The third panel of the Energy Crops session focused on “Feedstock Systems and Cropping”.  For myself, and perhaps for others in the audience coming to the field from the perspective of biological training or experience, the subject matter of this panel was unfamiliar, but at times eye-opening, and clearly important for the commercial use of energy crops in biofuel manufacture. The presentations were devoted to discussions of the ways in which the yield of biofuel from various plant feedstocks can be negatively affected by certain common cropping, harvesting and processing practices, and how these can be overcome to increase fuel yield. The first speaker was Gavin Maxwell of Coolfin Partnership, who discussed the need to minimize “pre-farmgate” costs and waste in the harvesting and processing of energy feedstocks. His particular example was the use of Miscanthus canes to yield pellets for use in bioenergy production, where seemingly routine practices like the mechanical chopping of the canes to create the pellets can result in potentially significant economic losses due to abrasion of the cutting blades, resulting in contamination of the pellets with metal particles, thus reducing the efficiency of the pellets for their intended end use. John Finnan, of the Irish agriculture and food development authority Teagasc, then discussed similar types of losses or potential adverse economic effects resulting from harvesting practices, also focused on Miscanthus. Finnan reported on direct harvest losses (e.g. the amount of biomass left on the ground after harvesting) as well as indirect losses (e.g. yield decreases caused by compacting of the soil by harvesters and other farm machinery). Finally, Lucy Hopwood of the National Non-Food Crops Centre (NNFCC), the U.K.’s national center for biorenewable energy, fuels and materials, discussed a number of factors negatively affecting the logistics and efficiency of energy crop utilization, for example the fact that energy crops are not always grown in the areas where they are most needed for energy generation, thus increasing transportation costs and harming the bottom line. Together, this panel made a compelling case that, although the impact of any one of these many factors may be small, together they can add up to significant yield decreases, and concomitant economic disadvantage, for the growers and processors of energy crops. 

The fourth and final panel of the session was devoted to “New Generation Plant Biotech”. My talk led off the session, and I presented an overview of the approaches being taken to apply genetic engineering and other advanced biotechnologies to the improvement of energy crops. I have already previewed my talk elsewhere in this blog, and the slides from my presentation are now available at my SlideShare site, so I won’t describe my talk here. There were planned to be three additional speakers on the panel, but the speaker from Kaiima was unable to attend, and so we heard presentations only from FuturaGene and Life Technologies. Stanley Hirsch of FuturaGene gave a broad overview of his company’s activities in developing improved energy crops, particularly including improved varieties of Eucalyptus, which FuturaGene has been field testing in Brazil and elsewhere in the world. He described some of the company’s strategies to enhance the growth rate of these crops, as well as to enhance the availability of free cellulose molecules in plant tissue to better enable digestion of the biomass in the preprocessing stages of cellulosic ethanol production. The final speaker was Nathan Wood of Life Technologies, who discussed his company’s activities in cutting-edge genomics as they applied to the biofuels sector, including the company’s work with SG Biofuels in sequencing the Jatropha genome. 

This last panel concluded a long and rewarding day of interesting presentations, discussing research and innovations taking place along various stages of the life cycle of energy crops as they are used to produce biofuels. I won’t be blogging about any of the other sessions at the World Biofuels Markets conference, but I found the conference to be quite useful in exposing participants to so many different aspects of the biofuels business, including in my case exposure to issues relating to international fuel standards and sustainability standards as they apply to the production of biofuels, which I expect will be useful to me in the future. 

D. Glass Associates, Inc. is a consulting company specializing in several fields of biotechnology. David Glass, Ph.D. is a veteran of nearly thirty years in the biotech industry, with expertise in patents, technology licensing, industrial biotechnology regulatory affairs, and market and technology assessments. This blog provides back-up and expanded content to complement a presentation Dr. Glass made at the EUEC 2010 conference on February 2, 2010 entitled “Prospects for the Use of Genetic Engineering in Biofuel Production.” The slides from that presentation, along with more information on D. Glass Associates’ regulatory affairs consulting capabilities, are available at www.slideshare.net/djglass99 or at www.dglassassociates.com. The views expressed in this blog are those of Dr. Glass and D. Glass Associates and do not represent the views of any other organization with which Dr. Glass is affiliated.

According to the conference website, the World Biofuels Markets conference is “a 3 day ’one stop shop’ [that will] assemble the entire biofuels value chain and accelerate the commercialization of sustainable mobility”. The conference features three days of concurrent sessions on topics including bioethanol, military biofuels, aviation biofuels, advanced biofuels, algae, energy crops, and several sessions on the economic and business aspects of the biofuel business. The meeting is being held at the World Trade Center in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, a modern well-equipped facility for professional conferences right in the bustling downtown area of the city. As I write this entry, the conference is winding down, with just one session of panels to go before the meeting concludes. 

The Energy Crops session consisted of four panels over the course of the day on Tuesday, March 22. The first panel, “High Powered Energy Crops” featured discussion of new feedstocks such as switchgrass, Miscanthus and others. Caroline Midgley of LMC International began the session with a talk entitled “Can energy crops compete with residues and woody biomass”, a presentation based on economic analysis conducted by her firm. The conclusions of the study were that most countries have adequate existing supplies of biomass that can be used to generate biofuels (e.g. agricultural residues, forest biomass), and that dedicated energy crops may “struggle to compete” with such biofuel feedstocks. However, the study did conclude that energy crops may offer better potential for cost reductions in the future. Neal Gutterson, CEO of Mendel Biotechnology, then spoke about his company’s efforts to develop the high-biomass grassy species Miscanthus as an energy crop. The germplasm of Miscanthus that is currently used is a sterile hybrid of two species, and must be propagated from rootstock or rhizomes. Mendel’s approach is to develop a system where Miscanthus could instead be sold as seeds, and they have done this by creating a fertile tetraploid strain of this crop, from which significant yield increases have been seen. Gutterson also spoke of the company’s other strain development efforts and their programs to assess and assure the sustainability of their products. The final speaker of the panel was Tania de Grave-Curado of AgrenNewEnergy, that is developing a novel oilseed crop, crambe (Crambe abyssinica) that offers some potential advantages for use as a biodiesel feedstock, such as a short growing season (90 days to harvest) and lower water requirements than other crops. Although some of those in attendance were familiar with crambe, it was a new crop to most of us (myself included), and there was good audience discussion of these presentations. 

