by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  What’s the latest with carbon fiber?  The US Department of Energy is supporting a project to develop and demonstrate an acrylonitrile (bio-ACN) production process from biomass-derived sugars at ≤ $1/lb. Additionally, the team …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The DOE is supporting a project to develop engineered clostridia strains and fermentation process that can directly utilize cellulose and fix CO2 for n-butanol production from lignocellulosic biomass. The engineered strains can …

(U.S. Department of Energy)  Last spring, the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Bioenergy Technologies Office (BETO) conducted its seventh biennial external review of its research, development, and communications portfolio. More than 40 external subject matter …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The US Department of Energy is supporting a project led by Novozymes that proposes to deliver a screening platform which can be used to reduce discovery time required for tailoring enzymes to …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  This week marks the 10th anniversary of the first demo flight on biofuel  which was done by Virgin Atlantic.
LanzaTech CEO Jennifer Holmgren shared the factoid that, since that day, more than …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The objective? To create an economically viable process for the production of butanol from the underutilized natural resources domestically available economically sustainable biofuel at or below DOE target selling price. And, suitable for …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  You know what they say, “you can make anything you want from lignin except money.”  It’s the most challenging issues in biofuel production: upgrading the lignin-containing biorefineryresidues to fungible bioproducts, in an …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest) Can it be done? That is, development of a sustainable green chemistry platform for production of acetone and downstream drop-in fuel and commodity products directly from biomass syngas via a novel …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The US Department of Energy has a key project called Co-Optima, which aims to determine key fuel properties that enable improved engine efficiency, provide key science to enable high efficiency combustion …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest) We’ve been covering some important movements in the design and performance of yeast in recent weeks, including the arrival of Novozymes’ Innova drive strains. Most of the activity has been focused …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The US Department of Energy is supporting a Kiverdi-led project to develop microbial biocatalysts to convert syngas into monoterpenes.
Syngas feedstocks are relatively inexpensive and diverse, and thermophiles have several unique advantages; …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The Consortium for Computational Physics and Chemistry (CCPC) is a joint core research and development activity among five national laboratories that has been created to utilize unique DOE computational modeling facilities …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  In the world of bio-oil production, current technologies have low carbon retention in fuel range and high hydrogen consumption. The DOE is supporting a project led by Daniel Resasco at the …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The project goal? To produce and commercialize lignin-derived, industrial-grade composites with properties including 3D printability, rivaling current petroleum-derived alternatives. That’s the project undertaken by a team led by Amit K. Naskar, …

