-food biomass to fermentable sugars, and ultimately to sustainable products including biofuels and bio-based performance ingredients in household goods such as laundry detergents and shampoos.

Clariant and Elevance enter deal
Elevance Renewable Sciences and the additives business unit of specialty chemical company Clariant are collaborating in the development and commercialization of renewable-based plastic additives. No other information was disclosed but the blog assumes some of the products involved has something to do with waxes (see quoted official from Clariant).

$9m grant for LS9 and HCL CleanTech
LS9 and its partner HCL CleanTech have been awarded a $9 million grant from the Department of Energy (DOE) to improve and demonstrate an integrated process being developed by the companies to convert biomass feedstocks into fermentable sugars and then into diesel and other fuel and chemical products.

Cereplast entered into a distribution agreement with Polimernet Plastik Ltd. to supply Cereplast bioplastic resins to the Turkish market. Polimernet Plastik will use the Cereplast Compostable 3000 and the Cereplast Compostable 7003 film grades to produce bioplastic film for garbage bags, food packaging and t-shirt bags. The bioplastics are proprietary patented formulations, which includes Ingeo PLA.

Solvay awarded Technip, an engineering services contract, for studying the construction of a greenfield chemical plant in Taixing, Jiangsu Province, China. The plant will be based on Solvay's Epicerol™ technology and will produce 100 kilo-tons per year of epichlorohydrin from glycerine. Technip's operating center in Shanghai, China will execute the contract, which is scheduled to be completed in the second semester of 2013.

GreenCore Composites has completed its NCell High Performance Nature Fibre Composites project, co-funded by the Ontario BioAuto Council. GreenCore has developed renewable natural fiber reinforced composite materials that can replace up to 40% of synthetic polymer content and provides weight savings of up to 20% compared to traditional glass fibre materials.

AkzoNobel has acquired from Integrated Botanical Technologies (IBT) its patented Zeta Fraction™ technology, which makes it possible to harvest and separate constituent parts of a living cell from any plant or marine source without requiring any solvents.The technology will be integrated into the Personal Care business of AkzoNobel's Surface Chemistry business unit.

Cargill has announced that the palm oil products it supplies to its customers in Europe, United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand will be certified by the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) and/or originated from smallholder growers by 2015 (excluding palm kernel oil products). This commitment will be extended across all Cargill's oil and trading businesses to cover 100 percent of its palm oil products and all customers worldwide - including China and India - by 2020.

Possible carcinogen tag won't dent US styrene demand - analyst

US safety board slams DuPont for '10 W Virginia phosgene accident

German chem industry condemns attacks on biotech plant facilities

Here's a pretty nice online video from the Advanced Biofuels Association (ABFA) launched today. The group said this is the first of a series of online advertisements promoting the uses of advanced biofuels across the US.

By the way, a lot of things going on in US Congress about biofuels especially the possible repeal of the ethanol subsidy the Volumetric Ethanol Excise Tax Credit (VEETC), the repeal on a 54 cent/gal tariff on ethanol imports, and the possible extension for cellulosic biofuel production tax credit.

Here's an article from ICIS news about it. The BIO organization just wrote their statement about it as well.

The Sarnia-Lambton Economic Partnership contacted me if I know any consultants out there that are interested in their project below. The truth is I don't really know who to recommend so I'm going to give everybody their chance to contact the group -- just don't contact me on this unless you want to say thanks =).

-----------------
We are looking for a consultant that can undertake a review of our current marketing strategy in support of the biohybrid chemistry cluster.

The Economic Partnership is the regional economic development agency for the region of Sarnia-Lambton in Ontario Canada. Traditionally, Sarnia-Lambton has been a North American Cluster for traditional petrochemical and refining activities. During the past six years, working with our regional partners, we have made considerable progress in establishing the region as an emerging bio-hybrid cluster. Our partners include the Sustainable Chemistry Alliance, the Bioindustrial Innovation Centre, the LANXESS Bioindustrial Park Sarnia, the University of Western Ontario Research Park and Lambton College.