The second panel focused solely on Jatropha as an emerging energy crop, with speakers from the Jatropha Alliance, SG Biofuels, JOil, and D1 Oils. All the speakers discussed the need for universally-accepted industry standards for the development of this crop as well as the efforts to develop such standards. Sriram Srinivasan of JOil was the first speaker, and he discussed the company’s activities in developing Jatropha varieties with improved oil yield per hectare. The company is using traditional breeding as well as biotechnology to develop improved varieties. Thilo Zelt, the president of the Jatropha Alliance, next spoke about the efforts of his organization to promote standards for the prudent and sustainable use of Jatropha in the production of biofuels. Among other efforts, the Alliance is adopting the newly-released program of the Roundtable for Sustainable Biofuels (see below) for a self-certification process for sustainable biofuel production, and also relies on the RFTO standard from the UK for the assessment of CO₂ emissions and carbon balance. The next speaker was Miguel Motta of SG Biofuels, who set out the company’s three-fold goal of addressing “Energy, Economics and Execution”. Motta said that Jatropha is currently economically viable and that the company’s JMax 100 variety is capable of producing fuel at $58 per barrel with additional improvement to $31 per barrel possible. SG Biofuels is also developing a hybrid seed technology for Jatropha. The final speaker on this panel was Henk Joos of Quinvita, a Jatropha producer that was recently spun out of D1 Oils. Joos discussed his company’s efforts to develop different Jatropha strains that are appropriate for each growing region and the need to “professionalize” Jatropha as biofuel crop. This panel generated a vigorous audience discussion, which focused on critical issues facing Jatropha’s role as a viable energy crop. 

The remaining panels of the Energy Crops session focused on “Feedstock Systems and Cropping” and “New Generation Plant Biotech”, and I will summarize these panels in the next blog entry in the next day or so. 

As a final note, there was a great deal of discussion throughout the conference regarding sustainability issues and the increasing effort to develop programs and procedures for certification of sustainability. As noted above, the Roundtable for Sustainable Biofuels recently announced its program for sustainability certification, and many of the talks at the meeting touched on this issue in one way or another.

D. Glass Associates, Inc. is a consulting company specializing in several fields of biotechnology. David Glass, Ph.D. is a veteran of nearly thirty years in the biotech industry, with expertise in patents, technology licensing, industrial biotechnology regulatory affairs, and market and technology assessments. This blog provides back-up and expanded content to complement a presentation Dr. Glass made at the EUEC 2010 conference on February 2, 2010 entitled “Prospects for the Use of Genetic Engineering in Biofuel Production.” The slides from that presentation, along with more information on D. Glass Associates’ regulatory affairs consulting capabilities, are available at www.slideshare.net/djglass99 or at www.dglassassociates.com. The views expressed in this blog are those of Dr. Glass and D. Glass Associates and do not represent the views of any other organization with which Dr. Glass is affiliated.

The conference website describes the World Biofuels Market conference as “a 3 day ’one stop shop’ [that will] assemble the entire biofuels value chain and accelerate the commercialization of sustainable mobility”. The conference features three days of concurrent sessions on topics including bioethanol, military biofuels, aviation biofuels, advanced biofuels, algae, energy crops, and several sessions on the economic and business aspects of the biofuel business. The Energy Crops session consists of four panels over the course of the day on Tuesday, March 22. The first session, “High Powered Energy Crops” will discuss new feedstocks such as switchgrass, miscanthus and camelina. The second session will focus solely on jatropha as an emerging energy crop, with scheduled speakers from the Jatropha Alliance, SG Biofuels, JOil, and D1 Oils. The first session of the afternoon will be on “Feedstock Systems and Cropping” and will focus on agricultural and agronomic techniques to improve yields of energy crops. The final session of the day will be devoted to “next generation plant biotech” and the role of plant science and genetics to influence energy crop development. My talk will be at this last session, and I’ll be presenting an overview of the potential uses of biotechnology to improve the plant species used as feedstocks for biofuel production. I’ll be accompanied on this panel by speakers from companies currently conducting such R&D. 

My talk will begin with an overview of the crop species that are considered for use as energy crops and the genetic engineering technologies that may be applicable to these plant species. In recent years, many academic research labs and companies have been applying genetic engineering or other advanced biological technologies to improve plants to create specially-tailored feedstocks for production of biofuels. There are several excellent review articles providing more comprehensive scientific reviews of research in this field, such as Sticklen 2006; Torney et al. 2007; Gressel 2007; Sticklen 2008; Weng et al. 2008; Hinchee et al. 2009; Hisano et al. 2009; Abramson et al. 2010 (Plant Science 178:61-72); Vega-Sanchez and Ronald 2010, and Simmons et al. 2010, among others. 

Techniques for genetic engineering of plants have been well-established for over twenty-five years, with the earliest methods for transforming dicotyledonous plants being developed in the mid-to-late 1980s and methods for transforming monocots (including most of the world’s important cereal crops) arriving several years later. Among the techniques available are the use of Agrobacterium, a microorganism naturally having the ability to inject its DNA into plant cells; electroporation, in which the DNA is transported into plant cells using electric current; and the “gene gun”, where DNA is adhered to extremely small nanospheres which are shot at high velocity into the cells. Today, virtually any plant species of any agricultural or industrial importance can be genetically engineered. 

Although I won’t be discussing the choice of feedstock in any level of detail, the following are the species that are most often considered as energy crops: 

Sugar- or Starch-Based (for Ethanol, butanol)

First Generation

• Corn
• Sugarcane
• Sugar Beet
• Sorghum

Second Generation

• Switchgrass
• Miscanthus
• Eucalyptus
• Willow, Hybrid Poplar

Oilseed (for Biodiesel)

First Generation

• Soybean
• Canola/Oilseed Rape

Second Generation

• Jatropha
• Camelina
• Castor Beans

The bulk of the talk will consist of descriptions of the most common strategies to use advanced biotechnology to improve energy crops. Although time constraints will require this to be a fairly brief overview, I’ll present some specific examples of companies and academic labs that are pursuing these strategies. These strategies are as follows. 

Enhancing substrate concentration

• —  Engineer oilseed crops to have altered or enhanced lipid content
• —  Engineer cellulosic crops to increase polysaccharide levels

Enhancing feedstock digestibility

• —  Improve or optimize enzymatic degradation of cellulosic feedstock
• —  Decrease or modify concentrations of lignins, other recalcitrant compounds

Increasing biomass or crop yield

• —  increasing plant growth rates
• —  insect or herbicide resistance
• —  drought tolerance

Plant genomics to aid breeding, genetic engineering

Use genetically modified plants to manufacture industrial enzymes

I’ll also present a list of the companies that are known to be using recombinant DNA or other advanced biotechnologies to improve energy feedstocks. I’ve previously profiled these companies in earlier entries in my blog – in a series of three entries beginning here, as well as an additional entry late last year profiling several other companies. 

In the next section of the talk, I’ll briefly summarize the impact of biotechnology regulations on these efforts to improve energy crops using biotechnology. This part of the talk will also deal with ground that I’ve covered in earlier entries in the blog, with several entries on U.S. regulation of transgenic plants, and others on the situation in Canada and Europe. I remain optimistic that improved energy crops can successfully navigate the regulatory process in countries like the U.S. and Canada, and that government regulation will not present an impossible roadblock to the industry. The recent, long-awaited U.S. approval for Syngenta’s corn variety expressing a thermostable amylase is an encouraging development. However, I hope to have time in the talk to at least mention the strong dissenting opinion that was put forward by Steven Strauss and colleagues at Oregon State University, in a provocative article in BioScience in October 2010. Strauss et al contend that the level of regulation imposed on transgenic plants in the U.S. and elsewhere is excessive and is not justified by scientific considerations, and these authors view these regulatory schemes as having, in the words of the title of their article “far-reaching deleterious impacts” on research with engineered perennial biofuel crops. 