(U.S. Department of Energy)  The U.S. Department of Energy’s Bioenergy Technologies Office (BETO) hosted the 2017 Project Peer Review on March 6–9, 2017, in Denver, Colorado. During the event, approximately 192 projects in BETO’s research, …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The presence of significant concentrations of oxygen-bearing compounds, particularly carboxylic acids and other carbonyl-containing compounds, makes biomass derived oils corrosive to many common structural materials. So says everyone.
But a research team …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  To develop and optimize a hybrid separation method to recover high-value methoxyphenols to improve the process economics and environmental impact for the production of advanced biofuels from catalytic pyrolysis, integrated with …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  Improving hydrogen utilization and carbon recovery, as a pathway to higher efficiency bio-oil production using thermochemical process? That’s the focus for a project from RTI International that picked up significant DOE …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  Can you build a catalytic process to produce alpha, omega diols from lignocellulosic biomass? Such a process, using inorganic catalysts for conversion of biomass into 1.5 pentanediol (PDO) and 1,6 hexanediols …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest) The Brazil Bilateral is a co-operative R&D effort between Brazil’s Petrobras and the US National renewable Energy Laboratory. It aims to demonstrate technical and economic feasibility of co-processing raw fast pyrolysis …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  Hydrogen, hydrogen, hydrogen — the most abundant element in the universe, but the advanced bioeconomy can never seem to get enough of it, and finding ways to produce renewable, affordable hydrogen …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The US Department of Energy has a goal of developing industrially-relevant strains to meet titer, rate, and yield targets for fuel precursors for the 2022 BC Platform cost target goals of …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest) The Agile BioFoundry, designed to productionize synthetic biology, is a public infrastructure investment aimed at increasing U.S. industrial competitiveness and enables new opportunities for private sector growth and jobs. Specifically, the foundry …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The US Department of Energy is supporting a project from DMC Limited and Duke University to develop scalable and cost-effective next generation semi-continuous fermentation based processes for biofuels, reducing commercial scale capital …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The US Department of Energy is supporting a project to better manage seasonal variation in algal biomass production, through stabilization to reduce conversion costs, and to reduce ash to increase …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The US Department of Energy is supporting a project to develop and optimize a hybrid separation method to recover high-value methoxyphenols to improve the process economics and environmental impact for the …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The US Department of Energy is supporting a project to demonstrate the techno‐economic feasibility of upgrading biomass derived pyrolysis oil using electro-deoxygenation process. A ceramic membrane that selectively transports oxygen under …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The US Department of Energy is supporting a project to identify and mitigate the challenges of moving new fuels and vehicles into markets.  Including but not limited to: facilitating new …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The US Department of Energy is supporting a project to develop a biological approach to depolymerize lignin for upgrading of aromatic compounds to co-products. Lignin valorization is key for meeting …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The US Department of Energy is supporting a project led by Pacific Northwest National Lab to develop a new deconstruction technology to provide low ash and low impurity sugars and sugar-derived intermediates …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest) The US Department of Energy is supporting a project led by Michael Himmell at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory to develop technology to meet or exceed the target of 10 mg/g …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The US Department of Energy is supporting a project to develop efficient and robust fungal biocatalysts and bioprocesses that utilize lignocellulose feedstocks to produce advanced biofuels and bioproducts at lower …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The US Department of Energy is supporting projects to investigate and recommend promising pathways for advanced biological upgrading of biomass sugars and lignin to hydrocarbons (HC) and co-products to support …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The US Department of Energy is supporting a project within its Advanced Algal Systems Platform to define the indicators of sustainable algal biofuels, and determine best practices for sustainably meeting productivity and …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The US Department of Energy is supporting a project on hydrothermal liquefaction — a thermochemical interface for algae biofuels — developing processing methods to reduce conversion cost, improve sustainability and …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest) The US Department of Energy is supporting a project to develop a catalyst cost estimation tool that would enable rapid and informed cost-based decisions in research and commercialization of catalysts.
As the research …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The US Department of Energy is supporting a NREL-led project to establish a novel gas fermentation bioprocess for secretion of an array of fuel and chemical intermediates. The project also …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest) The US Department of Energy initiated a project to advance a hybrid conversion technology for catalytic upgrading of biomass-derived syngas to produce Alcohol-to-Jet fuel and chemicals while meeting the cost, quality …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The DOE established and funded a project to develop a novel Multistage Hydrothermal Liquefaction (HTL) of biomass and integrate with Virent’s Catalytic BioForming Process to efficiently produce cost effective “drop‐in” …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The US Department of Energy has established a project to reduce cost of algal biofuels by increasing intrinsic algal biomass value, with two specific goals. First, to Identify and isolate scalable, …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  Back in 2014, Sapphire Energy and the US Department of Energy embarked on a project to advance Sapphire’s (then) biomass production technologies across three priority areas to meet a target …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  In June 2011, the Secretaries of Agriculture, Energy, and Navy signed MOU to commit $510M (up to $170M from each agency) to produce hydrocarbon jet and diesel biofuels in the …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The US Department of Energy initiated a project to identify and mitigate the challenges of moving new fuels and vehicles into markets. Specifically, engaging with all critical stakeholders (OEM’s, fuel …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  What is the Advanced Biofuels Process Demonstration Unit, where is it, who does it serve and how?
Located at Berkeley Lab, the ABPDU aims to “support the commercialization of industry-, academic-and DOE-driven …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest) Hydrogen, hydrogen, hydrogen — the most abundant element in the universe, but the advanced bioeconomy can never seem to get enough of it, and finding ways to produce renewable, affordable hydrogen …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  Hydrothermal liquefaction has a huge fan base in the biorefinery R&D sector. There’s lots to like.  It’s robust tech and can be applied to attractive, low-cost wet feedstocks (ag resid, …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest) The DOE is funding a fascinating project to develop a continuous electrochemical process to convert biorefinery waste lignin to substituted aromatic compounds for resins and resin binders. The goal? Integration into …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  How much biomass is there? What types, prices, when will they be available, and produced by whom, and how? These are questions that the US Department of Energy undertook to answer, …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest) The US Department of Energy has a goal of developing industrially-relevant strains to meet titer, rate, and yield targets for fuel precursors for the 2022 BC Platform cost target goals of …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest) Within the ChemCatBio set of core catalysis projects lies Fast Pyrolysis and Upgrading, which has as its goal “to develop cost competitive biofuels through catalytic stabilization and deoxygenation of Fast Pyrolysis …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The US Department of Energy has set a goal to “Select and develop at least one route for catalytic upgrading of sugars/related intermediates and/or biologically derived intermediates into fuel blendstockswith …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  ChemCatBio is a research and development consortium dedicated to identifying and overcoming catalysis challenges for biomass conversion processes. Led by U.S. Department of Energy national laboratories, the consortium works “with …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  At the 2017 DOE Project Peer Review, John Staser of Ohio University gave this illuminating overview on a continuous electrochemical process to convert biorefinery waste lignin to substituted aromatic compounds …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  Lysle Whitmer on behalf of an Iowa State-led group of researchers gave this illuminating overview of Liquefaction of Forest Biomass to Drop-in Fuels, at the 2017 DOE Project Peer Review sessions. …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  Vertimass’ John Hannon gave this illuminating overview of one-step, high-yield production of drop-in fuels without added hydrogen, at the 2017 DOE Project Peer Review sessions.  READ MORE