The Sarnia-Lambton Economic Partnership is seeking the services of a consultant with expertise in contemporary economic development marketing together with an understanding of the emerging biochemicals sector. The consultant will also have practical working knowledge of the site location process

It should be noted that submissions will be accepted from consultant teams, where two or more firms collaborate on the project.

The consultant will perform the following services:

1. Document and assess the Sarnia-Lambton Biohybrid Chemistry Cluster's strengths and weaknesses in relation to the key site location requirements for the attraction of commercial scale next generation biochemical investment.

2. Perform an analysis of the Sarnia-Lambton Biohybrid Chemistry Cluster's marketing strategy and related programs for the attraction of commercial scale next generation biochemical investment

3. Create a refined value proposition to improve the effectiveness of strategic attraction activities pertaining to next generation biochemical investment

4. Development of a tactical marketing plan

Depending on the consultant, there could be some flexibility in the required services. Attached is a copy of the RFP for the project.

CONTACT:
Mike Ireland
Senior Development Consultant
Sarnia-Lambton Economic Partnership

1086 Modeland Road
Building 1050, Suite 100
The University of Western Ontario Research Park
Sarnia-Lambton Campus
Sarnia, Ontario N7S 6L2

Telephone 519.332.1820
Email: ireland@sarnialambton.on.ca

Toyota and Ford are neck-to-neck (or maybe it should be hood-to-hood) in adopting renewable-based materials and chemicals for their automobiles.

Ford announced that it has teamed up with Recycled Polymeric Materials (RPM) for the use of gaskets and seals made from 25% post-consumer particulate from recycled tires and 17% soybean-based materials on Ford's 2011 model vehicles such as F-150, Escape, Mustang, Focus and Fiesta.

More than 2.2m pounds of rubber from recycled tires has been made into the RPM seals and gaskets while 150,000 pounds of soy has been used to create the materials, according to Ford. The company had already been using soy foam seat cushions, wheat straw-filled plastic, recycled resins for underbody systems, recycled yarns on cover seats and natural-fiber plastic for interior components.

Last year, Ford biomaterial researchers filed a patent for soy oil-based rubber that can be used in automotive parts such as deflector shields and baffles, radiator deflector shields, cupholder inserts and floor mats. The researchers found that using soy materials as a 25% replacement for petroleum oil-based carbon black more than doubled rubber's stretchability. The rubber research, which was funded in part by grants from the United Soybean Board, included the use of soy fillers as well as soy oils.

"According to the International Rubber Study Group, the automotive sector accounts for more than 50% of worldwide rubber consumption, which exceeded 22m tonnes in 2008," said Ford. Automotive rubber use is expected to rise more than 4% through 2013."

As for Toyota, the company said its new hybrid Prius a (Prius alpha) now features interior parts made with DuPont's Sorona EP thermoplastics which contains between 20% and 37% sugar-based materials. The biobased parts - developed in collaboration with DuPont Kabushiki Kaisha, Toyota Motor, Kojima Press Industry and Howa Plastics - are used on the instrument panel air conditioning system outlet.

DuPont compares its Sorona EP to petroleum-based, high performance PBT (polybutylene terephthalate).

In an automotive related news, Honda said ten of its 14 North American manufacturing facilities have achieved zero waste-to-landfill status. Examples of its waste reduction initiatives include reuse of leftover sand from aluminum and ferrous metal casting operations; reducing steel scraps; using a closed-loop system for recycling aluminum scrap; eliminating cafeteria waste through composting, recycling and energy recovery; and recycling plastics. 

US polylactic acid (PLA) plastic producer NatureWorks will soon offer high-purity, polymer grade Ingeo meso-lactide under the brand Ingeo M700 lactide in commercial quantities (about thousands of tons) to be available in 2013.

