The R&D collaboration resins producer Braskem (São Paulo / Brazil; www.braskem.com.br) and bioengineering specialist Genomatica (San Diego, California / USA; www.genomatica.com) first entered into in late 2013 (see Plasteurope.com of 16.01.2014) is starting to bear fruit. In late November, the two companies announced that they have been producing butadiene from renewable feedstocks on a laboratory scale since June this year, thereby achieving a significant milestone in their efforts to develop commercial-scale biological production of the plastics feedstock.

The results achieved so far include the successful development of a microorganism capable of converting sugar into butadiene in two-litre fermenters as part of a direct and continuous process. During their research, teams from both companies also uncovered multiple direct pathways and new enzymes, testing the five best biological pathways for experimental validation. Global demand for butadiene is pegged at about 9m t/y, the two companies said.

Genomatica provides licenses for its proprietary “Geno” 1,4-butanediol (BDO) process technology, which it most recently sold to German petrochemicals giant BASF (Ludwigshafen; www.basf.com) – see Plasteurope.com of 29.09.2015. The US bioengineering specialist also collaborates with Cargill (Minneapolis, Minnesota / USA; www.cargill.com) – see Plasteurope.com of 23.07.2015 – and Royal DSM (Heerlen / The Netherlands; www.dsm.com) – see Plasteurope.com of 07.01.2014 – among others.