Finally, I’ll conclude the talk with some very brief observations on the prospects for commercial success of engineered energy crops, and the obstacles they may face in reaching the market. 

I’ll be posting my slides after the talk, and will post a link in a blog entry shortly after the conference. I also hope to be blogging during or shortly after the conference to report on any interesting news or information that I may learn on topics relevant to the focus of this blog. As always, please feel free to comment or contact me with any questions you may have. 

D. Glass Associates, Inc. is a consulting company specializing in several fields of biotechnology. David Glass, Ph.D. is a veteran of nearly thirty years in the biotech industry, with expertise in patents, technology licensing, industrial biotechnology regulatory affairs, and market and technology assessments. This blog provides back-up and expanded content to complement a presentation Dr. Glass made at the EUEC 2010 conference on February 2, 2010 entitled “Prospects for the Use of Genetic Engineering in Biofuel Production.” The slides from that presentation, along with more information on D. Glass Associates’ regulatory affairs consulting capabilities, are available at www.slideshare.net/djglass99 or at www.dglassassociates.com. The views expressed in this blog are those of Dr. Glass and D. Glass Associates and do not represent the views of any other organization with which Dr. Glass is affiliated.

I’ve briefly described this product in an earlier entry in this blog. Originally known by the internal product name “Corn [Maize] event 3272”, this line was developed using recombinant DNA technology to introduce into corn the amy797E gene and the pmi marker gene. The amy797E gene is derived from alpha-amylase genes from three hyperthermophilic microorganisms of the archaeal order Thermococcales, and it encodes a thermostable AMY797E alpha-amylase enzyme which catalyses the hydrolysis of starch by cleaving the internal alpha-1,4-glucosidic bonds into dextrins, maltose and glucose. The pmi gene from Escherichia coli encodes the phosphomannose isomerase (PMI) enzyme, which allows the plant to utilize mannose as a carbon source. The company’s press release announcing the approval describes the product and its importance as follows:

By enabling expression of an optimized alpha-amylase enzyme directly in corn, dry grind ethanol production can be improved in a way that can be easily integrated into existing infrastructure.  “Enogen corn seed offers growers an opportunity to cultivate a premium specialty crop. It is a breakthrough product that provides U.S. ethanol producers with a proven means to generate more gallons of ethanol from their existing facilities,” said Davor Pisk, Chief Operating Officer. “Enogen corn also reduces the energy and water consumed in the production process while substantially reducing carbon emissions.”

This action has important implications for several reasons. As mentioned above, it is the first U.S. approval for commercial use of a genetically engineered plant variety specifically designed for biofuel production (although in May 2010 USDA did grant the biotechnology company Arborgen a significant permit for expanded field testing of transgenic Eucalyptus varieties as improved energy crops, but that permit was only for experimental field testing, not commercial use and sale). Although, as noted in Syngenta’s press release, the corn amylase trait in Enogen had already been approved for import into Australia, Canada, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, Philippines, Russia and Taiwan, and for cultivation in Canada, the U.S. regulatory approval had been pending since 2005, and followed multiple years of field testing at numerous plots around the country and the world. I’ve described this long history and USDA’s environmental assessment of Enogen corn in an earlier blog entry. The history of agricultural biotechnology regulation is replete with examples where pioneering applicants proposing the first of a new type of product have often been subjected to long regulatory review times and some amount of regulatory uncertainty, but where after the initial approval the path was cleared for subsequent applicants of similar products. As I’ve described in prior entries in the blog, there are a good number of companies developing transgenic plants as improved biofuel feedstocks, including several other efforts to develop energy crops expressing biodegradative enzymes in planta to improve the efficiency and economics of feedstock processing, and it is good to know that developers of such products can now see the roadmap to regulatory approval in the U.S. 

USDA’s decision on the Syngenta decision comes hard on the heels of two other long-awaited biotechnology regulatory decisions, the January 27, 2011 decision to fully deregulate Roundup® Ready alfalfa and the February 4, 2011 decision to partially deregulate Roundup® Ready sugar beets, both of which had been the subject of protracted legal action. Over the past two or more years, it has seemed that the Biotechnology Regulatory Services (BRS) branch of USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) has been (understandably) paralyzed by these ongoing legal challenges, and had seemed to put on hold deregulation petitions for numerous biotech crops as well as the agency’s effort first proposed in 2007 to rewrite the biotechnology regulations. Although each of these recent decisions may yet be subject to further legal challenge, it is good to see the logjam breaking somewhat with these three decisions being issued early enough in the year to apply to the 2011 growing season. 

Finally, the Enogen approval is noteworthy for its several commercial implications. It will be the first transgenic plant variety to be sold in the U.S. as a dedicated energy crop, which will make its ultimate commercial success a bellwether for other companies developing similar products. Perhaps more importantly are the conditions that Syngenta will place on its use in 2011. According to the company’s press release, production of Enogen corn will be managed using a contracted, closed production system, through which the company plans to sell the seeds to only a small number of corn growers in close proximity to the ethanol production facilities that will process the corn, in preparation for larger scale commercial introduction in 2012.  Such a “closed loop” system serves two purposes. It addresses the concern expressed by many biotech opponents as well as corn millers and others in the food industry over the disruption to food supplies that could arise if the amylase corn is inadvertently found in food supplies. As reported in the New York Times on February 11, 2011, Syngenta’s own data has apparently indicated that as little as one amylase corn kernel mixed with 10,000 conventional kernels could be enough to weaken the corn starch and disrupt food processing operations. Syngenta’s response is that the enzyme is not active when the kernel is intact and is most active at higher temperatures and at certain levels of acidity and moisture found in ethanol factories but rarely in factories that make corn starch, corn syrup or corn chips. Having a closed loop arrangement where growers are contracted to grow the corn and sell it to ethanol producers puts in place a system where the transgenic corn is segregated and kept separate from corn grain that will be used for animal feed or human food processing, to try to avoid as best as possible any inadvertent contamination of food corn with the amylase-expressing corn (although, as noted in the New York Times article, the alpha-amylase expressed in Enogen corn has already been approved for food use by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, and this should to some extent lessen the concern over inadvertent contamination). 

But the closed loop system is also important for other commercial reasons. Presumably, Enogen corn seed will be sold at a premium over other, traditional corn varieties, but the harvested corn should command a higher price than traditional corn when sold to ethanol producers. In order for growers to be sure of getting that higher price for their crop in return for paying the higher price for seed, some guaranteed form of segregation would be needed. In fact, such a model seems to be critical for the future success of all plant species (conventional or transgenic) that are being developed as dedicated energy crops – in most cases the developer will need to sell seed at a premium (e.g. to recoup R&D costs) and so the grower must be guaranteed of being able to sell the crop to the fuel producers at a higher cost.  So, Syngenta’s experience with its closed loop system may be an indicator of the success that similar such models will face in the coming years. 

Although it has been a long, hard path for Syngenta to win this approval, and although roadblocks may yet lie ahead, this can only be a positive development for the many other companies developing transgenic plants as improved biofuel feedstocks. I’ll be watching and commenting on future regulatory developments as they may arise. 