Samples will be available in 2012, said NatureWorks. The lactide can be used as an intermediate for copolymers, amorphous oligomers and polymers, grafted substrates, resin additives/modifies, adhesives, coatings, elastomers, surfactants, thermosets, and solvents (whew! I didn't know you can do a lot of stuff with lactides...)

NatureWorks said their M700 lactide is cheaper, easier to process and an overall better alternatives to high-priced racemic lactide and L- and D-lactides in a host of industrial applications.

In order to cope with the future demand, the company said it is expanding its Blair, Nebraska facility, which currently has 140,000 tons/year capacity. NatureWorks has been looking to expand its production capacity and was planning to build a second plant of about 150,000 tons/year somewhere in Asia (previous talks pinpointed Thailand).

The blog wondered if this announcement means the expansion will instead be focused back to the company's Nebraska plant instead.

A news report by ICIS (subscription required) on May 20 noted comments from a NatureWorks official about high prices for conventional polypropylene (PP) and polystyrene (PS) are making PLA a more attractive alternative in North America. Price of NatureWorks' Ingeo PLA was quoted at that time around 90 cents to $1/lb, delivered in bulk in the US.

Prices for the benchmark PP injection and general purpose PS resin grades were assessed by ICIS at 99 cents to $1.01/lb and $1.00-1.03/lb respectively on a delivered basis for the week ended 13 May.

More two weeks worth of news...just trying to clear up my draft list =)

• PetroAlgae Partners with CRI Catalyst to Optimize Conversion of Biomass to Renewable Fuel

• DSM strengthens yeast technology leadership for 2G biofuels

• Petrobras acquires 50% of biodiesel plant in Rio Grande do Sul

• Coskata Signs Letter of Intent for the Engineering, Procurement and Construction of its First Commercial Facility

• Genencor Launches a Market-Leading Enzyme Product to Advance Cellulosic Biofuel Production Worldwide

• European Commission, Airbus, Airlines and Biofuel Producers Launch Aviation Biofuel Initiative

• DuPont Danisco Cellulosic Ethanol to Purchase Iowa Land for Biorefinery to Make Fuel From Corn Stover

• Motiva to Build Ethanol Rail Facility in Port Everglades Terminal

• Novozymes Strengthens Partnership with Lignol and Joins Industrial Consortium

• New ASTM Standard Allows Renewable Fuels to Be Used in Aviation Fuel

• World's First Self-Powered Modular Cellulose Ethanol Refinery Announced

• KiOR, Inc. Announces Pricing of Initial Public Offering

• Neste Oil to take part in international algae research projects in Australia and the Netherlands

I am taking a short break from writing an article for ICIS Chemical Business about bio-based chemicals for rubber manufacture, which is giving me a massive headache given the unfamiliarity of this industry.

Here's a question for bio-butanediol (BDO) developers: How come nobody is mentioning the potential market for butadiene given the projected supply tightness of this C4 key raw material for synthetic rubber manufacture? I read that butadiene was once manufactured from BDO during World War II.

The blog will explore more about green rubber chemicals covering bio-isoprene (players include Genencor/Goodyear and GlycosBio), bio-isobutene (Gevo/Lanxess and Global Bioenergies) and renewable-based processing aids for rubber manufacture (Elevance/Hutchinson).

For now, let's talk about OPXBIO's recent $36.5m funding, Blue Marble Biomaterials' new biorefinery and LS9's several press releases within the past few days.

OPX Biotechnologies said on July 7 that it has raised $36.5m from a C-round financing, which will help accelerate the company's bio-acrylic acid commercialization. Investors include US Renewables Group leading the financing, new investors DBL Investors, and existing investors Mohr Davidow Ventures, Braemar Energy Ventures, Altira Group and X/Seed Capital.

Missoula, Montana-based Blue Marble Biomaterials announced that it's zero-waste chemical biorefinery, said to be the first in the US, is now operational. The facility will produce 72 tons/year of fine chemicals used primarily in the food, cosmetics and personal care markets. Only facility's waste only include purified water and pellet fuel for wood-boilers, the company said.

