Global Bioenergies reports first successful production of bio-butadiene by direct fermentation

26 November 2014

Global Bioenergies (GBE) has successfully produced bio-sourced butadiene by direct fermentation. This marks the first time an entirely biological production process—i.e. without any chemical step—has been reported for butadiene, an important petrochemical building block.

<!——>

Butadiene is a key platform molecule of the petrochemical industry with a world-wide market of more than 10 million metric tons per year. As of today, butadiene is exclusively obtained from fossil resources, principally through extraction from naphtha cracking. Given the decrease in naphtha cracking capacities, there is a need for alternative routes to butadiene.

In this context, Global Bioenergies signed in 2011 a collaboration agreement with Synthos, a leader in the production of butadiene-derived rubber products, to develop a direct fermentation route allowing a cost-effective transformation of renewable resources into butadiene.

Since such a direct biological route does not exist in nature, Global Bioenergies first had to invent a new metabolic pathway comprised of a series of non-natural enzymatic reactions. This step was successfully achieved in December 2012.

The next step consisted in improving the activity of those enzymes and implementing them into a bacterial strain.

Global Bioenergies has created such a proprietary production strain. This strain was placed in a lab-scale fermentation device, and upon the addition of glucose, the presence of butadiene in the off-gases was detected.

We now have in our hands a prototype process for the direct biological conversion of renewable resources into butadiene. We expect that this butadiene program will deploy in the next years as did our isobutene process, our most mature asset now operated in an industrial pilot. Direct fermentation of butadiene has major inherent advantages translating into better economics. We expect to demonstrate these in an industrial environment in the next few years.

Earlier this month, Global Bioenergies successfully carried out its first isobutene production trial at its industrial pilot site in Pomacle-Bazancourt. A production run was initiated on 3 November, resulting in the first production of isobutene by fermentation in an industrial environment. (Earlier post.)