D. Glass Associates, Inc. is a consulting company specializing in several fields of biotechnology. David Glass, Ph.D. is a veteran of nearly thirty years in the biotech industry, with expertise in industrial biotechnology regulatory affairs, patents, technology licensing, and market and technology assessments. This blog provides back-up and expanded content to complement a presentation Dr. Glass made at the EUEC 2010 conference on February 2, 2010 entitled “Prospects for the Use of Genetic Engineering in Biofuel Production,” and will also complement Dr. Glass’s upcoming presentation on uses of biotechnology to improve the plant species used as feedstocks for biofuel production, at the “Energy Crops” session  at the World Biofuels Market conference in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, on March 22, 2011. Slides from Dr. Glass’s presentations, along with more information on D. Glass Associates’ regulatory affairs consulting capabilities, are available at www.slideshare.net/djglass99 or at www.dglassassociates.com.

The Energy Crops session consists of four panels over the course of the day on Tuesday, March 22. The first session, “High Powered Energy Crops” will discuss new feedstocks such as switchgrass, miscanthus and camelina. The second session will focus solely on jatropha as an emerging energy crop, with scheduled speakers from the Jatropha Alliance, SG Biofuels, Joil, and D1 Oils. The first session of the afternoon will be on “Feedstock Systems and Cropping” and will focus on agricultural and agronomic techniques to improve yields of energy crops. The final session of the day will be devoted to “next generation plant biotech” and the role of plant science and genetics to influence energy crop development. 

At this last session, I’ll be presenting a talk giving an overview of the potential uses of biotechnology to improve the plant species used as feedstocks for biofuel production. For this talk, I’d appreciate receiving information on company activities or recently published academic research involving uses of transgenic plants or other applications of biotechnology for the enhancement of biofuel feedstocks. If you have any such information, you can post it as a Comment on this blog entry, or e-mail it to me. 

As I work on my talk, I hope to post occasional blog entries to preview my presentation, and of course I’ll be posting my slides after the talk, and will post a link in a blog entry shortly after the conference. I also hope to be blogging during or shortly after the conference to report on any interesting news or information that I may learn on topics relevant to the focus of this blog. As always, please feel free to comment or contact me with any questions you may have. 

D. Glass Associates, Inc. is a consulting company specializing in several fields of biotechnology. David Glass, Ph.D. is a veteran of nearly thirty years in the biotech industry, with expertise in patents, technology licensing, industrial biotechnology regulatory affairs, and market and technology assessments. This blog provides back-up and expanded content to complement a presentation Dr. Glass is making at the EUEC 2010 conference on February 2, 2010 entitled “Prospects for the Use of Genetic Engineering in Biofuel Production.” The slides from that presentation, along with more information on D. Glass Associates’ regulatory affairs consulting capabilities, are available at www.slideshare.net/djglass99 or at www.dglassassociates.com.

Today’s posting will focus on companies developing modified plant varieties for use as biofuel feedstocks. This is a topic I may revisit in the blog in the coming months, because I have been asked to chair a session on “Energy Crops” at the 2011 World Biofuels Market Conference in Rotterdam in March. So far it is shaping up as a diverse, interesting set of presentations, and for my own talk, I’m planning to present an overview of the plant biotechnology strategies that are being used to improve energy feedstocks.  I welcome comments and suggestions about this topic in the months leading up to the March 22, 2011 session.

A large number of companies are using advanced biotechnology to improve the plant varieties that are, or might be, used as feedstocks to produce renewable fuels like ethanol or biodiesel. Many of these companies were profiled in a series of earlier blog entries, beginning at http://wp.me/pKTxe-1p.  The following are profiles of additional companies in this sector. The profiles have been adapted or excerpted from company websites and/or other publicly available information, and I don’t assume any liability for the accuracy, comprehensiveness or use of the information.

Abba Gaia is a Spanish company formed on April 2, 2008 to use biotechnology to help improve the environment.  Abba Gaia’s main business is using Nicotiana glauca for phytoremediation, and has R&D programs directed at genetic engineering to improve the plant’s ability to remove heavy metals and other contaminants from soil, water and sludge. According to the company’s website it is active in several other industrial sectors, including “renewable energy”, but the website offers no specifics about activities in the energy sector. However, in 2010, in a notification submitted to the EU, the company proposed a field test in Spain of Nicotiana glauca genetically modified as an energy crop (Notification B/ES/10/50, Spain, published 24 June 2010). According to this notification, the genetic material inserted into Nicotiana glauca is the wheat phytochelatin synthase gene under the control of the 35S promoter of cauliflower mosaic virus, to provide phytochelatin synthase and phytochelatins overexpression in the plant, along with a gene conferring resistance to the antibiotic kanamycin for selection of transformed plants. The goal of this field test is to evaluate the genetically modified line for biomass production under different cultivation situations .

Catchlight Energy is a joint venture between Chevron and Weyerhaeuser, formed in February 2008 to commercialize large scale production of liquid transportation fuels from sustainable forest-based resources. The plan was to leverage the strengths of both companies: Weyerhaeuser’s expertise in innovative land stewardship, resource management and capacity to deliver sustainable cellulose-based feedstocks at scale, and Chevron’s technology capabilities in molecular conversion, product engineering, advanced fuel manufacturing and fuels distribution. The joint venture reflects the parent companies’ shared view that cellulosic biofuels can fill an important role in diversifying the nation’s energy sources and addressing global climate change by providing a source of low-carbon transportation fuel.

Catchlight Energy’s vision is to become a major integrated producer of biofuels derived from non-food sources and to deliver renewable transportation products produced from biomass in a manner that is scalable and sustainable — both environmentally and economically. By focusing on researching and commercializing technology, Catchlight Energy hopes to help the U.S. make the move to the next generation of biofuels. The company’s research addresses a range of products including ethanol as well as gasoline and diesel hydrocarbons, and its commercial business model is expected to involve multiple pathways based on combinations of biological, chemical and thermochemical process steps.

Building on the strengths and core competencies of its parent companies, Catchlight’s R&D program is aimed at discovering, developing and/or licensing third party developed technology solutions for converting forest-based feedstocks to liquid transportation fuels. This strategy will likely involve cooperation with key technology partners having complementary interests and technology. The company says there are two main thrusts to its current research efforts: a near term focus on early commercialization opportunities for producing ethanol and a longer term focus on direct conversion of biomass to hydrocarbons. While there is a large and ready market for ethanol today, the company thinks it will be important for longer term success to expand its product portfolio to include hydrocarbons like gasoline and diesel, fuels that are fully compatible with the existing infrastructure.

Catchlight Energy intends to utilize the potential of forests to produce biomass in a sustainable manner while still maintaining supply for traditional forest products. Specifically, perennials, short rotation trees, understory crops and residuals to supplement high-value timber can be used for emerging biofuels markets, and such purpose-grown energy crops can be grown in conjunction with high-value timber. The plan is to grow alternating strips of trees and energy crops. The energy crops can be harvested annually while the trees are managed for wood products and fiber. The company will develop large-scale production capability by leveraging Weyerhaeuser’s strengths in managing large-scale ecosystems, its experience with harvest, handling and transport infrastructure, and its expertise in genetic improvement (e.g. to improve yield, product quality). The company will also aim to scale up their processes so that cellulosic ethanol can be produced in a manner that is scalable and sustainable — both environmentally and economically. In this regard, the company will capitalize on Weyerhaeuser’s vast land holdings, Chevron’s large fuel infrastructure, and the development of a cost-effective end-to-end business model, to enable the company to produce significant quantities of cellulosic biofuels.