The company has future plans to power its facilities using its own waste gas and pelletized solid waste in already on-site gasifiers. The facility uses a wide range of plant feedstocks.

According to CEO Kelly Ogilvie, Blue Marble is already in several Memoranda of Understanding with clients, including global chemical distributor Sigma-Aldrich, to bring their bio-based chemicals to the global market.

Finally, LS9's media relations seem to be energized these past few days as they churned out three press releases in a row.

In July 4, LS9 announced that it has opened a new office in Sao Paulo, Brazil, with its subsidiary L29 Brasil Biotecnologia (LS9 BB). In July 7, the company said it has begun collaboration with MAN Latin America, an engineering and vehicles manufacturing company in Brazil, to test LS9's renewable diesel UltraClean in both stationary engines and operational fleet vehicles. 

The fatty acid methyl ester (or what is known as biodiesel) is said to have already achieved key parameters of B100 (100% biodiesel) based from US, European Union and Brazil standards.

In July 11, LS9 said it will now start its second phase of research with Chevron Technology Ventures to produce specific hydrocarbon products.Terms of the program were not disclosed.

[Photo of Blue Marble's Missoula facility]

 A compilation of a two-week news roundup...

Elevance Renewable Sciences and Hutchinson Worldwide will collaborate in the use of Elevance's renewable-based products for use as processing aids in Hutchinson's rubber compounds. The collaboration will combine rubber formulation expertise and manufacturing capabilities of Hutchinson with Elevance's metathesis technology and products.

AE Biofuels enters renewable chems
AE Biofuels has completed acquisition of Zymetis, a Maryland-based industrial biotechnology company that develops products for the renewable chemicals and advanced fuels industries. Zymetis holds four granted patents and more than ten pending patents on the Z-microbe™, a marine organism that was originally discovered consuming plant cellulose at a high rate in the Chesapeake Bay.

Greenstar, Vadxx in recycled plastics-to-oil JV
Greenstar Recycling and Vadxx Energy form a joint venture to convert recovered plastic into synthetic crude oil. The companies expect the JV to begin producing crude oil in mid-2012 with target location for the project in Ohio.

LanzaTech on CO-based jet fuel
LanzaTEch has been awarded funds from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to perform research focusing on novel, low cost routes for the production of jet fuel (JP-8) from carbon monoxide rich sources. The project will focus on technology development to reduce costs for producing alcohol intermediates, which will be thermochemically converted to JP-8.

Honeywell will invest $33m in its Baton Rouge, Louisiana, manufacturing facility to produce a new low-global-warming-potential (GWP) blowing agent and propellant (HFO-1234ze) on a commercial scale. Production is scheduled to begin in ate 2013. HFO-1234ze can be used in a variety of applications and can replace HFC-134a and HFC-152a in aerosol applications and thermal insulating foams and it is also being considered to replace HFC-134a for large stationary refrigeration applications.

Dow, Ube in energy storage JV
Dow Chemical and Ube Industries will form a 50-50 joint venture called Advanced Electrolyte Technologies LLC to manufacture and market formulated electrolytes for lithium-ion batteries in energy storage applications. The joint venture's first manufacturing facility is expected to be built at Dow's Michigan Operations' site in Midland for start-up in 2012.

Eastman Chemical will acquire Sterling Chemicals for $100m that will include its plasticizer and acetic acid manufacturing assets in Texas City, Texas. Eastman plans to modify and restart Sterling's current idled plasticizer facility to produce non-phthalate plasticizers.

Rhodia uses bio-ethanol for vanillin solvent
French chemical company Rhodia recently converted several steps of their vanillin manufacturing process in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and Saint-Fons, France, to the use of food-grade bio-ethanol as a solvent. The conversion enables the company to avoid use of toluene.

Xylitol Canada is in discussions with Mascoma to co-locate a commercial-scale xylose plant adjacent to one of Mascoma's first commercial cellulosic ethanol plants. The companies will create a facility to convert wood chips into ethanol and high-value co-products such as xylitol.

