January 2012 Archives

This news came out last week but I was waiting to tie this with my bio-succinic acid article that was just published today on ICIS Chemical Business.

According to Myriant's press release, the company has been chosen by Japanese chemical firm Showa Denko K.K. (SDK) to be its global supplier of bio-succinic acid. SDK will use biosuccinic acid for the production of high-performance biodegradable polybutylene succinate (PBS), a key polymer used in the production of bioplastics.

SDK is a producer of PBS under the trademark Bionolle® and Starcla®, a key component used in the production of bioplastic products that include biodegradable mulch films and compostable bag applications.

I've mentioned the PBS market in my bio-succinic acid article, where PBS is currently produced by combining petroleum-based succinic acid and 1,4 butanediol (BDO). Of course, in SDK's case, the succinic acid component will soon be replaced by Myriant's product although I am not sure if SDK will also soon source a bio-based BDO to make it 100% renewable-based.

I've also mentioned that current petrochemical-derived PBS producers aside from SDK included Mitsubishi Chemical, Samsung Fine Chemical and a couple of companies in China, according to Mitsubishi Chemical. The PBS market is currently at 5,000-6,000 tonnes/year and is expected to grow to 50,000 tonnes/year in the next five years, Mitsubishi Chemical said.

BioAmber, who was picked by Mitsubishi Chemical to be its bio-succinic acid supplier, noted in its IPO filing that addressable market for PBS, PBS blends and PBS composites is around $2bn, while modified PBS is $500m.

Polybutylene succinate can also be combined with polymers such as polypropylene (PP), polystyrene (PS) and polycarbonate (PC) as well as bioplastics such as polylactic acid, polyhydroxyalkanoate, and poly-3-hydroxy butyrateco-valerate. In composites, PBS can be combined with fibers or fillers for applications such as automotive interiors, nonwovens, construction materials and consumer goods.

Below is a map of current bio-succinic acid companies and their planned production capacity worldwide. Not included in the map is a 65,000 tonne/year capacity being planned by the BioAmber/Mitsui JV either in the US or Brazil. The BASF/Purac JV did not yet disclose location for its planned 50,000 tonne/year bio-succinic acid facility. I don't have a clue why it showed up in the map ...still trying to figure out this new Google application...

As I've said before this post, too much news clogging my draft box and it's just the first month of the year. By the way, I will start working on a bioplastic article for ICIS Chemical Business' green chemicals issue. I just wondered what particular topic readers would like to read about bioplastics.

Let me know!

Cereplast new hybrid resins
Cereplast launched its next generation Hybrid Resins, an expansion of its Biopropylene PP-based resin product offering through new grades, Hybrid 102D and 105D. The resins replace up to 50% of the petroleum content in traditional plastic products with biobased materials such as starches. The new grades Hybrid 102D and Hybrid 105D are both injection molding grades, a heating and cooling manufacturing process in which the material is molded in different shapes.

DaniMer Scientific gets certification
DaniMer Scientific's ReNew packaging and film resins have been officially certified as compostable by Vincotte International. DaniMer's OK Compost certified resins are both compostable and biodegradable. Renew Film Resins are specifically designed for the efficient conversion and production of: disposable shopping bags, compostable bags, odor barrier packaging products and agricultural mulch film, among others.

GSA bags Plaxica's PLA demo design
Grimley Smith Associates (GSA) won a contract to design Plaxica's first biopolymer demonstration facility at Wilton International on Teesside, UK. The proposed demonstration plant will use energy efficient processes to produce second generation high performance polylactic acid (PLA) based materials. Plaxica will build the demonstration facility and will use it to gain key process data on the technology in preparation for scale-up, commercial implementation and technology licensing. The plant is expected to be operational later in 2012.

Teknor Apex sells vinyls with Dow bioplasticizers
Dow Chemical and Teknor Apex are collaborating on a joint market development for flexible vinyl  that will contain Dow Ecolibrium biobased plasticizers in several applications such as consumer and industrial products, certain medical devices, auto components and select wire and cable products. Teknor Apex plans to commercialize the vinyl compounds this year and introduce new compounds at NPE 2012 in April.

Micromidas awards biopolymer funding
The Michigan Molecular Institute (MMI) has secured $30,000 funding from a collaboration with start-up waste-to-chemicals development firm Micromidas to research biopolymers and renewable polymer building blocks. MMI is also providing proof-of-concept expertise to the Corn Marketing Program of Michigan's renewable propylene glycol derivatives research.

Palm oil bioplastic in Malaysia
The government-owned research technology company SIRIM has built a first-of-its-kind pilot plant in Malaysia to convert palm oil into versatile biodegradable plastic materials. The facility in Shah Alam, Selangor state is fully automated and produces various types of polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHAs). It uses palm oil mill effluent (POME) and crude palm kernel oil as feedstock to produce 2,000L of different PHA materials.