Idén Biotechnology was founded in 2005 by members of the Carbohydrate Metabolism Research Group at the Agrobiotechnology Institute of the Spanish National Research Council. The company’s goal has been the generation, transfer, exploitation and marketing of innovative agricultural biotechnology knowledge. The company’s founding scientific team has expertise in plant and bacterial carbohydrate metabolism knowledge at a physiological, biochemical and molecular level, and have used this expertise to develop new industrial raw materials which the company says are applicable to the energy, paper, biomaterials and pharmaceutical sectors. Specific areas of research focus as the development of new plant-derived raw materials based on manipulation of carbohydrate metabolism, with applications in bioenergy, food, feed and biomaterials, or through modifications in secondary metabolism to address markets including agriculture, food, feed and biomaterials.

Among the company’s activities in the energy sector, Iden submitted a notification to EU regulatory authorities for a field test in Spain of maize plants engineered for modified lignification with the goal of improving digestibility for bioethanol production. According to Notification  B/ES/10/40, published 23 March 2010, the company planned a small field test of corn in which the gene encoding cinnamyl alcohol dehydrogenase (CAD), an enzyme which is involved in lignin production in the plant, was knocked down using RNA interference. In CAD-RNAi expressing plants, the enzyme CAD was shown to be inactivated. In greenhouse experiments, CAD-RNAi expressing plants showed altered lignin production and an increase in degradability for the production of ethanol in vitro as compared with wild type corn plants. The company hopes that field tests will establish that residual biomass of these plants could be of great agronomic value for more efficient ethanol fermentation.

Naturally Scientific plans to use waste CO₂ to bio-manufacture fermentable sugars and pure vegetable oil from plant cell cultures to provide sustainable feedstock for bio-diesel, ethanol and “drop-in” synthetic fuel producers. In April 2010, Naturally Scientific CEO Geoff Dixon said that his company had signed its first five commercial installations, a series of five $50 million projects that would be erected in China over the next five years. In May 2010, the company announced further details about its patented solution for converting waste CO₂, water and light in a photosynthetic reaction to grow palisade layer plant cell culture to produce low-cost sugar – glucose and sucrose. This natural sugar can be sold in crystallized or concentrated liquid syrup form or alternatively it is used in a second process as the necessary carbon source for vacuole cells of rapeseed (or other oil seeds) to produce pure vegetable oils and their valuable derivatives. Naturally Scientific says that its technology absorbs and fixes between 90% and 100% of the CO₂ passed through it, and in using plant cell cultures, the resulting products can be produced in a safe and sustainable way that results in no indirect land use change or deforestation. Naturally Scientific has constructed a demonstration plant in Nottingham, UK which it expected to be fully operational by the end of May 2010, producing both sugars and oils. The plant is a scaled down version of a 500,000 gallon plant proving the technology, automated process control systems, yields and unit economics at commercial-scale. The company is planning a business model based on out-licensing its technology to other companies.

D. Glass Associates, Inc. is a consulting company specializing in several fields of biotechnology. David Glass, Ph.D. is a veteran of nearly thirty years in the biotech industry, with expertise in industrial biotechnology regulatory affairs, patents, technology licensing, and market and technology assessments. This blog provides back-up and expanded content to complement a presentation Dr. Glass made at the EUEC 2010 conference on February 2, 2010 entitled “Prospects for the Use of Genetic Engineering in Biofuel Production.” The slides from that presentation and Dr. Glass’ September 2010 talk on biotechnology regulations from the Algae Biomass Summit, along with more information on D. Glass Associates’ regulatory affairs consulting capabilities, are available at www.slideshare.net/djglass99 or at www.dglassassociates.com.

A number of companies are reported to be using advanced biotechnology to improve the algal strains that are, or might be, used to produce renewable fuels like biodiesel, jet biofuel, or ethanol. Many of these companies were profiled in an earlier blog entry. The following are profiles of three additional companies in this sector, which have been adapted or excerpted from company websites and/or other publicly available information, and I don’t assume any liability for the accuracy, comprehensiveness or use of the information. 

Photon8 is a Brownsville, Texas based company that is utilizing what it calls a “financials-first” strategy, to enable technology developments capable of 100-fold reductions in capital and operating expenses for the production of fuels from algae. Locating in Brownsville gives the company access to optimal algal growth conditions and a partnership with the University of Texas-Brownsville, where the company operates its offices and labs in the university’s “International Innovation Center”.  The company has not said much publicly about its technology strategies, but it has said that it is using genetic technologies to enhance the ability of algae to produce lipids; it is developing a Parallel Film Reactor (PFR^sm), with “Traveling Wave Technology” that will offer closed-system performance at lesser cost than an open system and which makes full use of injected CO₂; and that it is developing strategies to remove lipids from the algae without dewatering and without killing the cell, and thereby allowing reuse of algal cells.

In October 2010, the company announced that it has succeeded in producing “drop-in” fuel components from its genetically improved algae, as determined by an outside laboratory using gas chromatography analysis for determining carbon chain length and degree of saturation. The company’s president and CEO, Brad Bartilson, has been quoted as saying “the process is simpler than those who propose producing ‘green crude’ and sending it through an oil refinery hydrotreating system. We have already achieved the productivity of 5600 gal/acre/year, and most importantly, within our confines of under $10/m², leading to a cost of jet fuel components of less than $1.50/gallon.”

TransAlgae was founded in 2008 to commercialize biotechnologies based on development and breeding of transgenic algae to enable its cost-effective conversion into oil, protein and other co-products. TransAlgae is a registered USA company, with a research center located at the Weizmann Science Park in Rehovot, Israel. TransAlgae believes that undomesticated algae are incapable of providing cost-effective production solutions to the world’s needs, just as wild plants cannot produce foods. The company believes that meeting  feed and fossil fuel needs for both the long term and short term can only come by domesticating algae with the requisite genes by genetic engineering, to enable algae to fix large amounts of carbon dioxide into biological molecules, such as carbohydrates, protein and oil with favorable economics.

TransAlgae hopes to build the framework for algal biofuel and animal feed using genetic engineering combined with practical agricultural, industrial and economic approaches. The company’s scientific team has completed its first generation of transgenic algae, and is further developing its marine algae platform to be resistant to contamination by other algae and other organisms, reducing downtime in production facilities, as well introducing genetic failsafe mechanisms that preclude the transgenic algae from reproducing in natural ecosystems. In addition to higher productivity, the company says that genetic approach enables rapid growth, and the production of multiple high-quality products.