Aurora Algae awarded MWH and John Holland (JH) the initial engineering contract for design and construction of the Company's commercial-scale photosynthetic algae facility in Maitland, Western Australia. The facility will be equipped to manufacture thousands of tonnes of algae-based biomass annually for the production of sustainable products in the nutraceutical, pharmaceutical, aquaculture and renewable energy markets.

GreenShift licenses extraction process to Sunoco
GreenShift has licensed its patented technology to Sunoco for extracting corn oil from Sunoco's corn ethanol manufacturing facility in Fulton, NY. The process gives Sunoco ability to contribute to the production of corn oil-based biodiesel from every kernel of corn that is refined into ethanol. One kernel of corn can now produce two renewable fuels using GreenShift's proprietary process.

INSIGHT: Porto Torres to close, only to be born again.

Styrene to remain on US 'anticipated carcinogen' report list.

Japan's Mitsui & Co. to build solar farms in quake-hit areas.

INSIGHT: The promise of a bio-BDO revolution.

The chemical/plastic industry seems to be opening more and more to bioplastics collaboration as seen with the recent news from Gevo and Toray on bio-PET (polyethylene terephthalate) and today with Avantium and Solvay's announcement to jointly develop green engineering plastics.

Gevo announced on June 27 that it has successfully produced 100% renewable-based PET using its isobutanol to make paraxylene (PX) in collaboration with Toray Industries. For more about the chemical chain to produce bio-PET, see the blog's post on June 15.

Gevo said it had already provided the bio-isobutanol-based PX to international brand owners for evaluation. Some from the bioplastic industry has been speculating Gevo's possible involvement with Coca-Cola but of course, that has not been confirmed.

"We believe there is strong customer demand for fully renewable, non-petroleum derived PET and we are working to fill that demand as soon as possible. Last month, we disclosed that we had provided renewable para-xylene to international brand owners for evaluation and the production of a fully renewable bottle from PET," said Christopher Ryan, Ph.D., President and COO of Gevo. "We are pleased to have validated this technology with Toray and look forward to building a market for fully renewable PET as soon as possible."

Gevo and Toray said they are moving from from lab-scale "proof of concept" to establishing commercial-scale operations for the bio-PX. Gevo is currently working with partners to optimize the process technology to produce PX from isobutanol at commercial-scale and competitive economics.

Meanwhile, Avantium said today that it will start collaborating with Belgium-based chemical company Solvay to develop bio-based high-performance polyamides for engineering plastics application using Avantium's furanics building blocks YXY.

Solvay will test the polyamides for engineering applications in areas such as automotive and electronic materials. Solvay and Avantium said they have entered into a multi-year, exclusive collaboration towards commercialization of the new polyamides.

By the way, ICIS Chemical Business just published an article on bioplastics for its June 27 issue. It's free for access!

The green blogger is back from vacation and hopefully did not miss a lot of important news from the past two weeks (such as Gevo's announcement of its isobutanol-paraxylene collaboration with Toray).

Before anything else, the blog congratulates this year's EPA Presidential Green Chemistry awardees  - BioAmber, Genomatica, Kraton Performance Polymers and Sherwin Williams as well as Professor Bruce Lipshutz of University of California, Santa Barbara.

The US EPA (Environment Protection Agency) has been giving out the awards for the past 16 years recognizing innovative chemical technologies developed that are making significant contribution to pollution prevention in the US. The EPA says the Green Chemistry Challenge program promotes research and development of less-hazardous alternatives to existing technologies that reduce or eliminate waste, particularly hazardous waste, in industrial production.

I'm sure the blog's readers are already very familiar with bio-succinic acid producer BioAmber and bio-1,4 butanediol (BDO) producer Genomatica as the blog covered and monitored the companies' progress for several years now.