Cardia Bioplastic expands China supply
Cardia Bioplastics Limited is supplying three more City Districts in China to provide householders with kitchen waste bags made from Cardia renewable Biohybrid™ products. The total sales value for the supply of bags for the trials is expected to be AUD$600,000 over the next 6 months.Cardia was also awarded the supply contract by the City of Nanjing in December.

Too much news piling my draft box....

US Biodiesel breaks 1bn gal mark
The US biodiesel industry reached a key milestone by producing more than 1bn gallons of fuel in 2011, according to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Last year, 1.1bn gallons were produced exceeding the 800m gallon-target required under the EPA's Renewable Fuel Standard. Previous record production was 690m gallons in 2008.

Fiberight to build waste-based biofuels plant
The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) has partnered with Fiberight to build a 6m gal/year advanced biofuel plant in Blairstown, Iowa, which will start in the first half of 2013. The USDA will invest $25m and Fiberight $20m for the plant's construction. Fiberight has developed a targeted fuel extraction process to cost-effectively convert municipal solid waste into cellulosic biofuel and energy. Fiberight has partnered with Novozymes for the use of enzyme catalysts for the technology.

Mascoma expects tech sales in Q1 2012
Cellulosic ethanol developer Mascoma expects to generate revenues for its Mascoma Grain Technology (MGT) yeast product beginning in the first quarter of 2012. The MGT product is a genetically-modified yeast designed a s drop-in substitute for conventional fermenting yeast that lowers costs for corn ethanol producers by alleviating the need to purchase expensive enzymes. The MGT product is expected to be sold to corn ethanol producers under commercial arrangements that enable the company to receive a significant portion of the incremental margin generated by the product.

OriginOil, DOE in algae crude oil
OriginOil plans to co-develop an integrated system with the US Department of Energy's Idaho National Laboratory for direct conversion of raw algae into a renewable crude oil that can be used by existing petroleum refineries. OriginOil's Biocrude System™ will integrate its own harvesting system with biomass processing technology being developed under the recently-announced research agreement with INL, to convert raw algae into barrels of renewable crude oil.

Greenbelt Resources' biorefinery equipment
Greenbelt Resources' subsidiary Diversified Ethanol Corp. will supply the distillation and dehydration system in the $20m Stan Mayfield biorefinery pilot plant at the University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences laboratory. The facility will identify better ways to produce fuel ethanol from biomass.

Toyo gets bioethanol engineering contract
Toyo Engineering & Construction Sdn Bhd has been awarded a contract to build a 10,000 tons/year bioethanol production facility in Johor, Malaysia, owned by GlycosBio-BioXcell JV. The plant will produce industrial grade bioethanol from crude glycerin. The project is scheduled for completion in the second quarter of 2013 and its total production capacity could expand to 30,000 tons/year by 2014.

And in ICIS News (requires subscription):
Brazilian ethanol prices fell sharply in the third week of January, pressured by softer demand and inventory reduction, research group CEPEA said.

The US National Biodiesel Board (NBB) urged President Barack Obama to finalise the delayed rule for boosting biodiesel use under the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) in 2013 and reinstate the $1/gal biodiesel tax incentive.

Brazil-based energy company Petrobras plans to increase capacity at its biodiesel plant in Montes Claros, Minas Gerais, by 40%, the company said.

Producers and consumers confirmed first-quarter US industrial ethanol contract settlements at declines of 7.50 cents/gal on average, on the back of weaker corn prices early in the fourth-quarter.

The blog will still try to do a weekly news roundup but for now here are some of the news that came out the past two weeks:

Genomatica licenses PROESA
Genomatica has obtained exclusive worldwide rights to the PROESA process from Beta Renewables for butanediol (BDO) production from biomass through any fermentation-based process. The companies plan to produce biomass-based BDO at demonstration-scale in 2012 at Beta Renewable's facility in Rivalta Scrivia, Italy.

Verdezyne secures patent
Verdezyne has been granted a US patent number 8,093,037, titled "Engineered microorganisms with enhanced fermentation activity" for the company's engineering of a yeast which incorporates xylose isomerase, a key enzyme in the fermentation of certain pentose (C5) sugars to ethanol and other products.

Solazyme launches new skincare line
Solazyme has launched a new Firming and Lifting skincare line to their brand Algenist worldwide. The line features three new products targeted at women ages 45-60 and will retain for under $94. The Algenist brand is said to be the first to introduce Alguronic acid to the anti-aging ingredient market. Alguronic acid reportedly outperforms the anti-aging benefits of ingredients such as hyaluronic acid and retinol.

DSM introduces castor-based flooring materials
DSM and Empresa Brasileira de Biotechnologia (Ebrabiotech) has launched a new line of DSM-branded castor oil-based materials targeting the concrete floor coatings market. The partnership will also develop future materials that will offer low-carbon footprint solutions for aquaculture and structural steel protection applications.

Recycling glycols from waste antifreeze
ThermoEnergy Corp. signed a contract for sale of its CAST 3000 Wastewater Recovery System to a major recycling company in the west coast to recover ethylene glycol from spent car and truck antifreeze/coolant. The west coast facility is expected to recover more than 1,000 gal/day of pretreated wastewater containing 40% of ethylene glycol. The flash vacuum distillation system uses a physical-chemical process that uses temperature and reduced pressure to separate chemicals, metals and nutrients from wastewater.

