Genomatica Advances the Commercial Readiness of Biomass Feedstocks for Chemicals

Boosts potential for bioprocess plants worldwide; details published in DOE report

Genomatica announced significant progress in harnessing cellulosic biomass for commercial production of high-quality chemicals rather than just fuels. Genomatica’s work sets the stage to increase the range of feedstock choices for making chemicals using biotechnology. Through advances in strain engineering and process design, Genomatica has developed clear guidance for biomass pretreatment technology developers to enable their technologies to work better with commercial bioprocesses for chemicals.

An extended series of trials by Genomatica confirmed major improvements in process performance and the qualification of multiple types of biomass sugars as suitable feedstock. The results advance the prospects for economical production of polymer-grade chemicals from biomass as pretreatment technologies mature toward reaching their cost targets.

As part of the current work, Genomatica developed a ‘sugar specification’ for biomass pretreatment technologies to produce sugars compatible with commercially-proven GENO™ processes; assessed ten technologies against that standard; and demonstrated that at least four can currently produce sugars suitable for commercial production of chemicals from a quality standpoint.

Technical details are available in a March 2015 presentation and June 2015 report. Genomatica’s work was supported in part by grant DE-EE0005002 from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Bioenergy Technologies Office (BETO).

Integrated approach to bioprocess development enabled rapid progress with biomass

In late 2012, Genomatica achieved commercial scale with its GENO BDO™ process, producing thousands of tons of the chemical 1,4-butanediol (BDO) from conventional sugars in just a few weeks. To harness cellulosic biomass effectively required changes to the microorganism and the overall process, including downstream separation and purification unit operations. Changes were guided by Genomatica’s ‘whole-process’ approach to bioprocess development, which is driven by techno-economic analysis and consideration of downstream unit operations, and leads more rapidly to a commercially viable solution.

For an integrated process from biomass to BDO, Genomatica has disclosed results achieved earlier in the project that exceed 120 grams per liter and 3.1 grams per liter per hour. While Genomatica has achieved significantly higher results with conventional commercial carbohydrate feedstocks, our achievements to date bring commercial success with biomass within range.

Built core competence in biomass to chemicals; established industry guideposts; next steps

Genomatica believes that its sugar specification and vendor evaluation is the industry’s most extensive effort at characterizing and enhancing the suitability of pretreatment technologies for non-fuel applications. The results of this effort include:

  • Creating a definitive sugar specification: Genomatica’s spec provides important baseline guidance to biomass pretreatment vendors. The spec documents the specifics of the sugar streams that a pretreatment process needs to meet so it can be used as part of a cost-effective bioprocess for the production of high-quality major chemicals. This eliminates guesswork and gives vendors targets that are more precise than what is required for fuel or ethanol applications.
  • Feedback to multiple pretreatment vendors: Genomatica shared specific feedback with multiple pretreatment vendors, to accelerate their progress toward becoming suitable candidates for use in integrated bioprocesses for chemical production.

Genomatica has begun working with partners on feedstock evaluation programs as initial steps toward potential technology licensing and commercial plant construction using GENO™ process technology with biomass feedstock.

Supporting quotes

“Genomatica’s success with biomass is another step toward providing the industry with ‘best-fit’ feedstock flexibility,” said Christophe Schilling, CEO of Genomatica. “We are pleased to publish the hard data to support our innovation claims, and show that as biomass sugars are produced that meet quality and cost specifications, our technologies are ready to convert those sugars into polymer grade chemicals.”

About Genomatica

Genomatica is a widely-recognized technology leader for the chemical industry. It develops manufacturing processes that enable its licensee partners to produce the world’s most widely-used chemicals a ‘better way,’ from alternative feedstocks, with better economics and greater sustainability than petroleum-based processes.

Genomatica has delivered the industry’s first commercial biobased process for a high-volume intermediate chemical. Its GENO BDO™ process has produced thousands of tons of BDO and been licensed by BASF and Novamont. Multiple large chemical firms have publicly validated quality or described commercialization plans, including Invista (for its well-known Lycra® spandex), DSM, Lanxess, Toray, and Far Eastern New Century.

Genomatica’s biotechnology platform and over 600 patents and applications enable it to develop processes for additional major chemicals. The next is for butadiene, with Versalis and Braskem as partners, and over $100 million in industry support. Genomatica has also announced a program to
develop processes for the production of nylon intermediates, including hexamethylenediamine, caprolactam and adipic acid.

Genomatica has earned tremendous recognition for its innovation and commercialization track record, including the Kirkpatrick Award, for ‘the most noteworthy chemical engineering technology commercialized in the world,’ and the 2015 World Economic Forum Technology Pioneer award.

 

Source

Genomatica, press release, 2015-06-17.

Supplier

BASF SE
Braskem
DOE's Bioenergy Technologies Office (BETO)
DSM
Far Eastern New Century Corporation (FENC)
Geno (formerly Genomatica, Inc.)
Invista
Lanxess AG
Novamont S.p.A.
Toray Industries Inc.
Versalis S.p.A.

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