BioAmber was given the Small Business Award for its "Integrated Production and Downstream Applications of Biobased Succinic Acid." BioAmber's technology produces succinic acid at a cost 40% below that of petroleum-based succinic acid and can even compete when oil prices are below $40 per barrel. The technology also sequesters carbon dioxide rather than emitting it. Here is the blog's latest post last May on BioAmber's activities.

Succinic acid, commonly referred to as amber acid, is a key building block for a wide range of secondary chemicals used in the chemical, pharmaceutical, food and agricultural industries (I copied this statement from BIO's press release). BioAmber's biosuccinic acid can also substitute for other chemicals like adipic acid in traditional polymers and serve as the starting material for the production of chemicals such as BDO and tetrahydrofuran (THF).

Genomatica, on the other hand, has been recognized for its production of high volume basic chemicals from renewable feedstocks at lower cost under the "Greener Synthetic Pathways Award." BDO, with a 2.8 billion pound, $3 billion worldwide market, is a high-volume chemical building block used to make many common polymers, such as spandex and in automotive plastics.

Genomatica expects its production expenses for bio-BDO should be 15-30% less than petroleum-based BDO and be competitive at oil prices of $45 per barrel or at natural gas prices of $3.50 per million Btu. Here is the blog's latest post on Genomatica.

Kraton is already well known in the chemical industry and the company received this year's "Greener Reaction Conditions Award." for its NEXAR™ Polymer Membrane Technology. The technology is a family of halogen-free, high-flow, polymer membranes made using up to 50% less hydrocarbon solvent. The NEXAR™ membranes can purify hundreds of times more water than one using traditional membranes. The EPA noted that Kraton's technology also save 70% in membrane costs, and 50% in energy costs.

The NEXAR polymers are reportedly made from block copolymers with separate regions that provide strength (poly(t-butyl styrene)), toughness and flexibility (poly(ethylene-propylene)), and water or ion transport (styrene-sulfonated styrene).

The blog is actually very interested in Sherwin-William's water-based acrylic alkyd technology which was given the "Designing Greener Chemicals Award." Sherwin-Williams is said to have developed its water-based paints (sold under ProClassic Waterbased Acrylic Alkyd, ProMar 200 Waterbased Acrylic Alkyd, and ProIndustrial Waterborne Enamel) made from recycled soda plastic bottle (PET), acrylics and soybean oil.

Sherwin-Williams has used 320,000 pounds of soybean oil, 250,000 pounds of recycled PET, and eliminated 1,000 barrels of oil use as well as over 800,000 pounds of VOCs in 2010.

For the Academic Award, Professor Lipshutz was recognized for development of a novel, second-generation designer surfactant called TPGS-750-M made from inexpensive ingredients: tocopherol (vitamin E), succinic acid, and methoxy poly(ethylene glycol) (a common, degradable hydrophilic group also called MPEG-750).

TPGS-750-M forms "nanomicelles" in water that are lipophilic on the inside and hydrophilic on the outside. The technology is said to offer opportunities for industrial processes to replace large amounts of organic solvents with very small amounts of a benign surfactant nanodispersed in water only. These reactions can even be run in seawater. Sigma-Aldrich is currently offering TPGS-750-M for sale, making it broadly available to research laboratories.

As a background finale to this post, Pike Research recently published its Green Chemistry study noting that the industry is expected to grow from $2.89bn in 2011 to $98.5bn by 2020.

"Green chemistry markets are currently nascent, with many technologies still at laboratory or pilot scale," says Pike Research president Clint Wheelock, "and many production-scale green chemical plants are not expected to be running at capacity for several more years. However, most green chemical companies are targeting large, existing chemical markets, so adoption of these products is limited less by market development issues than by the ability to feed extant markets at required levels of cost and performance."

While Pike Research anticipates dramatic growth rates for green chemicals during the coming decade, these emerging markets represent a drop in the bucket compared to the $4 trillion global chemical industry. By 2020, the firm expects that the total chemical industry will expand to $5.3 trillion in annual revenues.