Dow selects Solar Shingles dealers
Dow has chosen three Colorado roofing contractors - Academy Roofing, B&M Roofing of Colorado Inc., and D&D Roofing to be its first authorized dealers for Dow Solar's Powerhouse Solar Shingles. Expanded availability of the solar shingles and the Powerhouse authorized dealer network will be announced throughout Colorado and other US markets in the coming months.

HyperSolar's wastewater into hydrogen tech
HyperSolar has developed a wastewater treatment technology that uses sun to photo-oxidize wastewater, and simultaneously produce hydrogen and clean waster. The company noted that drinking water and wastewater systems account for 3-4% of energy use in the US, and 30-40% of total energy consumed in municipal governments.

And in ICIS News (requires subscription):
Italian bioplastics producer Novamont is considering building a second bio-butanediol (BDO) project in Porto Torres, Italy, using Genomatica's bio-BDO technology.

Solvay has created a new energy services business "Solvay Energy Services" as it looks to cut its energy costs and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions.

Officials of US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) launched an online database that provides individuals access to site-specific information on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by power plants, refineries, chemical producers and other industries.

INSIGHT: Moving from pilot to commercial scale, some bio-based petrochemicals are starting to make a clearer impression on the consumer. Soon, they will start to make an impression on the industry.

It looks like a good start for 2012 with several companies closing some good funding this month.

New Zealand-based LanzaTech announced this week that it has bagged a total of US $55.8m in its series C round of financing led by the Malaysian Life Sciences Capital Fund. New investors include PETRONAS Technology Ventures Sdn Bhd and Dialog Group. Existing investors such as Khosla Ventures, Qiming Venture Partners and K1W1 -- I like this name =) -- participated in the round as well. LanzaTech said the compay raised a total of more than $85m to date.

The company also gave a small update on their $5m acquisition of a US cellulosic ethanol facility now dubbed "Freedom Pines Biorefinery" located in Soperton, Georgia, which was previously owned by Range Fuels. LanzaTech said, the facility will produce renewable fuels and chemicals from waste wood using their proprietary processing technology (industrial waste gas-to-fuel/chemicals via fermentation).

Another recent news is advanced fuel developer KiOR closing a $75m four-year term loan with a lender group comprised of  an affiliate of Vinod Khosla and two Canadian corporations owned by pension fund clients of Alberta Investment Management Corp.

Waste CO2-to-fuel/chemicals developer Joule has also closed a $70m funding this month bringing a total funding round of more than $110m to date. The company did not disclose funding sources.

The proceeds will be applied towards the build-out and operation of a Joule facility located in Hobbs, New Mexico and slated for commissioning in the summer of 2012. Joule was founded by venture capital firm Flagship Ventures in 2007.

Zeachem also announced yesterday that it has been selected by the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) for a $232.5m loan guarantee under the 9003 Biorefinery Assistance Program. The conditional loan enables the financing and construction of ZeaChem's first commercial-scale cellulosic biorefinery in Boardman, Oregon, with a capacity of 25m gal/year enabling the production of cellulosic ethanol and acetic acid/ethyl acetate using woody biomass.

On Wednesday, Canadian renewable chemical firm EcoSynthetix secured a $2.1m funding from Sustainable Development Technology Canada (SDTC). The funding will support EcoSynthetix's project for further development of its EcoMer® bio-based monomer platform.

The blog also received news from Bioformix CEO Adam Malofsky that the company closed a $13m funding from GM Ventures this month and is waiting to close another funding from a big Japanese multinational company soon.

Also this year, we had BASF investing $30m in cellulosic sugar developer Renmatix; Agilyx secured $25m in its series C funding; DSM investing $250m in cellulosic ethanol via its joint venture with US developer POET;  US biodiesel company Renewable Energy Group targeting $100m via its IPO filing; DuPont investing in biomass sorghum developer NextSteppe (undisclosed amount); and another sorghum developer Chromatin has been awarded $5.7m grant from the US DOE.

I've compiled a rough list of last year's financing rounds and IPOs. Hopefully, this will be useful to you.

Source: Company Reports

Last week, the staff of ICIS Chemical Business received news of the death of Arthur R. Kavaler, former editor-in-chief and publisher of Chemical Market Reporter (1972-1990). ICB's current editor-in-chief Joseph Chang has written this tribute (below), which will be published next week.

I did not have the privilege of working under Mr. Kavaler when I started at CMR in 2000 but during my stint in covering the fats and oils market, I had the pleasure of communicating with his daughter Andrea Kavaler, who is currently executive vice president of consulting firm LMC International.

I am sure Mr. Kavaler will be missed by so many people in the chemicals community. On behalf of the blog and its readers, we are sending our heartfelt condolence to Andrea and her family.

