ESPOO – VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland has started a large European project, combining the forces of European research institutes and companies for developing the next generation of biofuel. The NEMO project, which has received funding of €5.9 million from the EU, is aimed at developing manufacturing methods for liquid biofuel from agricultural and forestry waste, such as straws and wood chips.
Agricultural and forestry waste is mainly ligno-cellulose, which is comprised of sugars but in a form that makes them difficult to be used by microbes in the production of ethanol. The project develops enzymes that can be used to cut ligno-cellulose into sugar compounds suitable for fermentation.
The objective also is to tailor the metabolism of microbes so that they can produce large volumes of ethanol out of the biomass sugars, economically and efficiently. The project evaluates the suitability of the developed enzymes and yeast strains for industrial biofuel manufacturing processes.
The four-year €8.2 million NEMO project (Novel high performance enzymes and micro-organisms for conversion of ligno-cellulosic biomass to bioethanol) is developing the next, second generation production technology for the utilisation of ligno-cellulose raw material in the production of ethanol. The cost-effective production of the next generation biofuels requires the technology to be developed further. More at www.vtt.fi
Finns lead project to develop manufacturing method for biofuel
ESPOO – VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland has started a large European project, combining the forces of European research institutes and companies for developing the next generation of biofuel. The NEMO project, which has received funding of €5.9 million from the EU, is aimed at developing manufacturing methods for liquid biofuel from agricultural and forestry waste, such as straws and wood chips.
Agricultural and forestry waste is mainly ligno-cellulose, which is comprised of sugars but in a form that makes them difficult to be used by microbes in the production of ethanol. The project develops enzymes that can be used to cut ligno-cellulose into sugar compounds suitable for fermentation.
The objective also is to tailor the metabolism of microbes so that they can produce large volumes of ethanol out of the biomass sugars, economically and efficiently. The project evaluates the suitability of the developed enzymes and yeast strains for industrial biofuel manufacturing processes.
The four-year €8.2 million NEMO project (Novel high performance enzymes and micro-organisms for conversion of ligno-cellulosic biomass to bioethanol) is developing the next, second generation production technology for the utilisation of ligno-cellulose raw material in the production of ethanol. The cost-effective production of the next generation biofuels requires the technology to be developed further. More at www.vtt.fi