Sustainable: tenable or degradable?
When I was a child we often went on a holiday to France. To get us through the long journey we’d bring along small packages of apple juice, those with three in a wrapping and with shining foil to stick … Read more
Ecover: it is all about sustainability
As companies strive to be more sustainable, their customers might grow more critical on their performance rather than less, asking questions that were never raised. At least, that is what Ecover experiences. These bottles being made from sugar rather than … Read more
Biobased chemicals: European share to drop sharply
Whereas world capacity for biobased chemicals and materials is rapidly growing, Europe clearly lags behind. Lux Research, a Boston based company, expects a doubling of global biobased capacity in 2017 to 13.2 Mton. But Europe’s share will drop from 37% … Read more
Toxic substances in food packaging – an opportunity for bioplastics?
Our industrial society exposes us to low doses of toxic substances. These are known to have health effects – but to what extent? For some time, air pollution and lung degradation have been a focus of debate; now researchers started … Read more
Paper and pulp industry needs biorefinery, says Michiel Adriaanse
The paper and pulp industry calls it MIMO: Multiple Inputs, Multiple Outputs. In other words: biorefinery of various resources in order to produce multiple end products. Of which the paper and pulp sector would be just one of the clients, … Read more
SkyNRG for sustainable jet fuel
Just five years ago, flying on bio jet fuel seemed an impossible dream. But SkyNRG developed a powerful concept that allows it to offer this product at an increasing number of airports. Its funding and co-creation model allows the company … Read more
Biobased Society becomes Bio Based Press
As of today, the name of our website will be biobasedpress.eu. This is a better expression of who we are. Our twitter account was already called @biobasedpress. From now on, we will use this name in all our communications. Our … Read more
Design rules for the biobased industry #4: elegance is beautiful
In this series, we discussed three design rules: reduce capital costs and create jobs, be lean on materials flows, and preserve structure. Our last guideline, elegance is beautiful, sums up the former three and enlarges them. Elegance in chemistry means … Read more
Design rules for the biobased industry, #3: preserve structure
Petrochemical industry breaks down the feedstock into its simplest components, and subsequently starts piecing all ‘building blocks’ together in order to arrive at the required products. Biobased industry will never be able to compete if it follows this same logic. … Read more
Elon Musk and a lot of batteries
“Cheap batteries will revolutionise the renewable energy market,” wrote ex-Secretary of State for the UK Chris Huhne past Sunday in the Guardian. For the supply of renewable energy it’s usually not stocks but flows that get the attention. For lack … Read more
Anton Robek (DSM): biobased needs to start simple and learn fast
The future is to biobased, says DSM’s Anton Robek. In 10-20 years’ time, virtually all of DSM’s feedstock will be biobased. The question now is not if, but how fast industry will get there. It needs to take a hurdle … Read more
Design rules for the biobased industry, #2: be lean on materials flows
A biobased industry should not copy petrochemical industry’s structure: that structure has been optimised for over a century, for this particular feedstock. In order to compete, the biobased industry should particularly be lean on materials flows: it should use all … Read more
European Union biased on biobased
One of the discussion themes in the corridors of the World Bio Markets conference in Amsterdam last week, was industry-government relationships. Major European biobased industries feel frustrated that they invest in other continents, whereas they received so much support from … Read more
Design rules for the biobased industry, #1: reduce capital costs and create jobs
Will biomass ever be able to compete across a broad range of products with fossil feedstock, that is so much easier to recover and has such excellent economies of scale? In his valedictory speech as professor in biomass valorisation, delivered … Read more
Glycix, the biodegradable thermoset polymer that will conquer the world
Researchers of the University of Amsterdam (UvA) have made a new step in the development of glycix, the only thermoset plastic that is both biobased and biodegradable. All inflexible plastic items used in homes and buildings can be made from … Read more
Pier Vellinga (Wageningen UR): sustainability is cost-effective, and has an emancipatory power
‘Often, sustainability is not merely better, but cheaper too. Sustainable technologies lend themselves to local systems with far lesser control costs. That is the basis for a technological transition with which the earth can feed as many as ten billion … Read more
Pharmafilter’s sustainable hospital waste processing system now commercially available