For those who remembered Arthur Kavaler, a memorial book online is accessible in this link until February 19. You can also directly contact Andrea at this email address: akavaler@lmc-ny.com.

A tribute to former CMR publisher Kavaler

Arthur R. Kavaler, who served for 46 years as reporter, editor and eventually publisher and editor-in-chief of Chemical Market Reporter - one of the three predecessor publications incorporated into ICIS Chemical Business - died at the age of 91 on January 18, 2012.

Kavaler was a large personality and wonderful raconteur with a zest for life, notes his daughter Andrea Kavaler, who works as a consultant for global agribusiness and bio-based chemicals consultancy LMC International. A probing reporter and an editor with unwavering convictions, he made a major impact on chemical industry journalism.

In 1947, Kavaler joined Schnell Publishing as market editor of the Oil, Paint and Drug Reporter (OPD). He was appointed news editor in 1949, managing editor in 1952 and editor-in-chief in 1969. In 1972, he became president of Schnell and publisher and CEO of OPD, which was renamed Chemical Marketing Reporter (then again later renamed Chemical Market Reporter). He remained editor-in-chief until his retirement in 1990.

The Kavaler Award was given to leading chemical CEOs from 1990-1999, including Jon Huntsman, Sr., founder, chairman and CEO of Huntsman, and Frank Popoff, chairman and CEO of Dow Chemical.

Kavaler's reputation preceded him - and it also followed him well after he left the company. While I never had the privilege of meeting Kavaler, having joined Chemical Market Reporter in 1997, countless people I met at industry events asked about the former editor, and this continued on for years.

Today we celebrate his achievements in advancing chemical journalism and leading a great industry publication - one whose impact on the chemical markets certainly lives on in ICIS Chemical Business.

Joseph S. Chang
Global Editor
ICIS Chemical Business

Is it just the blog's imagination or are there seem to be more and more chemical companies venturing into advanced ethanol production, the recent one being DSM?

Let's see our list here:

• DuPont Cellulosic Ethanol - No need to introduce DuPont in this case. The company's cellulosic ethanol business is planning to build a 27.5m gal/year cellulosic ethanol plant in Nevada, Iowa, which is expected to start in late 2013. 


• INEOS Bio - the advanced biofuel technology business of Switzerland-based petrochemical company INEOS. Through its joint-venture project INEOS New Planet BioEnergy (INPB), the company plans to start commercial production of cellulosic ethanol this year in a 24,000 tonne/year biorefinery in Vero Beach, Florida.


• Gruppo Mossi & Ghisolfi (M&G) - this Italy-based polymer company formed a joint venture called Beta Renewables with TPG Capital. Beta Renewables is building a 13m gal/year cellulosic ethanol in Crescentino, Italy which is expected to start this year. Novozymes is supplying the enzymes for this project.


• Celanese - planning for possibly 3 greenfield coal-to-ethanol production units in Nanjing, China with a capacity of 600,000 tones/year expected by mid-2013. Celanese is also looking into producing ethanol from natural gas here in the US and is building a technology development unit for ethanol production at its facility in Clear Lake, Texas.


• Sud-Chemie - a technology business of Switzerland-based Clariant, the company has been building its 1,000 tonne/year cellulosic ethanol in Straubing, Germany, which is supposed to have already started by the end of 2011.


• Dow Chemical - I am not sure if Dow and its partner Mitsui will sell sugarcane-based ethanol itself as the companies plan to use if for plastic feedstock but the partnership is currently constructing ethanol mill in Brazil, which will deliver 240m liters/year of ethanol by the second quarter of 2013.

The 50-50 POET-DSM JV is scheduled to start cellulosic ethanol production in the second half of 2013 via POET's 20m-25m gal/year facility dubbed Project Liberty currently being constructed in Emmetsburg, Iowa (initial Capex is $250m).

POET-DSM intends to replicate and license the technology to additional plants to be built at 26 other corn ethanol facilities in POET's network. The JV will also license the technology to other producers in the US and worldwide using corn crop residue as feedstock. POET said if the technology is replicated at all of its 27 existing corn ethanol plants across the US, it could produce up to one billion gallons of cellulosic ethanol per year.

According to DSM, the JV is expected to be profitable in the first full year of production in 2014. In their conference call last Monday, DSM CEO Feike Sijbesma said the JV is expected to get more than $100m revenue from the Project Liberty plant. POET CEO Jeff Broin noted that their cellulosic ethanol will be cost-competitive with traditional corn ethanol.

Looking at ICIS Pricing, anhydrous corn ethanol spot price in the midwest last week was quoted in the range of $2.02-2.06/gal. I remembered asking Novozymes in 2010 what should be the cost of cellulosic ethanol to be competitive with corn, and back then the company said any cellulosic ethanol plant "should be able to reach between $2.25-$2.50/gal in a fully loaded production cost without subsidies to be competitive."

This includes depreciation and a 10% return on investment (ROI) over 20 years for the plant investment. In the conference call, POET noted that the company's ethanol cost production is below $3/gal. Since DSM "potentially" plans to produce enzymes onsite, the blog figured that should bring costs down.

