Clariant inks cellulosic biodiesel pact with ExxonMobil/REG

The companies said the goal of their partnership was to combine Clariant’s sunliquid^® microbial cellulose degradation technology with REG’s patented fermentation technology to produce biodiesel from cellulosic sugar in a one-step process. According to the companies that process could reduce greenhouse gas emissions namely CO₂ emissions significantly.

Since 2017, ExxonMobil and REG have already validated the ability of REG Life Sciences’ platform to convert sugars from cellulosic sugars into biodiesel through a single-step process. ExxonMobil and REG hope they can further optimize REG’s process by using previously tested and benchmarked cellulosic sugars created through Clariant’s sunliquid process. Clariant is specialist in converting agricultural residues such as wheat straw, rice straw, corn stover and sugar cane bagasse through its sunliquid process, which uses a feedstock and process-specific mixture of microbes to generate C5 and C6 sugars without the need of chemical pretreatment.

“Over the past three years, our work with REG has led to important advances in genetically improving REG’s proprietary microbes for a beneficial use in facilitating the conversion of cellulosic sugars into biodiesel,” said Vijay Swarup, vice president of research and development at ExxonMobil Research and Engineering Company. “Applying Clariant’s expertise and knowledge will help us better understand and advance a key stage in the overall cellulosic conversion process, and hopefully lead to the development of scalable biodiesel technology.”

Under the agreement, Clariant will conduct trials at its pre-commercial plant in Straubing, Germany converting different types of cellulosic feedstocks into sugars that fuel the process developed by REG and ExxonMobil to generate high-quality, low-carbon biodiesel.

“We are proud that two strong allies in the biofuels industry have selected Clariant as their partner and are excited to work with them on further leveraging this unique technology for converting cellulosic biomass to fuels and chemicals, including biodiesel,” said Christian Kohlpaintner, member of Clariant's executive committee.

The partners also agreed to work on a conceptual engineering study to validate the feasibility of the integrated process comprising the technologies of all parties.