Pharmafilter is a Dutch company that has developed a new and sustainable system for processing hospital waste. It produces devices like bed-pans and urinals from a biobased and biodegradable plastic; these can be ground after single use, and processed in … Read more
Thistle biorefinery to reinforce Sardinian economy
If plans work out as projected, Sardinia’s new Matrìca plant in Porto Torres might show the way into a new industrial future for the whole of Europe. The Matrìca project, sized € 500 million, will turn the site of an … Read more
Green chemistry, rather than green energy
Most people, when talking about a sustainable future for Europe, think in terms of energy supply. That is one-sided. It is true: the energy conflict still deepens, as the incumbent powers start to be challenged just recently, forty years after … Read more
Innovation: the state bears the risk, companies reap the benefits
‘Socialise the risks and privatise the gains’ has been the reigning economic principle in the financial world in the past few years. Now such a mechanism also appears to be functioning in the much less murky innovation process. And here … Read more
Almost until the very end
Why on earth do we human beings have so much difficulty changing our thoughts – and our actions? For instance, change from a fossil economy to a green economy, from an inflexible hierarchical command society to a small-scale grass roots … Read more
In the middle of the ‘mother of all transitions’
We are right in the middle of the most radical transition that our society can go through: that of a centralistic, fossil-fuelled society to a much more decentralised society mainly on the basis of local resources. Different observers, dependent on … Read more
Innovations in green chemistry, will they ever come?
There is a very strange body of regulation for biobased innovation subsidies. These rules seem to be exclusively intended to direct biomass and agricultural wastes to the energy sector, ignoring higher-value applications in green chemistry. Will that endanger further development … Read more
Technology, no longer a threat
In fifty years’ time, technology has changed from the bogeyman to the saviour of mankind. Large-scale and energy intensive processes used to be the pinnacle of technology, producing much collateral damage that was merrily cleaned up afterwards (it was all … Read more
Rob Baan (Koppert Cress): Horticulture should be more innovative
‘Frontrunners in horticulture should concentrate on fresh products that contain ingredients for a healthy diet and would be a remedy against diseases like cancer, obesity and diabetes2. The Netherlands have the best horticultural sector in the world, but misses an … Read more
Biorefinery as the key to the circular economy
The Dutch agricultural sector has one major problem: an excess of manure production as a consequence of the large livestock population. Dutch livestock farming depends on major imports of soy and other crops for fodder production. ‘At the end of … Read more
The biobased industry needs many educational courses
The world needs a fantastic amount of knowledge, for its sustainable development, and in order to feed all new mouths. According to the OECD, we need to open three new universities every week of 30,000 students each, in order to … Read more
Human error, a category that raises more questions than it answers
Human error is the label stuck on accidents that cannot be directly explained by the failure of a device, be it mechanical, electric or electronic. But the other side of such errors might well be the variation in the way … Read more
Know-how as a location factor for the biobased chemical industry
Biobased resources and biochemical processes will change the appearance of chemical industry. Changes may occur in scale and in location. There will be a tendency towards a smaller scale. But know-how, the skill of process operators, might become an important … Read more
Focus on biobased materials in a new regional development model
The recent report ‘Strategy for a green society’ (in Dutch) of the Scientific and Technological Committee for the biobased economy (WTC) puts an emphasis on biobased materials. Biobased materials are the driving force for the biobased economy, according to the … Read more
Strategy for a green society, WTC’s swan song
The Dutch Scientific and Technological Committee for the biobased economy (WTC) has published its second and last report. Elsewhere on this site, we will go into the committee’s recommendations, intended to turn the Netherlands into a green society. Here something … Read more
Circular economy: do not merely close the chain, but slow it down as well
‘Cradle-to-cradle (C2C) shows some undesirable developments, in particular in the process of awarding certificates. C2C has become a business model, and the famous certificate promotes recycling and therefore discarding of products. Let us prefer products that last instead, products that … Read more
PBL-WRR-AWT-WTC
Sorry, we publish this column on Dutch innovation policy in Dutch only.
