We see it on the news. We feel it at the pump. Fuel prices are at record highs. And so is the demand for alternative fuels.
Since 1998, Verenium has been applying its expertise in the field of enzymes to develop clean, economic processes for the conversion of plant material, such as corn, and agricultural waste, called biomass, into cellulosic ethanol for fuel.
Verenium's first biofuels product, Fuelzyme™-LF enzyme, increases the efficiency in producing ethanol from corn.
Fuelzyme™-CX enzymes are under development for the conversion of cellulosic biomass - the stems, stalks and leaves of plants - to fuel ethanol.
Verenium's has also received regulatory clearance to market our Purifine™ enzyme to enhance the production of biodiesel, an alternative fuel made from vegetable oils.
Choose a product from the menu on the left for more information on individual enzyme products.
Verenium is featured on the TV program, Today’s Environment, hosted by John Paul Mitchell. View the segment on how Verenium's enzymes are making ethanol an affordable reality (Windows Media Player, 8.1 MB, 04:11 min.).
Ethanol’s history as a transportation fuel can be traced back to the 1880s and Henry Ford, who fueled the first car, a quadricycle, and the early Model Ts on ethanol.
Today, the largest single use of ethanol is to increase octane and improve the emissions quality of gasoline. Manufacturers anticipate the use of ethanol as a fuel additive to increase in order to comply with governmental mandates to phase out MTBE. Prior to the MTBE phase out, about one-third of America's gasoline was blended with 10% ethanol.
E85, a fuel blend containing 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline, is gaining in popularity in the U.S. as an alternative fuel, with more than 4 million FFVs, flexible fuel vehicles, on the road today designed to run on E85 or traditional gasoline.
Manufacturers currently produce ethanol from sugar or starch-based feedstocks by a fermentation and distillation process similar to making beer or whiskey.
The greatest production hurdle for ethanol producers is the conversion of the plant or biomass feedstocks into simple sugars.
In Brazil, with its abundance of sugar cane, ethanol is relatively simple to make. Producers mechanically extract cane juice, which is sugar, from the harvested plants, and ferment ethanol directly by using yeast. Enzymes are of little use for process improvements.
In the U.S., however, where corn is the chief feedstock, enzymes play a key role in transforming corn starch into ethanol. Starch is simply a chain, or biopolymer, of sugars such as glucose. The enzyme alpha-amylase helps transform the corn into a liquid slurry, in a process called liquefaction, while glucoamylase completes the conversion of starch into sugar, in a process called saccharification.
click image to enlarge
To reach the alternative fuels market, Verenium has developed and is marketing Fuelzyme™-LF enzyme amylase enzyme for the conversion of corn into ethanol.
Verenium's partner, Syngenta, is developing a genetically modified strain of corn that expresses high levels of a Verenium alpha amylase enzyme, called internally amylase-T, to increase the cost effectiveness of ethanol production from corn starch.
In order to meet future demand for ethanol, renewable and cheaper feedstocks, such as agricultural and forest residues, municipal solid waste, and dedicated energy crops, will need to be converted to fuel. The conversion of this "cellulosic biomass" to ethanol presents a greater technological challenge to industry.
Verenium believes that ultimate success in the cost-effective production of ethanol from biomass will require the development of collections of multiple enzyme "cocktails" - called Fuelzyme™-CX enzymes - to break down cellulosic biomass Our expertise in enzyme discovery and evolution makes us uniquely qualified to achieve the significant advances in enzyme development that will be necessary to make cellulosic ethanol economically viable.
Towards this goal, Verenium is participating in a consortium lead by Dupont Bio-based Materials known as the Integrated Corn-based Biorefinery (ICBR) program. The aim of the program, which was initiated in 2003, is to develop a cost-effective process to convert corn and corn stover to sugars for production of ethanol and other value-added chemicals.
In addition, Verenium is looking for novel cellulosic enzymes found in microbes living symbiotically in the guts of termites in an attempt to capitalize on the insect's ability to efficiently convert wood to energy.