TransAlgae has developed novel technologies for gene insertion, has introduced into algae genes encoding resistance to herbicides that can be used to control wild algae and cyanobacteria using sub micromolar levels, and is introducing genes that control other contaminants as well as genes that prevent establishment of the transgenic algae in natural environments. On top of this platform TransAlgae is adding genes for improved protein content as well as genes encoding expensive feed additives, while modifying the algae to increase digestibility. TransAlgae is developing strains that are appropriate for different environments and system designs. By developing strains for a matrix of climates, resources and co-products, the company hopes to be able to rapidly deploy stocks worldwide, allowing its partners to meet demand and respond to changing market conditions.

In November 2009, TransAlgae announced that it had  signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Endicott Biofuels, LLC, a Houston-based, next-generation biodiesel producer, for the development of algae as a potential transportation fuel and renewable chemical feedstock source.

Viral Genetics is a biotechnology company whose primary business is the discovery and development of  immune-based therapies for HIV and AIDS using a proprietary thymus nuclear protein compound. Founded in 2000, the biotech company is researching treatments for HIV/AIDS, Lyme Disease, Strep, Staph and drug resistant tumors. The company has recently announced an expansion of its efforts to encompass work in algal biofuels. Company advisor Dr. M. Karen Newell originally of the University of Colorado and now at the Texas AgriLife Research Blacklands campus, has discovered a trigger that increases oil or lipid production in plant cells, which leads to the possibility that plant or algal cells can be manipulated to produce more oil. Viral Genetics has licensed the right to develop commercial applications for Newell’s biofuel discoveries. Newell recently received a $750,000 grant from the Texas Emerging Technology Fund to expand research into developing plant-based fuels. Viral Genetics has the exclusive right to develop commercial applications for this technology.  The company’s CEO Haig Keledjian was quoted as saying, “this grant validates an exciting line of research into increasing yields of plant oils including algae bio-fuel and agricultural oils such as palm or corn oil,” and company advisor John Sheehan has said, “Viral Genetics is in the right place at the right time with this technology. Identifying and controlling the trigger for lipid production in algae has long been the holy grail of algal biofuels technology. Many big players are working in this field, and whoever is first to translate such a discovery into an economic process will leap frog to the front of the pack.”  

Breaking News: On December 7, 2010, just a day after I originally posted this blog entry, Viral Genetics announced that it has launched a subsidiary called VG Energy, Inc. to market the biofuel technology that I’ve described above. This subsidiary is majority-owned by Viral Genetics and its current shareholders, and Viral Genetics’ CEO Haig Keledjian will serve as CEO of the new subsidiary. According to the company’s press release, VG Energy will be marketing an algae-enhancing technology (described above) which the company says has been shown to increase the yield of oil production from algae by as much as 300%. Dr. Newell-Rogers said, “Our research seems to indicate that we can trigger plant cells to increase their fat stores. We can manipulate plant cells so that they store oil and eventually release those reserves instead of burning the fat for fuel when glucose stores are low. The end result is more oil is available for processing into a biofuel.”

According to the new company’s website, their technology is embodied in a portfolio of patents and patent applications relating to what it calls “Metabolic Disruption Technology” (“MDT”) in non-human cells. MDT encompasses the use of combinations of certain proprietary compounds and processes to change how cells use fat and sugar for energy. The MDT technology led to the yields in oil production described above, and the company says it also has the ability to increase oil storage in seeds for increased production of edible oils. VG Energy will be focusing on scaling-up the technology and seeking industry partnerships and licensing deals.

D. Glass Associates, Inc. is a consulting company specializing in several fields of biotechnology. David Glass, Ph.D. is a veteran of nearly thirty years in the biotech industry, with expertise in industrial biotechnology regulatory affairs, patents, technology licensing, and market and technology assessments. This blog provides back-up and expanded content to complement a presentation Dr. Glass made at the EUEC 2010 conference on February 2, 2010 entitled “Prospects for the Use of Genetic Engineering in Biofuel Production.” The slides from that presentation and Dr. Glass’ September 2010 talk on biotechnology regulations from the Algae Biomass Summit, along with more information on D. Glass Associates’ regulatory affairs consulting capabilities, are available at www.slideshare.net/djglass99 or at www.dglassassociates.com.

This entry will profile several additional companies developing altered microorganisms or yeast for the production of ethanol, higher alcohols and other fuels. Future postings will discuss companies developing modified algae or plants for fuel manufacture. The following profiles have been adapted or excerpted from company websites and/or other publicly available information, and I don’t assume any liability for the accuracy, comprehensiveness or use of the information. 

Companies Developing Modified Microorganisms for Ethanol Production

A large number of companies are using advanced biotechnology to improve the bacterial and yeast strains that are used to produce ethanol from traditional sugar or starch based feedstocks or from cellulosic feedstocks. These were profiled in my earlier entries, beginning at http//wp.me/pKTxe-I. The following are profiles of some additional companies in this sector. 

iDiverse, Inc. is developing high-performance cell lines for the biological manufacture of fuel ethanol, industrial enzymes, and pharmaceutical products, and is also working on creating transgenic plants that are resistant to a broad spectrum of diseases and environmental stresses. The company says that its proprietary technology includes genetic sequences which, when introduced into cells, allows the resulting transformed cells to be able to resist a variety of stresses that occur in the bioproduction process. The company believes that cell lines incorporating this proprietary ProTectAll™ transgenic technology will have enhanced resistance to the stresses of the bioproduction process, that will enable these cells to produce more product at higher concentrations, using less nutrients, and under more extreme conditions, thus resulting in higher production efficiencies at lower costs. 

The company is targeting the production of fuel ethanol as the first application of this technology. Fuel ethanol is ordinarily produced by the fermentation of a carbohydrate substrate by yeast cells, but yeast can be inhibited from reaching its optimum production efficiency by a variety of stresses including rising alcohol concentration, low pH, high temperature, bacterial contamination, and dissolved chemicals. The changes iDiverse is engineering into yeast strains are designed to overcome these problems. In October 2010 iDiverse announced that it had successfully modified yeast to be highly resistant to a number of lethal stresses normally encountered in the bioproduction of fuel ethanol, and in doing so enabled the yeast to generate significantly more ethanol. In its press release, the company said “Our technology is applicable to current fuel ethanol manufacturing processes using corn and sugar cane as starting materials and also to those being developed to use cellulosic biomass”. The company’s CEO also says that, “if its technology is effective at large-scale, it could increase the efficiency of installed fuel ethanol plants, enhance yields from corn and sugar cane feed stocks, and help manufacturers bridge the fuel ethanol production gap until the next generation biomass plants come on-line. Also, our technology is ready to be used in applications beyond fuel ethanol. Those include the bioproduction of industrial enzymes, research reagents, and pharmaceuticals. Our technology will provide benefits to biomanufacturing cell types beyond yeast, such as CHO, insect, fungal, and algal cells.” 

iDiverse is also developing genetically modified plants incorporating its ProTectAll™ transgenic technology that are expected to be resistant to a wide range of fungi and viruses. Such plants will require less pesticide, fertilizer, and water to achieve better yields and will be able to be grown on less than optimal land under adverse conditions. These plant varieties are expected to be less costly to grow, provide higher yields, and be friendlier to the environment. 

