Shale gas, a possible threat to green chemistry?
We all know that ‘Big Oil’ is not fond of green chemistry and the green economy. But biobased chemists trust that crude oil prices will keep rising, dragging along natural gas prices on their way. This would advance the production and use of biobased chemical feedstock. They reckon that in twenty to thirty years’ time,
Why PEF is better than PET
Biobased PEF (polyethylene furanoate), the new feedstock for soft drink bottles (Coca Cola and Danone) is not only green, but also cheaper to produce than both fossil and drop-in green PET (polyethylene terephthalate). It also has better properties. Tom van Aken, Avantium’s CEO, explains it again and again. PEF is six times a better barrier
Lignin, new opportunities
As researchers have discovered commercial pathways to separate cellulose and hemicellulose on a commercial scale, lignin treatment is the next step. And quite more complex. Utrecht University seems well underway to tackle this problem. Chemistry is on its way to discover many pathways for separation of vegetal fibres into green chemical building blocks. Recently, DSM
Top sector policy, a mission impossible?
Government should invest more in innovation in businesses, and less in fundamental scientific research. That is the shorthand notation for the new Dutch innovation policy, ‘top sector policy’. But this policy meets with difficulties, while financing research is increasingly unclear. Until recently, Dutch government paid its R&D share out of natural gas profits. But as
Will there ever be a big BPM factory in Europe?
They were not overly optimistic, the industrialists gathered at the conference on Biobased Performance Materials, last week in Wageningen, on the future prospects of the bioplastics industry in Europe. There were quite a few of them. And they were very sceptical about Europe’s industry policy (not about research facilities, inter alia). Europe’s biobased economy lags
Europe’s bioeconomy: this year is decisive
That is Nathalie Moll’s opinion, secretary-general to Europabio, the Brussels lobby branch of Europe’s biotechnological industry. Industrial biotechnology is growing fast, and is selected as one of six Key Enabling Technologies for a greener and more sustainable Europe. The European bioeconomy (European shorthand for agriculture and all production from agricultural crops) by now has a
Logistics in the biobased society
It goes without saying that the biobased economy will produce major changes in society. Yet, many people do not realise to what an extent – eventually, the biobased economy will produce another society, a biobased society. Logistics is a fine example. Today, crude oil tankers make up for the biggest logistical movements around the globe,
Marcel Wubbolts: DSM is the first in second generation biobased
‘We had quite some response, and congratulations from peer companies too, as we announced our next step in the implementation of bioalcohol production from corn waste end January 2012, a joint venture of POET and DSM.’ Says Marcel Wubbolts, DSM’s newly appointed chief technology officer. ‘The knack in this technology is that we do not
