Reverdia, the new 50:50 joint venture of DSM (Sittard / The Netherlands; www.dsm.com) and French starch and derivatives producer Roquette Frères (Lestrem; www.roquette.com) has been approved by all regulatory authorities – see Plasteurope.com of 10.05.2011. The company is currently building a 10,000 t/y commercial production facility to produce bio-succinic acid from starch feedstock.

The back-integrated unit, described as the first large-scale facility, is scheduled to start up in Q3 2012 at Roquette’s Cassano Spinola / Italy site. The proprietary yeast technology that converts sugars into succinic acid has been tested in a pilot plant since 2010. Reverdia says the process is “simple, stable, very energy-efficient and generates less waste and fewer impurities than the bacteria-based technologies currently used as alternative routes to bio-based succinic acid.”