Posted on 03/11/2008 1:01:04 AM PDT by neverdem
University of Maryland research that started with bacteria from the Chesapeake Bay has led to a process that may be able to convert large volumes of all kinds of plant products, from leftover brewer’s mash to paper trash, into ethanol and other biofuel alternatives to gasoline.
That process, developed by University of Maryland professors Steve Hutcheson and Ron Weiner, is the foundation of their incubator company Zymetis, which was on view today in College Park for Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley and state and university officials.
"The new Zymetis technology is a win for the State of Maryland, for the University and for the environment,” said University of Maryland President C.D. Mote, Jr. "It makes affordable ethanol production a reality and makes it from waste materials, which benefits everyone and supports the green-friendly goal of carbon-neutrality.
“It also highlights the importance of transformational basic research and of technology incubators at the University. Partnership with the State enables University of Maryland faculty and students to commercialize new discoveries quickly.”
“Today, Marylanders are leading the nation in scientific discovery and technology innovation,” said Governor Martin O’Malley. “We must continue to invest in Marylanders like Steve Hutcheson and in their revolutionary ideas to protect our environment, create jobs, and improve lives.”
75 Billion Gallons a Year
The Zymetis process can make ethanol and other biofuels from many different types of plants and plant waste called cellulosic sources. Cellulosic biofuels can be made from non- grain plant sources such as waste paper, brewing byproducts, leftover agriculture products, including straw, corncobs and husks, and energy crops such as switchgrass.
When fully operational, the Zymetis process could potentially lead to the production of 75 billion gallons a year of carbon-neutral ethanol.
The secret to the Zymetis process is a Chesapeake Bay marsh grass bacterium, S. degradans. Hutcheson found that the bacterium has an enzyme that could quickly break down plant materials into sugar, which can then be converted to biofuel.
The Zymetis researchers were unable to isolate the Bay bacterium again in nature, but they discovered how to produce the enzyme in their own laboratories. The result was Ethazyme, which degrades the tough cell walls of cellulosic materials and breaks down the entire plant material into bio-fuel ready sugars in one step, at a significantly lower cost and with fewer caustic chemicals than current methods.
Hutcheson projects a $5 billion enzyme market for biofuels. The energy bill passed by the U.S. Senate in December mandates oil companies to blend in 21 billion gallons of cellulosic ethanol with their gasoline by 2022.
Inventors of the Year
Hutcheson and Weiner won the university’s Office of Technology Commercialization Inventor of the Year Award in 2007 in the Life Science category for their enzyme system invention.
Founded in 2006, Zymetis entered the university’s MTECH VentureAccelerator Program, which provides hands-on business assistance to faculty and students interested in forming companies around university-created technologies. “MTECH VentureAccelerator helped us validate our market,” says Hutcheson. “They found space for our company. They helped us with licensing our technology, forming financial and business plans, and establishing trademarks.”
Zymetis also sought expertise from MTECH’s Bioprocess Scale-Up Facility (BSF) staff to determine how to mass-produce S. degradans. The BSF is part of the MTECH Biotechnology Research and Education Program, an initiative dedicated to research, education and the development of biotechnology products and processes for Maryland companies.
Source : University of Maryland
Maybe if the people in the waste disposal business (I don’t know if you’re familiar with who runs that business but I assure you it’s not the Boy Scouts.) saw a chance at a profit, they could “persuade” their Congresscritters to rearrange policies....
Do you have any idea how much energy goes INTO producing that trash? And stop to think how much trash it will take to produce the energy we need.
/s
Do you know a damn thing about farming? The statement about a famine tells me you don’t.
I found this on another thread.
Percent change in commodity prices since January 1st
aluminum 29.2
barley 7.5
cocoa 25.9
coffee 23.5
copper 26.3
corn 21.2
cotton 32.0
gold 17.4
lead 32.7
oats 33.8
oil 6.8
silver 37.8
tin 15.5
wheat 32.7
zinc 20.5
Can you explain the government ethanol subsidies distorting all those other commodity prices? Somebody with half a brain could see that we are in the middle of a general commodities price rise because of the low dollar.
In the long run yes but I don’t want to have to get rid of my current vehicles because methanol is the required fuel. That is the problems with many Freepers solutions. Lets do Biodiesel, well I support it but I can’t use it in my gasoline car. Hydrogen and fuel cells, great ideas but again I am not saving money getting a new car that can run on it.
What we need is more gasoline (we need to drill for oil, build refineries, etc), turn coal into gasoline, and no more than 10% ethanol replacing MBTE and other additives is the current solution.
But the anti-nuke greens would never accept it.
I hope some one is working on it.
Increasing the nuclear power production is the ONLY viable option.
I agree - but the anti-nuke mob is fairly powerful. How many new nuke power plants have been built here in the last 20 years?
Thanks neverdem.
All should please realize that the reason for higher food prices is OPEC’s colluded price of petroleum. It has little to nothing to do with any kind of ethanol mandate or ethanol production. At 42 gallons a barrel, $100 a barrel crude means about $2.50 a gallon of crude (and that doesn’t take into account transportation and refining). Everything produced for retail has energy costs in its cost of production, cost of transportation, cost of wholesaling and retailing, and of course, indirectly, in bringing it home from the store.
I’ve heard that by the end of the summer, gasoline will be around $4 a gallon — the person I was riding with this afternoon bought Shell regular at $3.459 — and I’d make a wild guess that the price will be $5 a gallon a year from then.
However, that said, it isn’t likely that any of this alternative sourcing would be happening at all if it weren’t for the rising price.
Anything into Oil (Change trash & sewage to oil for $15@barrel)
DISCOVER Vol. 24 No. 5 | May 2003 | Brad Lemley
Posted on 08/20/2003 9:34:41 AM EDT by ckilmer
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/967192/posts
Finally - a breakthrough for oil?
Telepolis | 12/06/2004 | Craig Morris
Posted on 12/08/2004 12:30:48 PM EST by ckilmer
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1297067/posts
Ping
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