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  Mark Huntley and Zackary Johnson gave this illuminating overview of the MAGIC Marine Algae consortium project at the 2017 DOE Project Peer Review sessions.  READ MORE

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  Arizona State’s Wim Vermaas gave this illuminating overview of Direct Photosynthetic Production of Biodiesel by Decoupled Cyanobacteria at the 2017 DOE Project Peer Review sessions.   READ MORE

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  Michael Huessmann and John Benemann gave this illuminating overview of Microalgae Biofuels Production on CO2 from Air at the 2017 DOE Project Peer Review sessions.  READ MORE

On March 6–9, 2017, BETO hosted its biennial Project Peer Review in Denver, Colorado. During the event, approximately 192 projects in BETO’s research and development (R&D) portfolio were presented to the public and a panel …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  Can we enable the sustainable, nationwide production of biofuels that are compatible with transportation infrastructure, displace a share of petroleum‐derived fuels to reduce U.S. dependence on oil, and encourage the …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The program objective seen in these slides is to take a technology from Technical Readiness Level 2 to TRL 3/4 — a technology that directly upgrades ethanol to a drop-in …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  In June 2011, the Secretaries of Agriculture, Energy, and Navy signed MOU to commit $510M (up to $170M from each agency) to produce hydrocarbon jet and diesel biofuels in the …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  According to this presentation deck from NREL’s Melvin Tucker, “to produce high concentration sugar and reactive lignin streams at high yields and low costs from biomass to meet BETO’s 2017 ($5/GGE) and …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  To demonstrate an advanced biofuels technology that integrates a catalytic biomass pyrolysis step and a hydroprocessing step to produce infrastructure compatible biofuels, here’s the basic recipe, according to a research …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  As the project team behind this presentation explains, there’s trouble right here in River City when it comes to accessing good market and technical data on making hydrocarbons from a …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  The goal? Develop microbial biocatalysts to convert lignin-rich streams into value-added products. That’s subject which this project — “Synthetic Metabolic Pathways for Bioconversion of Lignin Derivatives to Biofuels,” led by Oak …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  BPA designs, builds, and operates commercial scale Grower Harvester bioreactors that enable efficient conversion of light and CO2 into high value microbial feedstock. BioProcess Algae LLC is based in Omaha, …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  To “Demonstrate an advanced biofuels technology that integrates a catalytic biomass pyrolysis step and a hydroprocessing step to produce infrastructure compatible biofuels,” that’s the ratuional behind a DOE project with …

The public is invited to join the U.S. Department of Energy’s Bioenergy Technologies Office (BETO) at the 2017 Project Peer Review on March 6–9, 2017, in Denver, Colorado, for an opportunity to learn more about …

by Sonja van Renssen (Energy Post)  Biofuels are returning to the political agenda in Europe as EU policymakers start to shape a strategy for reducing greenhouse gas emissions from transport after 2020. Biofuels producers continue …

by Osaretin Omorodion* (Advanced Biofuels USA) During late March 2015, the US Department of Energy (DOE) Bioenergy Technologies Office (BETO) offered what amounted to a seminar for the public consisting of a series of presentations …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  What’s the latest with such projects such as Frontline BioEnergy, Myriant, POET-DSM, INEOS Bio, Sapphire Energy, Abengoa, Haldor Topsoe, UOP. ZeaChem, Mercurius, and American Process, among others?
In Washington this June …

(US Department of Energy)  Visit the 2015 Project Peer Review Web page to download individual project and plenary presentations from BETO’s 2015 Project Peer Review. The peer review process provided BETO with feedback about the management …

The Bioenergy Technologies Office (BETO) is hosting the 2015 Project Peer Review on March 23–27, 2015, at the Hilton Mark Center, in Alexandria, Virginia. Approximately 185 projects in BETO’s research, development, and demonstration portfolio will …

(US Department of Energy)  In 2013, BETO implemented a comprehensive external review of its project portfolio through a Project Peer Review and Program Management Review. Results of this peer review process inform the Office’s strategic …

(US Department of Energy)  The Bioenergy Technologies Office 2013 Project Peer Review will take place at the Hilton Alexandria Hotel from Monday, May 20, 2013, to Thursday, May 23, 2013. The peer review process will …

Each year at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Hydrogen and Fuel Cells Program and Vehicle Technologies Program Annual Merit Review and Peer Evaluation Meeting (AMR) hydrogen, fuel cell and advanced vehicle technologies projects funded …

(US Department of Energy)  The U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, Biomass Program will be conducting detailed biennial peer review meetings of its activities throughout the first half …

All Programs in the U.S Department of Energy, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, are required to conduct a Peer Review of their funded projects on an annual or biannual schedule.  The Office of Biomass Program …