Global Bioenergies and LanzaTech announce the signature of a new collaboration agreement to broaden the feedstock flexibility of Global Bioenergies’ Isobutene process and the product-portfolio of LanzaTech’s carbon capture technology.
French biotech company Global Bioenergies has developed a process in which a microorganism can produce isobutene from renewable feedstock. Whereas the company’s primary focus has historically been to use industrial-grade or waste-derived sugars as feedstocks, the technological maturity of the process now allows to envision a broader range of feedstocks, including non-biomass-derived sources of carbon.
LanzaTech’s carbon recycling technology enables the bio-based transformation of industrial wastes, such as carbon monoxide and/or carbon dioxide and hydrogen, into valuable commodities. Waste gases from the chemistry of steel making, for example, can be captured and recycled into biofuels or chemicals such as acetone and others. LanzaTech (founded in 2005 in New Zealand) is currently building its first commercial facilities, which will produce ethanol from waste steel mill gases. These ethanol facilities will be able to change production to chemicals if desired through application of LanzaTech’s novel microorganisms.
The two companies entered into a collaboration agreement in 2011, with the goal to synergize their technologies, and build microbial strains capable of converting non-sugar feedstock into isobutene. Based on the results obtained during these four years, the two companies have now entered a new collaboration agreement in order to both intensify this cooperation and to develop, an integrated process.
Marc Delcourt, CEO at Global Bioenergies, states: “The diversification of feedstocks will leverage the technology of Global Bioenergies, and will be an important asset for the massive deployment of our technology on the mid-term.”
Jennifer Holmgren, CEO of LanzaTech, states: “The expansion of our synthetic biology portfolio has shown gas fermenting microbes to have the same capabilities as sugar fermenting organisms. We are now able to produce a variety of chemicals from a broad array of gas feedstocks, driving both economic and environmental benefits. »
IL BIOECONOMISTA 