“I expect 30% of jet fuel to be renewable by 2030 and we hope to have at least 1/3 of this market share”. John Melo talks to Il Bioeconomista. In this exclusive interview the President & Ceo of Amyris, the California-based company which has been named the #1 company in the 50 Hottest Companies in the Advanced Bioeconomy (“Hot 50”) contest, talks about his company and the bioeconomy, the role played by the U.S. government and the public opinion. “To me – Melo says – ecology and economy must go together. Producing less CO2 emissions should cost less, not more. When this happens ecology and climate are working in the same direction. What’s good for the planet should be good for business and we are making this a reality”.
Interview by Mario Bonaccorso
The South African Airways Group (SAA) last Friday operated Africa’s first sustainable biofuel flights. The flights on Boeing 737-800s between Johannesburg and Cape Town made history as the first sustainable biofuel flights to have taken place on the African continent. They used home-grown feedstock from the Marble Hall area in the Limpopo region of South Africa as part of Project Solaris, a biofuels project named after the energy tobacco plant used (a technology made in Italy). The nicotine-free, hybridised tobacco plant lends itself to the production of biofuel as the Solaris plant produces small leaves and prodigious flowers and seeds that are crushed to extract a vegetable crude oil. The Solaris plant is ideally suited for this purpose as the remaining seedcake is used as a high protein animal feed supplement that also contributes to food security.
Samsill Corporation today joins Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and an array of biobased stakeholders in Washington, D.C. at the United Soybean Board’s Biobased Stakeholders’ Dialogue held at the USDA headquarters.