LanzaTech is a New Zealand-based company founded in early 2005 to develop and commercialize proprietary technologies for the conversion of industrial waste gases into fuels (including ethanol) and chemicals using bacteria. LanzaTech says that its process can use gases from any source, including carbon monoxide produced in high volumes by the steel industry, other industrial waste gases that contain elevated concentrations of carbon monoxide and little or no hydrogen, as well as syngas. Syngas can be produced from any biomass resource, municipal waste or other organic wastestream, using a gasification process that breaks down the chemical bonds in the biomass making up to 80% of the energy available for fermentation. In the LanzaTech process, the gas feedstock is scrubbed, cooled and sent to a bioreactor. The carbon component is used as a food source for proprietary LanzaTech microbes during a biofermentation process, which produce ethanol as a liquid biofuel. 

After several years of fund-raising and internal growth, the company says it is now ready to undertake the next stage on its critical path, the pilot-scale demonstration of its fuel ethanol production from both biomass syngas and industrial waste gas feedstocks. A pilot plant design has been developed that will allow ethanol production from each of these feedstocks to be demonstrated at scale over the next 12 months (i.e. 2010-11). 

LanzaTech recently announced two alliances with Chinese companies: a memorandum of understanding with one of the largest coal producers in China, Henan Coal and Chemical Industrial Corporation (HNCC), for the production of fuels and chemicals using the LanzaTech Process and synthesis gas derived from the gasification of coal; and a partnership with China’s largest steel and iron conglomerate, Baosteel, and the prestigious Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) to commercialize its technologies for producing fuel ethanol from steel mill off gases. 

Xylogenics, Inc. is a start-up company spun off from the Indiana University Medical School.  Dr. Mark Goebl of IU and his colleagues identified a particular strain of yeast that was particularly efficient at producing ethanol from cellulosic feedstocks. The company says that this yeast strain is able to increase ethanol production from cellulose by at least 30%, while also allowing producers to use feedstocks such as corn kernels, corn stover, wheat straw, barley straw, grasses, wood waste and municipal waste. 

In August  2010, Xylogenics and Lallemand Ethanol Technology, a global provider of yeast to the fuel ethanol industry, announced that they signed an exclusive agreement to develop and commercialize genetically enhanced ethanol producing yeasts for first generation fuel ethanol production. Xylogenics will use its extensive knowledge of yeast genomics in cooperation with Lallemand to engineer a new class of industrial ethanol yeast strains. These enhanced yeasts will increase fermentation yield, reduce fermentation costs and potentially increase ethanol plant fermentation capacity compared with current commercial strains. Lallemand will be responsible for process development, manufacturing and commercialization of the new yeast. Under the terms of the agreement, Xylogenics will receive patent license fees and royalty payments. 

Companies Developing Modified Microorganisms for Production of Other Fuels

In earlier blog entries, I profiled several companies using biotechnology to improve organisms used to produce butanol or isobutanol, or other renewable fuels such as biodiesel or jet biofuel. Here are profiles of two additional companies active in these sectors. 

EASEL Biotechnologies, LLC is a UCLA spinoff company that is developing strategies for biosynthesis of chemicals and fuels from renewable resources such as CO₂. Ethanol made by fermentation can be used as a fuel additive, but its use is limited by its low energy content. “Higher” alcohols (those with more than two carbons in the molecule) have higher energy content, but naturally occurring microorganisms do not produce them. UCLA Professor James Liao has genetically engineered microorganisms to make higher alcohols from glucose or directly from carbon dioxide, and the company was founded to develop such organisms to enable manufacture of renewable higher alcohols for use as chemical building blocks or as fuel. Liao’s work makes use of genetically engineered E. coli or cyanobacteria, modified to enable use of photosynthesis to directly convert carbon dioxide into higher alcohols having between three and eight carbon atoms. Those alcohols can then be further processed to produce green fuels. 

In June 2010, EASEL Biotechnologies was named a winner of the 2010 Presidential Green Chemistry Challenge Award for Recycled Fuel Breakthroughs. The company won this award, given by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, with support from the American Chemical Society Green Chemistry Institute, for Dr. Liao’s work in developing what it calls the world’s first biofuels derived from recycled carbon dioxide.  In receiving the award, Liao was quoted as saying “The first practical application [of this technology] will probably be to hook up to power plants and recycle some of the CO₂ and make it into fuel,” Liao also said that, while the technology has the potential for multiple uses, he anticipates that the first goal would be to use it as a gasoline replacement. However, Liao estimated that it will probably take five to 10 years before the technology is ready for commercial use. 

Ginkgo BioWorks is a synthetic biology company founded by five MIT Ph.D. scientists, that is developing strategies for engineered biological solutions to address challenges in energy and chemicals. The company has developed a proprietary set of synthetic biology tools and technologies that allow it to design and build new organisms. Although much of the company is devoted to these basic “tool” products, the company has embarked on one biofuel-related project. Ginkgo, along with collaborators Jay Keasling of UC Berkeley and Mary Lidstrom and David Baker of the University of Washington, was awarded a $6.7M grant from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy (DOE ARPA-E) to engineer E. coli to produce liquid transportation fuels from electricity and carbon dioxide. The goal of the project is  use synthetic biology to re-engineer the bacteria to fix carbon dioxide into liquid transportation fuels, such as gasoline, using energy from electricity. The project was scheduled to begin in the summer of 2010 and last for three years. 

D. Glass Associates, Inc. is a consulting company specializing in several fields of biotechnology. David Glass, Ph.D. is a veteran of nearly thirty years in the biotech industry, with expertise in industrial biotechnology regulatory affairs, patents, technology licensing, and market and technology assessments. This blog provides back-up and expanded content to complement a presentation Dr. Glass made at the EUEC 2010 conference on February 2, 2010 entitled “Prospects for the Use of Genetic Engineering in Biofuel Production.” The slides from that presentation and from Dr. Glass’ September 2010 talk on biotechnology regulations from the Algae Biomass Summit, along with more information on D. Glass Associates’ regulatory affairs consulting capabilities, are available at www.slideshare.net/djglass99 or at www.dglassassociates.com.

The morning session began with a brief address by Arizona Governor Jan Brewer, who announced that she had awarded $4 million of state and matching funding to the Arizona Center for Algae Technologies and Innovations at Arizona State University. 

The two major talks of the morning plenary session offered somewhat differing views of the prospects for using microalgae to produce biodiesel or other biofuels. The first talk was by Mark Bünger of Lux Research, who described a market analysis that his firm recently conducted on the growing algal biofuels industry. Although describing himself as a proponent of the industry, Bünger said that the industry “will face challenges” in achieving its commercial goals.  The firm analyzed the production of algal biofuel using a model developed by Michael Porter, from the perspective of substitutes; customers; potential entrants to the market; suppliers; and competition. The discussion was far too detailed to summarize in depth, but here are some highlights. 