First fair-trade and climate-neutral coffee on the market
Coffee-roasting house Peeze in Arnhem introduced the first fair-trade and climate-neutral coffee on the market, last month. In the production chain of this fair-trade coffee, CO2 emissions are first reduced as much as possible; the remaining emissions are compensated by … Read more
High hopes in the Dutch wind sector
Sorry, we publish this article in Dutch only.
Sustainable supply chains: much progress has been made, but now governments need to act
Sustainable supply chains are of great importance for the biobased economy, in terms of environmental conditions and respect for biodiversity, and also on issues of improving working conditions and farmers’ incomes. In recent years, many labels have been created for … Read more
Joe Ross (Biorenewables Development Centre): businesses can work with us to start straight away
‘The unique feature of our centre is the cooperation with the excellent plant science and green chemistry centres in our University,’ says Joe Ross, Director of the Biorenewables Development Centre in York (UK). ‘Building upon the strong agricultural tradition in … Read more
Why Europe undermines its own policies on second-generation biofuels, whereas the US moves fast forward
Europe’s biofuel policy has been reformulated earlier this year, in order to promote the development of second-generation biofuels. But this seems to have little effect: whereas second-generation biofuels from food wastes are indeed being produced in Europe, there is just … Read more
Wood biorefinery: major steps in Nordic countries
At EFIB, it was a surprise to me as a Dutchman, living in a country where agriculture is mainly about food crops, to learn that wood biorefinery is important in the developing biobased economy of the Nordic countries. As was … Read more
Innovations across the entire value pyramid of the biobased economy
Agriculture, with its renewable feedstock, materials, textile fibres, food products and medicinal plants, has been the supplier of mankind with its livelihood for ages. By innovations, agriculture will again take up this role and contribute to the build-up of a … Read more
The biobased economy requires integration of all educational levels
Policy makers who aim to stimulate innovation, in the biobased economy for instance, sometimes exaggerate the importance of higher education. But getting innovations to be successful in pratice is highly dependent on skills that students learn in secondary and higher … Read more
Sustainable energy: keeping the score. Part 3: fossil fuels with CCS
Renewable sources cannot cover more than 30% of our energy demand within the next 25 years. A clear-cut strategy for continued deployment of fossil energy sources is unavoidable in which fruitful competition and a level playing field for all commercial … Read more
Sustainable energy: keeping the score. Part 2: The role of sun and wind
In part 1 we have shown the potential of biomass. We will now deal with sun and water as sources of renewable energy. We will give an estimate of the maximum contribution of renewables. Solar and wind energy together could … Read more
The comeback of flax and hemp
Flax and hemp are making a comeback. Many new products contain these fibres. ‘But the growth does not yet entail large volumes,’ says David Kasse, an agricultural engineer in the Dutch farmers’ association. Flax and hemp are as old as … Read more
Sustainable energy, keeping the score. Part 1: The role of biomass
After a few decades of research and development a halfway score is meaningful and, on headlines, very well feasible. For various reasons wind and biomass are showing their limits. Solar energy still has a big upward potential. Other sustainable sources … Read more
Biobased Wunderkammer: a lost opportunity
Sorry, we publish this review of the Dutch Design Week in Dutch only.
Cooperative organisations are of major importance for the biobased economy
Even though countries differ appreciably in culture, everywhere in the world farmers growing wet crops organise in cooperative organisations. That will not be different in the biobased economy. On the contrary: such cooperatives, well rooted in their regional communities, will … Read more
Towards a smaller scale in the biobased economy: the interim results
On August 18, we started a discussion on the development towards a smaller scale in the biobased economy. We continued this discussion in a LinkedIn group connected to www.biobasedeconomy.nl. What was the outcome of this discussion? The reason why we … Read more
The Bioprocess Pilot Facility in Delft
New prospects in industrial biotechnology (processes, new products) developed in the lab will have to be tested at a relevant scale before they can be taken into commercial production. A test facility that imitates the production process at a semi-technical … Read more