By the way, the blog did ask DSM if there is any future synergy on producing biochemicals in any of the JV's planned cellulosic ethanol biorefinery here in the US, and the answer was "maybe". Well, ok, this is not really Sijbesma's direct answer but he said that their biochemical business (such as bio-succinic acid) has a different route although he did add that there could be future consideration of other products.

It just made sense for the blog to ask this question given that DSM is in the bio-based chemicals business after all, and that several biorefinery technologies nowadays can produce both cellulosic ethanol and [or] biochemicals like these companies:

• Zeachem's Boardman, Oregon, facility can produce ethyl acetate and ethanol from cellulosics 


• LanzaTech now acquiring Range Fuel's cellulosic ethanol plant renamed Freedom Pines Biorefinery in Soperton, Georgia (LanzaTech's processing tech could produce both ethanol and 2,3 butanediol); 


• Cellulosic ethanol developer Coskata is also looking at biobased chemicals although the company did not mention any potential biorefineries producing both in the future;


• Aemetis (formerly AE Biofuels), which has refocused its business into producing advanced biofuels and renewable chemicals


• BlueFire Renewables' biorefinery technology could make a variety of products from biomass including ethanol, biobutanol, and chemical esters such as ethyl levulinate, ethyl lactate, and ethyl citrate.


• Enerkem's thermochemical process can convert municipal solid waste into ethanol, methanol and chemical intermediates

It does seems like more and more M&A's and buyouts are emerging in the renewable chemicals sector. Eastman bought bio-butanol developer TetraVitae Bioscience, Amyris bought Draths, PTT Global Chemical bought 50% of NatureWorks, and now bio-butanol developers Green Biologics (based in the UK) and butylfuel (based in the US) decided to merge their companies which will operate under the Green Biologics name headquartered in Abingdon, UK.

The blog is not really that familiar with butylfuel™ LLC but it described itself as a biorefining and industrial biotechnology company focused on producing high value C4 chemicals, fuels and energy from renewable carbon resources.

The company was founded on 1991 when founder, David Ramey, began his efforts to publicize the potential of biobutanol as an alternative fuel. butylfuel LLC operates a 1,100 liter pilot facility near Columbus, Ohio, specializing in the development of bio-butanol and butyric acid via fermentation.

Green Biologics, meanwhile, has been focusing as well on n-butanol, acetone and butyric acid.GBL was founded in 2003. GBL said it has three projects underway in China focusing on molasses and corn by-product feedstocks. In India and Brazil, GBL's focus is molasses, cane and bagasse while in North America, the focus is on both starch-based and cellulosic feedstocks.

"GBL aims to work closely with key customers and collaboration partners in the value chain to manage an orderly entry into large global markets. Butanol and its derivatives are key intermediates in the production of paints, coatings, adhesives and inks, an $85 billion global market. Butyl acrylates are also used in the $700 billion global plastics and polymers market."

Biofuels is also a strategic driver for GBL but the company said its immediate market focus is on butanol and C4 chemicals.

GBL's UK pilot plant

Why focus on ethanol? This has always been a question that lingers in my mind every time companies such Zeachem and even Gevo, LanzaTech and Amyris talk about their activity progress in the biofuel space.

Well, I bluntly asked this question to Zeachem CEO and president Jim Imbler, and his answer is just what the title says: "Given the subsidies for ethanol right now in the marketplace, this is our highest margin product."

Colorado-based Zeachem can now produce sugar-based acetic acid and ethyl acetate with the startup of the core operations at its 250,000 gal/year biorefinery facility in Boardman, Oregon. The intermediate chemicals can be used for applications including paint, lacquers and solvents, or the ethyl acetate can go through further processing (via hydrogenation) to manufacture ethanol at the back-end of the biorefinery.

Zeachem's 250,000 gal/year demo biorefinery

Ethyl acetate is also an extremely high margin product in the chemical space, but compared to the $60bn ethanol market, ethyl acetate (valued at a couple of billion dollars worldwide) coming from a biorefinery still requires chemical companies to test it and get the product qualified and approved. That will take a longer process."

Imbler said the demo biorefinery will provide both ethyl acetate and acetic acid to various chemical players for them to test the chemicals in their own product chain.Customers will be getting their samples later on in the year as Zeachem optimize their processing units.

"The primary purpose of the integrated demo plant is to prove out the design and metrics for the first commercial plant [with a capacity of 25m gal/year] that we are starting to work on right now, next door to this biorefinery. 

We already have the feedstock agreement with GreenWood Tree Farm Fund in place. With fuels, if you make the specification, you can sell them. With chemicals, you need first to provide people enough volume to run their own internal testing through their own product processing...." 

The blog is also curious how this biorefinery works. So we have this flowchart from their website:

For further explanation of this, Zeachem is working with the US Department of Energy (DOE) on the front-end (cellulosic to sugar) and back-end (ethyl acetate to ethanol) of the biorefinery. The biorefinery will be flexible enough to produce 100% cellulosic ethanol if needed or varying volumes of ethanol, ethyl acetate or acetic acid, whichever product is in demand.