In comparing algal biodiesel to petroleum fuels, Lux Research sees that algal fuels compete favorably with regard to chemical properties, the ability to reduce pollution and carbon emissions, and other aspects, but that petroleum fuels retain their advantage in cost and scalability of production and other factors. Bünger also compared algal biofuels to fuels produced from other biomass feedstocks, and concluded that it was more advantageous economically to use forest waste and agricultural waste to produce fuels than to use algae, oil crops like Jatropha, or other purpose-grown energy crops. Lux Research also considered the “supplier” side of the industry, that is, the companies that have been formed to develop algal fuels. Bünger listed several factors that are holding the industry back, including the youth and immaturity of companies in the industry, the low barriers to entry that allow many poorly-prepared companies into the market, and the low burden of proof that has led to exaggerated claims being made by some companies in the field. Bünger also analyzed and dismissed the fallacies underlying some typical business strategies or competitive claims in the industry, such as the argument that there is economic or other value in using “brackish water” as opposed to clean water (in many countries around the world, brackish water is all you can get), that it is a viable business strategy to sell co-products before being able to make fuel economically, and that a small company can build a business by simply licensing technology to larger companies for their use in fuel production.  His parting words to the audience were: don’t mistake momentum for progress; insist on a higher standard of truth; be realistic and honest about your own capabilities; and co-products are only a means to the end (my apologies if I’ve paraphrased incorrectly). 

A decidedly more optimistic view was then voiced by Dr. Stephen Mayfield, a well-known algae researcher at the San Diego Center for Algal Biotechnology. Dr. Mayfield described the imperative behind developing alternate fuels to replace fossil fuels before we run out of estimated fossil fuel reserves, and although he acknowledged the challenges that algal fuels might face, he was optimistic that algal-derived fuels can contribute to the solution. He described what he felt were the characteristics of a viable algal production strain and felt that many of these were either already met or were within existing engineering capabilities. For example, he cited a threshold that a production strain should achieve 30 g/m²/day growth and a yield of 30% extractable lipids, and he said that this has already been achieved. He discussed the need for engineering improvements in harvesting ability, lipid recovery and conversion of lipids to fuels, as well as the need to ensure that production strains can survive and thrive when production is scaled up to industrial levels. Dr. Mayfield said that the algal fuel industry will face many of the same challenges as have been faced in agriculture, such as yield, crop protection, harvestability, and product profile, and he described ongoing efforts to overcome these challenges. Finally, he described the challenges that remain as, in sequential order: obtaining sufficient investment to reach economic viability with any product (e.g. co-product or fuel); achieving environmental sustainability; reaching “world-scale” production levels, achieving economic viability with a fuel product; and obtaining positive “energy return on investment”. 

A major part of the closing segment of Dr. Mayfield’s talk had to do with environmental sustainability and the potential risks of using genetically modified algae (a topic close to my heart!). He is in favor of appropriate regulatory procedures and risk assessments, but he offered a spirited defense of the likelihood that GMO algae will pose low risks, including the fact that most GMO algae will be engineered for high levels of production to such an extent that they would compete poorly in the environment should they be released from a production facility. I’m sympathetic to these arguments, but I heard an eerie similarity to arguments made about genetic engineering in the early (1970s-1980s) days of the biotech industry, and in today’s regulatory environment, simply making such general arguments won’t take the place of case-by-case reviews of individual products. 

There were other sessions on Tuesday morning, including an executive roundtable featuring C-level officials from Solazyme, Sapphire, Algenol and Solix. But for now, I’ll only briefly summarize some of the brief talks in my afternoon panel, entitled “Green Policies Beyond Greenbacks: Short and Long Term Policy Considerations”.  Our moderator, Tin Zenk of Sapphire Energy, gave an overview of a number of policy issues important for the growth of the industry. Jenna Bloxom of Colorado State University discussed some long-term policy issues including the need for the industry to assess its performance in accordance with standardized measures of carbon emissions. Joanne Morello of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, described the various R&D programs being supported by DOE both within the agency and extramurally. Ben Malkin of the law firm Van Ness Feldman discussed the Renewable Fuel Standards and policy issues relating to climate change, and then Denise Gitsham of Sapphire (sitting in for Mike Evans of K&L Gates) described the current situation under which algal biofuels did not qualify for the same tax credits as cellulosic ethanol, and the legislative and lobbying efforts underway to rectify this situation (efforts which achieved some success that same day, in the passage of H.R. 4168, the Algae-based Renewable Fuel Promotion Act in the U.S. House of Representatives). Next, Earl Chilton of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department described his department’s ongoing efforts to develop new state regulations governing the introduction of exotic nonnative plants into Texas. These planned regulations have generated a good deal of attention in the algal community, since they might affect many strains of naturally-occurring algae and would include all genetically modified organisms. I’ll have more to say about these regulations in a future blog entry. Finally, my talk on “The Impact of Biotechnology Regulations on the Use of Genetically Modified Algae in Biofuel Production” was the last talk of the session, and I will post my slides from the talk shortly, and I’ll provide a link here in the blog. 

These comments are merely a brief summary of some of the talks I attended. The views expressed here and the descriptions and impressions of these talks are my own, so my apologies in advance if I have misrepresented any of the presentations or the views and opinions of the presenters. 

D. Glass Associates, Inc. is a consulting company specializing in several fields of biotechnology. David Glass, Ph.D. is a veteran of nearly thirty years in the biotech industry, with expertise in industrial biotechnology regulatory affairs, patents, technology licensing, and market and technology assessments. This blog provides back-up and expanded content to complement a presentation Dr. Glass made at the EUEC 2010 conference on February 2, 2010 entitled “Prospects for the Use of Genetic Engineering in Biofuel Production.” The slides from that presentation, along with more information on D. Glass Associates’ regulatory affairs consulting capabilities, are available at www.slideshare.net/djglass99 or at www.dglassassociates.com.

I will be appearing on a panel on Tuesday, September 28 entitled “Green Policies Beyond Greenbacks: Short and Long Term Policy Considerations”, along with several others from industry, government and academia. My talk is entitled “Impact of Biotechnology Regulations on Use of Genetically Modified Algae in Biofuel Production”. It’s a large and diverse group of panel members, and each of our presentations will necessarily be short, but I intend to present an overview of the EPA TSCA Biotechnology Rule and USDA’s biotechnology regulations, either of which might affect the use of genetically modified algae in the production of biofuels or for bio-based chemical manufacture, and to discuss these rules in the context of ensuring that a reasonable, science-based regulatory framework is put into place for the anticipated use of engineered algae for these purposes. 

I’ll be posting my slides after the talk, and I’ll provide a link in a blog entry shortly after the conference. I also hope to be blogging during or shortly after the conference to report on any interesting news or information that I may learn on topics relevant to the focus of this blog. As always, please feel free to comment or contact me with any questions you may have. 

D. Glass Associates, Inc. is a consulting company specializing in several fields of biotechnology. David Glass, Ph.D. is a veteran of nearly thirty years in the biotech industry, with expertise in patents, technology licensing, industrial biotechnology regulatory affairs, and market and technology assessments. This blog provides back-up and expanded content to complement a presentation Dr. Glass is making at the EUEC 2010 conference on February 2, 2010 entitled “Prospects for the Use of Genetic Engineering in Biofuel Production.” The slides from that presentation, along with more information on D. Glass Associates’ regulatory affairs consulting capabilities, are available at www.slideshare.net/djglass99 or at www.dglassassociates.com.