Cement Energy and Environment

Major biofuel startups Company Product Investments Current status Synthetic Genomics Algal biofuel $300million from Exxon, Developed some other investments not science, outdoor test disclosed facility to come up soon Sapphire Energy Algal biofuel More than $100 million Has produced synthetic crude from algae, volumes and economics not disclosed Solazyme Oil from algae usi ng plant More than $200 million, feed stock went public in May this year Claims to have developed algae with more than 80% oil content Coskata Ethanol using heat, Not disclosed chemicals and biological processing Amyris Biotechnologies Petrol-like oil using $120 million genetically modified yeast, using plant feedstock like sugarcane LS9 Oil using genetically $75 million modified E coli The sea is hostile environment but marine engineers had been working with several good materials. Sea6 realised that bamboo rafts break because they were rigid structures. A mesh structure that can move at the vertices would absorb the stress quite easily. The company developed an offshore farming system, based on a marine plastics polymer, within six months of incorporation. It has also filed a provisional patent application. The founders are tackling the next steps of finding a biological method to break down the plant into sugars and then converting the sugars into alcohol. Unlike plants, seaweed contains no lignin and is easier to break down. Sea6 needs a microorganism that works in sea water. It has found a few. Converting the sugars into alcohol or other fuels is the easiest task. "Once you have sugars," says KB Ramachandran, professor of biotechnology at liT Madras, who is incubating the company now, "we can make any petrochemical product. " Microalgae work a bit differently as they produce oil directly. When compared to plants and microalgae, the economics and technology are loaded heavily in favour of seaweed. Sugarcane has the highest productivity among plants, but you can get only 30 tonnes of it in a hectare. A similar area can produce 100 tonnes of seaweed. Simple calculations will show that you need an area roughly the size of Punjab to produce all the oil that the country needs using seaweed. Pilot plant for cellulosic ethanol to be ready soon Producing renewable chemicals, building fuel plant in Brazil Developing production plant in Brazil "At the moment, from a technology point of view, seaweed is superior to microalgae," says Syed Yazdani , synthetic biologist and scientist at the International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (ICGEB) at Delhi. Sea6 Energy would need Rs 50- 60 crore over the next four years to develop a farm of one sq km with a demonstration plant that produces ethanol and other petrochemical products. By the then rest of the world would have also made substantial progress, judging from the increasing interest on seaweed. By then we shou ld know whether large-scale seaweed cultivation brings up unforeseen environmental problems. Courtesy: et..e... l nologv@mdiatrmes.com 2