Zeachem did not give the investment amount for the core operation but for the book-end project, the DOE is shelling out $25m (20% cost-share), which will pay for the design, installation, construction and operation of the equipment.

The cellulosic ethanol project that will be produced in the demo biorefinery is expected to be completed this year. The blog is really not familiar with how the chemistry works on converting cellulose to sugar but according to Zeachem, the demo biorefinery will use about 2,500 bone dry tonne of feedstock (100 gal ethanol per bone dry tonne). For the 25m gal/year commercial plant, the company expects to produce  about 110 gal/bone dry tonne of feedstock and ultimately increasing to 135 gal/bone dry tonne.

While waiting for the DOE, Zeachem is also looking to run potential cellulosic hydrolysates through the core processing, although Imbler said, they are already talking to a number of people wanting to try out different cellulosic feedstock on the front end as soon as the DOE project is in place.

Another recent development is their collaboration with the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) on a $40m grant to produce bio-based jet and diesel fuels and bio-based gasoline at the demo biorefinery. Production of test quantities for biojet diesel is expected in 2013 and for biogasoline in 2015.

Regarding their planned 25m gal/year commercial biorefinery, Imbler said their are starting to "put the financial elements together for the project." Zeachem hopes to start construction next year and to start operations in late 2014. The commercial facility will be an exact replica of the demo plant.

Longer term, Zeachem said it is concentrating on identifying potential sites for ethanol plants both in the US, Canada and Australia. As far as South America is concern, the business model is more likely in terms of joint venture opportunities, while licensing opportunities could work out if looking at Asia, said Imbler.

With regards to Zeachem's collaboration with Procter & Gamble, their project of developing an entirely new platform beyond C2 is said to be going forward very well, which can be applied on a number of P&G's packaging and products.

PS
It was fortunate that I had my interview with Jim Imbler on the day that my speech class had an assignment for me to interview a stranger and present my findings to the class. Jim was kind enough to share his private life to me and to the blog:

Background: Jim was born in Wichita, Kansas, in 1957. Ran away to University of Kansas and spent 25 years getting his bachelor's degree in Chemical Engineering and MBA.  After that Jim worked for Koch Industries [for 11 years] and became president of the company where he was responsible for the refining, pipeline, energy and petroleum, asphalt and trading businesses. Finally, he moved to Denver, Colorado.

"I'm very much a Midwestern boy, very much a Kansan and very proud of Kansas."

Family: Jim was born among 6 brothers and sisters. He is now a proud parent of 2 boys, ages 20 and 17, and his little girl, age 14. He said something about a 3-year plan...=)

"My daughter thinks I work too much and travel too much, which she is probably right. I'm very precise. I love mathematics. My daughter will tell you that I constantly test her on math and science skills, and she loves it."

Hobbies: Being a Colorado boy, Jim said he likes to go biking, hiking, fishing skiing. This Zeachem head honcho also has an obsession to read anything.

Likes: Sunny days and blue sky. Snow. Being with the younger crowd whether it's scouting or in University setting.

Dislikes: Rain

What he wants to be when he grows up: To be a grandparent and spoil his grandkids like crazy.

What the blog is currently working on for ICIS Chemical Business is a story on succinic acid. This market is very small but people are wondering whether this chemical will have a big impact in the market in the future.

Unfortunately, the two big producers -- Myriant and BioAmber -- are currently under IPO so the blog is not sure if they can talk to the press. We are hoping BASF, DSM and other interested parties will participate in this one...crossing our fingers!

For now, here are this week's news roundup. By the way, I am also working on a blog post about my recent interview with Zeachem...interesting information about their new biorefinery operations in Oregon...

Gevo sells IDGs to Land O'Lakes
Gevo signed on off-take and marketing agreement with land O'Lakes Purina Feed for the sale of isobutanol distillers grains (IDGs) from Gevo's isobutanol facility at Luverne, Minnesota. Land O'Lakes Purina Feed will be the exclusive marketer of Gevo's isobutanol dried and modified wet distillers grains for the animal feed market. The companies will also work together to explore opportunities to upgrade the material for special value-added applications in feed markets.

Virent bags five US patents
Virent has been issued five new US patents covering aspects of its catalytic BioForming platform. Patents 8,053,615, 8,017,818 and 7,977,517, cover the production of various liquid fuels and chemicals related to its partnership with The Coca-Cola Company and its ongoing partnership with Royal Dutch Shell. The additional two patents, 7,767,867 and 7,989,664, are directed to the production of a range of other industrial chemicals and chemical intermediates using Virent's BioForming® process.

Agilyx secures $25m funding
Alternative energy company Agilyx has secured $25m in a series C funding led by Keating Capital and existing investors Kleiner Perkins Caulfield & Byers, Saffron Hill Ventures, Waste Management, Total Energy Ventures International, Chrysalix Energy Venture Capital and Reference Capital. The Agilyx system processes all type of waste plastic turning into synthetic crude oil.

