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Sugarcane Biorefineries
The Stone Age did not end for lack of
stone, and the Oil Age will end long
before the world runs out of oil.
Sheikh Zaki Yamani, Saudi Arabia oil minister
Integrated biorefineries
• By 2050
 75% of $2,000 billion chemical industry biobased
 Large opportunities for all participants in the value-chain,
including suppliers of renewable resources
• Biobased versus inorganic catalysis
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High yield, purity and specificity
Water-based, low T, low P
New product spectrum
Large reduction in environmental compliance costs
Why bioproducts (DuPont)?
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Renewable & widespread 
sustainable and reliable resource
Low toxicity & flammability 
inherent safe and benign process
Good raw material economics 
comparable to petrochemicals
Unique & rich functionality 
novel materials, oxygen built-in
Requires new technology 
opportunities for proprietary position
Chad says so: “25% renewable in 2010”
Requirements
• Cost efficient raw materials
 Carbon, energy and water
• Efficient catalysis
 Enzymatic catalysis, fermentation, in planta
• Efficient separation processes
 Water based separation
• Smart system integration
 Capital utilization for smaller plants
 New integrated product model
Criteria for a good feedstock
• Perennial crop
 Reduced mechanical input
• High biomass density
 Reduced transport energy
• High water efficiency
• High fertilizer efficiency
 Reduced energy input and environmental impact
• Readily processed
 Reduced process energy input and capital costs
• Inexpensive relative to quality
• Supply of energy for processing
Feedstock versus process
Energy
Chemicals
Production
Millable
Stalk
Feedstock
52%
47%
Process
48%
53%
Renewable source of process energy is as important as feedstock in
developing bio-based products.
Sugarcane has a unique advantage through bagasse.
1.40
Substituted products
TOTAL
-10.00
Sugar beet
Corn
-15.00
1.00
0.80
0.60
0.40
0.20
0.00
-0.20
-0.40
-0.60
-0.80
Sugar beet
Agricultural production
Processing
1.20
Corn
-5.00
Field emissions
Agricultural production
Processing
Substituted products
TOTAL
Sugarcane
0.00
Greenhouse gas emissions (kg CO2(eq)/kg monosaccharide)
5.00
Sugarcane
Energy input (MJ/kg monosaccharide)
10.00
PLA production
28.4+5.3 MJ
Corn
Corn
Gluten
Oil
8.8+0.6 MJ
Wet-milling
enz hydrolysis
Sug
Cane
crushing
Fibre
32 MJ
14.9+11.4 MJ
fermentation
purification
LA
12.8+0.4 MJ
polymerisation
gypsum
biomass
Cane
PLA
Ethanol
Gasolin
Energy gain
0.8
Price per bbl oil eq.
US $50
US corn
Cane juice
SugarBooster
1.3
8-10
10-15
US $60-75 ($2.6/bu)
US $60-75 (10c/lb)
US $40-60, 2015
Corn stover
Bagasse
Switch grass
5.3
Very high
2.6
2020?
2020?
2025?
Lignocellulosics
Lignocellulosic ethanol
• Bagasse is to sugar as coal is to oil
 Excellent source of heat and electricity
 Suited for some C5 (e.g., furfural) and lignin products
 Need quantum leap in technology to achieve meaningful
ethanol economy
• Limited quantity, seasonality
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Current thermochemical approaches non-viable
Need enzymatic approach or high value by-products
Realize environmental value though co-gen
Use coal-to-liquid and burn the bagasse
Ethanol: the worst possible product
Crude
40 GJ
$480

Petrol
40 GJ
$500
Sugar
18 GJ
$200

EtOH
27 GJ
$400 ($600oe)
In conventional combustion engines,
no premium for higher purity
Chemicals
Ethylene
Propylene
Styrene
Spot price
$ 950/t
$ 1100/t
$ 1290/t
LDPE
PP
PS
ABS
$ 1350/t
$ 1260/t
$ 1420/t
$ 1600/t
23.4.2007
Political imperatives
• Indirect farm subsidies
• Resource security
• Environmental impact
 Passenger cars <8% of Australian GHG emissions
 Existing technology could half this
 Several future alternatives
Political imperatives
• Indirect farm subsidies
• Resource security
• Environmental impact
 Passenger cars <8% of Australian GHG emissions
 Existing technology could half this
 Several future alternatives
• Ease of introduction
 Readily controlled by policy
 Existing technology
 Easy to explain
• Path to better products?
Efficient catalysts
• Enzyme bio-catalysis
 Low cost, flexible
 Limited product range (e.g., co-factor needs)
• Fermentation
 Fast development, large engineering potential
 Broad product range
• In planta
 Potentially lowest cost
 Long lead time, downstream purification
Metabolic engineering
We are studying microbes as "programmable"
manufacturing factories to make chemicals,
monomers and polymers from different nutrient
feedstocks. Current feedstocks for these materials
are petrochemicals from oil. We are programming
microbes to make very sophisticated polymer
building blocks and molecules out of simple,
renewable feedstocks, like glucose and methane.
Chad Holliday, Chairman & CEO – DuPont, Boston Chief Executive Club, Sept 99.
• Classical biotechnology
• Random mutations
• Process optimisation
• Fixed product range
• Classical biotechnology
• Random mutations
• Process optimisation
• Fixed product range
• Genetic engineering
• New products
PDO
• Classical biotechnology
• Random mutations
• Process optimisation
• Fixed product range
• Genetic engineering
• New products
• Enzyme engineering
• Improved kinetics
PDO
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• Classical biotechnology
• Random mutations
• Process optimisation
• Fixed product range
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• Genetic engineering
• New products
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PDO
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• Enzyme engineering
• Improved kinetics
• Metabolic engineering
• Pathway redesign
• Control redesing
Metabolic engineering
• From retrofitting to green field design
 Genetic engineering  systems & synthetic biology
• PDO
 7 years, 15 staff using conventional metabolic engineering
• Succinic acid
 3 years, 10 staff using systems biology
• Amino acids
 2-3 years, 3 staff using synthetic biology followed by
systems biology
Real challenges
• One 50,000 tpa facility
 $50m in R&D
 $75-150m in capital cost
 7-10 years to market
• Integration
 End-users expect complete solutions
 Existing chemical industry benefits immensely from process
and product integration
 Market penetration
 50% lower production price for replacement products
 Distinct advantages for new products
• Need collaborations to succeed!
Conclusions
• Over the next generation
 $2,000b chemical industry will become bio-based
 Large opportunities throughout the value chain
• Sugarcane ideal biomass crop
 Bagasse provides inexpensive, renewable energy
• Australia can compete
 Century long tradition of competing through leading
sugarcane technology
 Strong biotech infrastructure
 Portal to growing markets in Asia