- BASF led a $50 million financing round

- BASF share of investment is $30 million

- Renmatix’s patented PlantroseTM technology allows manufacture of sugar from wood biomass

03-01-2012. Philadelphia (Pennsylvania ) and Ludwigshafen (Germany). BASF is participating with $ 30 million through BASF Biorenewable Beteiligungs-GmbH & CoKG in the American technology firm Renmatix Inc. The BASF subsidiary led a $50 million financing round, joined by new and existing investors.

The technology company Renmatix has developed the Plantrose™ platform. With this patented process, industrial sugar can be produced from lignocellulosic biomass (wood, cane trash or straw). This technology makes it possible for the first time to produce industrial sugar in large quantities and at competitive cost from non-edible plant mass. “The Plantrose technology could allow us in the future to broaden our use of renewable raw materials while improving the cost effectiveness of our value chains even further. In the partnership with Renmatix, BASF is pursuing a new direction while simultaneously underlining its corporate strategy of offering even more sustainable solutions,” said Dr. Josef R. Wünsch, Senior Vice President Modelling, Formulation Research and Technology Incubation at BASF.

In the Plantrose technology, biomass is split into cellulose and sugar in supercritical water at high temperature and pressure in a two-step process. Since the Plantrose technology utilizes non-edible biomass as feedstock, it is not in competition with feed and food production. “Thanks to the partnership with BASF we can now develop and commercialize our technology more efficient. We have already demonstrated the functionality of the Plantrose process in a pilot plant. In cooperation with BASF, we will be moving it to the industrial scale,” said Mike Hamilton, Chief Executive Officer at Renmatix.

Industrial sugars are important renewable resources for the chemical industry and can be used, for example, to produce biofuels or basic chemical products and intermediates by fermentative processes. The availability of industrial sugars in sufficient quantities and at favorable cost is therefore important for the competitiveness of the products.

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26-07-2011. Süd-Chemie AG, a member of the Clariant Group, has started construction in Straubing (DE) of what will be the largest German plant for the manufacture of the climate-friendly biofuel cellulosic ethanol from agricultural waste materials. The total project volume is around EUR 28 million: EUR 16 million in investment and just under EUR 12 million for accompanying research measures. The Bavarian state government and the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) have
each put around EUR 5 million into this and other research initiatives relating to the project. From the end of 2011, the plant will produce up to 1,000 tonnes of cellulosic ethanol per year, primarily from wheat straw from the Straubing area, an agricultural centre of what is known locally as “the granary of Lower Bavaria”.

In the presence of Bavaria’s Minister of Economic Affairs, Martin Zeil, the ground-breaking ceremony for the future project funded by the Bavarian state government and the German Ministry of Research (BMBF) was held on 26 July 2011. Dr Günter von Au, Chairman of the Managing Board of Süd-Chemie AG, commented: “With the investment in building the demonstration plant, we are taking a major step towards commercialising our sunliquid® process and thus launching a sustainable process for climate-friendly fuels. With our Straubing demonstration plant, we will put a future technology made in Germany right at the forefront of the global market.” Dr Andre Koltermann, Head of Strategic Research and Development at Süd-Chemie, added: “As a second-generation biofuel, cellulosic ethanol delivers significant greenhouse gas savings of up to 95%. In addition, cellulosic ethanol has considerable potential to reduce dependence on crude oil on a long-term basis through local production of a renewable energy source.”

Since 2009, the sunliquid® process developed by Süd-Chemie has already been tested successfully on a pilot scale. This is an innovative, biotechnological process for producing bioethanol from plant waste materials such as cereals or corn stalks. Construction of the demonstration plant is the essential interim step for the planning of energy-efficient and cost-effective production facilities with optimum greenhouse gas savings. In this fully integrated process, highly optimised raw material-specific biocatalysts deliver high yields under stable process conditions. Process-integrated production of the biocatalysts provides flexibility and reduces production costs. By means of a new yeast organism, C5 and C6 sugars can be converted to ethanol, which increases the yield by around another 50%. A new purification process developed by Süd-Chemie will also be used for the first time at the Straubing plant. This is a significant factor in ensuring that the total amount of process energy required can be gained from the non-recyclable residual substance lignin.

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