Carbon Sciences launches CarbonCrude
Carbon Sciences has introduced CarbonCrude, an ultra-clean and environmentally friendly synthetic crude oil made from captured carbon dioxide and oilfield natural gas. CarbonCrude can be blended into natural crude oil and transported using existing oil pipelines.The CarbonCrude process consists of two steps: Carbon dioxide is converted into syngas using the company's reforming catalyst, and syngas is converted into low-cost Carbon Crude using low-intensity Fischer -Tropsch process.

Yulex gets global latex patents
Yulex Corp. has been granted patents from the US, Europe, Mexico, and South Africa covering its commercial methods for latex and resin extraction from the guayule plant, a desert shrub. The patents are directed to methods for cultivating, harvesting, defoliating and decorticating (?) as well as chemical and mechanical extraction of latex and resin. Yulex said its guayule-based latex has different and improved properties compared to other natural plant-based latex.

BP invests in Cool Planet Biofuels
BP Technology Ventures has invested in Cool Planet Biofuels' C round along with current investors General Electric, Google Ventures, ConocoPhillips, NRG and North Bridge Venture Partners. The C Round was led by Shea Ventures. No amount was disclosed. Cool Planet Biofuels is developing bio based gasoline that can be blended with conventional gasoline.

Corn stover in upholstered furniture
Corn Board Manufacturing, Inc. has partnered with Huntington Industries where it will become the exclusive user of CornBoard™ in the manufacture of upholstered furniture. Made from corn stover, a by-product of harvested U.S. corn, CornBoard™ is a renewable wood replacement with many of the same properties of processed plywood. ZeaHome™ will be offered by Corn Board Manufacturing, Inc. and will expand to include outdoor furniture made from 100 percent CornBoard™.

And in ICIS News (requires subscription);
Annual contracts for 2012 between US liquid sorbitol sellers and buyers settled at a 12% increase from 2011, market sources said.

Global demand for foodservice disposables is projected to grow by 5.4% per year to $53.3bn (€41.0bn) in 2015, according to Freedonia.

Brazil hydrous ethanol prices rose after the new year on reduced spot availability, research group CEPEA said.

Just like Coca-Cola's announcement of partnering with Gevo, Virent and Avantium, the renewable chemicals world takes notice when chemical giants such as BASF, Dow Chemical and DuPont announced further investments in this field.

BASF's $30m investment in US cellulosic sugar developer Renmatix signals the German chemical firm's intent to expand its feedstock source especially for its renewable chemicals and materials portfolio.

What interests BASF is Renmatix's Plantrose platform which can produce low-cost, large volume quantities of industrial sugar from lignocellulosic biomass (wood, cane bagasse or straw) using supercritical hydrolysis (supercritical water at high temperature and pressure). This is unlike the traditional approach of breaking down lignocellulose using acids or specially tailored enzymes (as what enzyme producers Codexis, Novozymes, Genencor, Verenium are offering).

Few are pursuing supercritical fluid routes for biomass, said Renmatix, and none are near the scale that the company is said to have achieved.

Renmatix currently has a pilot facility that converts 100 kg/day of dry biomass into xylose and glucose monomers, as well as a demo facility that converts 3 dry tons/day of biomass into xylose and glucose sugars as samples for potential customers. The facilities are located in Kennesaw, Ga.

Renmatix plans to have a commercial scale facility that can produce more than 100,000 tons/year of cellulosic sugar as soon as they can cough up about $100m for the facility. With $50m coming from BASF and other investors, I guess Renmatix is halfway there.

BASF has been greatly expanding its renewable chemicals portfolio over the last few years especially in the bioplastic arena. BASF, by the way, is one of the top 4 global BDO suppliers and getting a cellulosic sugar-based BDO is probably one of BASF's agenda.

Here are some of BASF's 2011 bio-based chemical/bioplastic activities (as taken from the blog):

• BASF is taking part in research activities on new biocatalytic amine syntheses and on the use of enzymes for the synthesis of functional polymers from renewable feedstock.


• BASF has developed latex for carpet backing adhesives to be made with a minimum of 10% renewable materials.Trademarked STYROFAN ECO 4810, the latex reportedly achieves key product performance levels targeted by both residential and commercial carpet manufacturers.


• BASF, which said that it has partnered with automotive manufacturer Ford in developing castor oil-based foam product for Ford's 2012 Focus instrument panel. The foam contains more than 10% renewable content


• BASF and Purac formed a bio-succinic acid JV and aims to be the first commercial bio-succinic acid producer in the market (by 2013, the blog believes) with a 25,000 tons/year capacity that will be located in Purac's site near Barcelona, Spain.


• BASF has successfully completed its compostable bag pilot project that uses BASF's Ecovio FS film. in the district of Bad Durkheim, Germany.


• BASF started its newly expanded Ecoflex biodegradable plastic plant in Ludwigshafen, Germany. The plant's production capacity increased from 14,000 to 74,000 tonnes/year.

