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Riverdale Capital Ltd. has completed its acquisition of Nevada-based WSPVA Bio Products International LLC. Riverdale Capital now retains 100 percent ownership of WSPVA, which holds an exclusive license to develop and market a polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) film known as “dissolving plastic” through a patented machine technology in North America. According to Aslan Halim, a consultant with Riverdale Capital, the PVA film is made from 100 percent starch-based alcohol. While some bioplastics companies use oils or additives to produce the material, Halim said WSPVA’s licensed process does not. The material is stronger than more traditional ethylene-based plastics. It is also very stable and can be dissolved in water. Initial commercial production of the bioplastic is scheduled to begin during the first quarter of 2011 in China, where the process was developed. An existing pilot-scale facility is being scaled-up to an annual production capacity of 60,000 metric tons, Halim says.
Biosuccinic acid and bioproducts producer BioAmber, formerly DNP Green Technology, has partnered with Cargill
Inc., resulting in BioAmber having the exclusive worldwide rights to Cargill’s novel fermentation technology platform to produce biobased succinic acid from an array of nonfood-based lignocellulosic feedstocks. The partnership with Cargill is part of BioAmber’s near-term objective to build biobased succinic acid plants in North America, Brazil and Asia. According to Mike Hartmann, vice president of corporate affairs for BioAmber, the company intends to add the technology licensed from Cargill to its proprietary fermentation platform in future commercial-scale biobased succinic acid facilities currently under development. The key to Cargill’s technology, according to Hartmann, is a highly efficient microorganism that can significantly increase output volume and performance. A team of researchers funded by the Energy Biosciences Institute, a BP-led program, has engineered a new yeast strain that will improve cellulosic fer mentation times by almost 40 percent. The ”G”engineers Suk-Jin Ha (left), collaboraYong-Su Jin, (center) and Soo Rin Kim helped to engineer the new tive effort yeast strain. through PHOTO: L. BRIAN STAUFFER, UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS NEWS BUREAU the University of Illinois, the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the University of California began working on the new yeast strain roughly one year ago. Now, food science and human nutrition professor at the University of Illinois, Yong-Su Jin, says the team has created a yeast that contains five different enzymes that make cofermentation of both glucose and xylose more efficient. “Standard fermentation (with standard yeast strains) is like giving a piece of chocolate and some broccoli to a kid,” Jin says. “The kid will eat the chocolate first and the vegetable later.” The new strain Jin’s team has devel-
oped combines the chocolate and vegetable together so the kid doesn’t know the vegetable is there, Jin says.
PHOTO: QTEROS
The gene discovery, which can be attributed to an initial interest at the foundation in devising methods to improve forage quality in alfalfa, was found after the team began analyzing mutated alfalfa plants that had altered patterns of lignin deposition. What the team had, Dixon explains, was an alfalfa plant in which a gene had been knocked out, and that was causing this increase in cell wall material throughout the stem. The team decided to look at another readily researched plant, Arabidopsis, and test their findings. The work shows that by knocking out a single gene it is possible to increase the amount of lignin, cellulose and hemicellose amounts in a plant, he says.
Forerunner Qteros president and CEO John McCarthy says his company has been working with Praj for 10 months on an experimental basis.
Marlborough, Mass.-based cellulosic ethanol technology developer Qteros Inc. and India-based engineering and design firm Praj Industries Ltd. have formed a strategic partnership to accelerate the commercialization of cellulosic ethanol production. The partnership agreement, according to Qteros president and CEO John McCarthy, was the result of a culmination of collaborative work between Qteros and Praj, which will allow both to aggressively roll out its commercial strategy. “We’ve been working with Praj for nine to 10 months now on some experimental work that we’re doing with some of their pretreatment materials, feedstocks and our technology platform, as we have done with a number of other players in the market,” McCarthy says. The partnership, according to McCarthy, is structured around a joint development program that will span roughly the next 18 to 24 months where Qteros will retrofit Praj’s existing fully integrated pilot ethanol facility in Pune, India, and use that as the foundation to deliver fully integrated engineering design packages. Share your industry briefs To be included in Business Briefs, send information (including photos and logos if available) to: Industry Briefs, Biorefining, 308 Second Ave. N., Suite 304, Grand Forks, ND 58203. You may also fax information to (701) 7468385, or e-mail it to rkotrba@bbiinternational.com. Please include your name and telephone number in all correspondence. february 2011 | Biorefining Magazine | 11