Clariant, a world leader in specialty chemicals, announced Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) Mass Balance supply chain certification for its plant in Gendorf, Germany, in order to meet the increasing demand for sustainable certified palm-based ingredients from customers in the personal care and home care sectors.
U.S. based Virent announced it has successfully received fuel registration from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for its BioForm Gasoline in blends of up to 45%. As a registered fuel, Virent’s biogasoline can now be used in on-highway motor vehicles.
Genomatica, US industrial biotech company, announced that major nylon intermediates – including hexamethylenediamine, caprolactam and adipic acid (HMD, CPL and ADA) – are the focus of its third publicly-disclosed development program.
Genomatica is developing complete process technologies for the biobased production of these intermediates, which it will then license to major firms in the nylon value chain. These three chemicals, with a total market of over $18 billion per year, are used primarily in the production of nylon 6 and nylon 6,6, also referred to as the polyamides PA 6 and PA 6,6.
M&G Chemicals announced that has entered into a Sino-foreign joint venture with Anhui Guozhen CO, Ltd. The new company – Anhui M&G Guozhen Green Refinery CO, Ltd – will employ Proesa technology licensed by Beta Renewables to convert 970,000-1,300,000 metric tons per year of agricultural residues into cellulosic ethanol, glycols and by-products such as lignin in Fuyang City (Anhui Province, PRC).
Tetra Pak U.S. released a new white paper examining the use of materials in packaging that can be regrown or replenished naturally as a solution to the planet’s growing resource scarcity and to sustain the future of the consumer packaged goods industry.
Another brick towards the European Bioeconomy. The European Commission organises from 8 to 9 October in Turin the EU Bioeconomy Stakeholders Conference “From sectors to system, from concept to reality”.
Two years on from the launching of the EU’s Bioeconomy Strategy, Brussels in collaboration with the Italian Presidency analyses the achievements and the opportunities ahead in the two-day conference.
Royal DSM, the global Life Sciences and Materials Sciences company, announces today it has reached agreement to acquire Aland (HK) Holding Limited, a Hong Kong-based company producing vitamin C in mainland China. Financial details will not be disclosed at this time. Subject to customary conditions, the transaction is expected to close in the next six to nine months.
“In order to be commercially successful it is essential to facilitate the introduction of innovative biobased products on the market. This means ensuring the implementation of the Priority Recommendations from the Lead Market Initiative, to boost the uptake of innovative biobased products on the European market. A good example from the US, in this respect, is the Biopreferred programme, which was established to ensure that US policy is aiding sustainable biobased industries to have a competitive edge through public procurement initiatives. Additionally, we need to foster investments through combined financing”. To say this – in this exclusive interview with Il Bioeconomista – is Nathalie Moll, Secretary General of EuropaBio, the European Association for Bioindustries. With Moll we discuss about bioeconomy in Europe and the next edition of EFIB, the European Forum for Industrial Biotechnology and Bio-based economy, which will take place in Reims (France) from 30 September to 2 October. “This years’s EFIB – says Moll – will provide the forum for dynamic discussion around the year’s biggest and best joint ventures, with high profile consumer brands. It will also provide a snapshot of how policy is being put into practice through the most significant developments in scale up of commercial biorefineries around the world”.
Interview by Mario Bonaccorso
Total, one of the world’s leading energy companies, and Amyris, an industrial bioscience company, begin to prepare to market a drop in jet fuel that contains up to 10% blends of renewable farnesane. This new jet fuel blend meets the rigorous performance requirements set for Jet A/A-1 fuel used by the global commercial aviation industry.
Celtic Renewables, the Edinburgh-based biofuel company, has signed an agreement with Europe’s foremost biotechnology pilot facility to undergo next stage testing of its process to turn whisky by-products into biofuel that can power current vehicles. The partnership, which will allow the company to develop its technology at Bio Base Europe Pilot Plant (BBEPP) in Ghent, has been made possible by second round funding worth €1.5million, including more than €1million from the UK Government, to help meet its ambition of growing a new €125 million-a-year industry in the UK.