As I am writing my second post of the year, we got this breaking news from @GiantMiscanthus on twitter that LanzaTech has bought Range Fuels for $5.2m.

LanzaTech's CEO Jennifer Holmgren confirmed to the blog today that they have acquired Range Fuels via an auction. I'm sure we will hear more from LanzaTech on what they're planning to do with the company's assets.

For those who are not familiar with Range Fuels (the green blogger for one), the company seems to have the bad reputation of being the Solyndra version of the cellulosic ethanol industry. Range Fuels was founded by Vinod Khosla and has been developing cellulosic ethanol since 2007. From then on, the company was able to get grants and private fundings but unfortunately was not able to deliver its promise of a 20m gal/year cellulosic ethanol plant in Soperton, Georgia, by 2008.

Range Fuels closed the Soperton plant last year and has been auctioned today, where LanzaTech apparently won the bid.

On the saga of Range Fuels, here is an interesting article from Wall Street Journal.

On Range Fuels' connection with LanzaTech, here is a good article from Biofuels Digest.

Happy New Year!!! The blog wishes everyone a prosperous 2012!

In my culture, we have this tradition that whatever you did in the first day of January is what you're mostly going to do throughout the year so maybe blogging today will make me more blog-productive throughout 2012. Crossing my fingers!

We'll ring the new year with this update from OPX Biotechnologies. This was my last interview for 2011 and my apologies to OPXBio for being so late in posting this. The green blogger was able to talk to CEO Chas Eggert - after doing his financial rounds in New York City =) and I was able to get new information especially the company's plans to diversify its product portfolio into the fatty acid and acrylamide sectors.

But let's start first with their recent financial round in September where the company was able to raised $41.2m in private equity financing. Investors now include Wolfensohn & Company, X/Seed, Altira Group, Braemar Energy Ventures, DBL Investors, MDV and US Renewables Group.

BIO-ACRYLIC ACID TIMELINE:
OPXBio's bio-acrylic project with Dow Chemical is also going well, said Eggert. Dow is focusing on the use of sugar feedstock and the conversion process of sugar to bio-acrylic acid while OPXBio is focusing on its microbe using its "Efficiency Directed Genome Engineering" (EDGE) platform, as well as developing the 3-HP (hydroxypropionic acid) bioprocess. Just to refresh readers' memory on 3-HP as it has been awhile since I last mentioned it, OPXBio uses microorganism to biosynthesize 3-HP by fermentation of sugar and subsequent dehydration of the 3HP to acrylic acid.

Both Dow and OPXBio will jointly fund the development, demonstration and commercialization of bio-acrylic acid. With Dow being a multinational acrylic acid producer and consumer, the company is certainly an expert in the ins- and outs- of the global acrylic market.

Now OPXBio is not the only one working on 3-HP to bio-acrylic. I think the blog also mentioned before that Cargill and its partner Novozymes have been working on this route for years although we have not really heard any updates from these companies although sources said they are planning to soon release their technology available for licensing within the next couple of years. Maybe it's time to go knocking on Novozymes' doors on this subject =).

Eggert's rebuttal against the Cargill technology is that OPXBio claims to have a lower-cost bio-based route (and competitive to petroleum-based route). OPXBio said it was already able to produce a 50 cents/lb bio-acrylic acid using dextrose feedstock at 14 cents/lb, and a 38 cents/lb bio-acrylic acid using sucrose feedstock at 8 cents/lb. At the time of the interview Eggert noted average market selling price of acrylic acid during the interview at $1.20 cents/lb.

OPXBio has already scaled up its bioacrylic acid production to 3,000 liter fermentation (equivalent to 60,000 lbs/year) at a demonstration plant in Lansing, Michigan, owned by MBI, a non-profit organization owned by Michigan State University (MSU) Foundation. Eggert said the company plans to have a second demonstration plant with a capacity of 600,000 lbs/year next year. A commercial plant with a capacity of 100m lbs/year is expected by 2015.

NEW PRODUCT PIPELINE
Leveraging from its 3-HP/bio-acrylic acid product is the development of acrylamide, a $3bn global market, and fatty acids, a $5bn market opportunity, according to Eggert. Both products are still in the early phase of development although OPXBio is already starting discussions with potential collaboration partners for bio-acrylamide.

OPXBio said they could produce bio-acrylamide using the 3-HP-to-acrylamide route at around 75 cents/lb to $1/lb range compared to current manufacturing cost of $1.50/lb via petroleum-based acrylonitrile process. Key market application for acrylamide is in water treatment polymers, which is a $3bn global market.

The blog was also interested in learning OPXBio's plans to get into the fatty acid market given Solazyme, Amyris and Elevance's presence in this sector. Eggert said it has already been able to demonstrate production on a laboratory scale and that they could produce customized fatty acid chains. An interesting information on this is that their EDGE technology can use carbon dioxide and hydrogen from gasified biomass, solid waste or natural gas as feedstock to produce the fatty acids. It makes me think of the same technology as LanzaTech's.

Hopefully the blog will know more of this development when it hits the pilot/demo scale.