The Biofuels Technology Square Dance
by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest) …How’s an investor to parse out all these technologies. For many, it’s a case of “you’re making what, from what, using what?”
…Here at the Digest, we think of it as a kind of old fashioned hoedown, a square dance involving four basic types of technologies – competing yet cooperating, all involved in and benefiting from the other’s success, interrelated and yet distinct.
Think of a quadrant – box with four cells (or visualize the one we’ve constructed here with some companies as examples – but keep in mind that these are companies suggested as examples, and represent far from a comprehensive list.
On the vertical axis, you have “fermentation” and “catalytic conversion”, and on the horizontal axis you have “gas phase” and “liquid phase”.
…There are some hybrids, and a handful of technologies that fall outside of this Bioenergy Square Dance box or barely fit in. But that’s the basic drill.
- Codexis
- Amyris
- Gevo
- Solazyme
- KiOR
- ClearFuels/Rentech
- Enerkem
- Envergent
- Annelotech
- Dynamotive
- Honeywell UOP
- Virent
- LS9
- Cobalt
- LanzaTech
- INEOS Bio
- Coskata
- ZeaChem
- Sapphire Energy
The Four Bewares
Need more hydrogen, baby…
Did we mention low-cost sugars? …
- Cobalt
- Mascoma
- Verenium
- Qteros
Did we mention finance? … That’s where “capital-light” comes in.
- Gevo
- Solazyme
- Cobalt
- Butamax
Did we mention geography? …
The Digest’s Take – Dancing with SARA
In the end, it comes down to matching feedstocks with economically viable processes. Any viable process will have its day in the sun; any process that matches up well with a sustainable, affordable, reliable, available (SARA) source of biomass – that’s a winner. READ MORE