BASF plans pro­duc­tion of buta­ne­di­ol from renew­able feedstock

BASF plans to begin pro­duc­tion of 1,4‑butanediol based on renew­able feed­stock (renew­able BDO) using the pat­en­ted pro­cess of Gen­o­mat­ica, San Diego, Cali­for­nia. The one-step fer­ment­a­tion pro­cess is based on sug­ars as a renew­able feed­stock. The com­pan­ies have agreed not to dis­close fin­an­cial details of the agree­ment. The license agree­ment allows BASF to build a world-scale pro­duc­tion facil­ity that will use the Gen­o­mat­ica pro­cess to man­u­fac­ture BDO based on renew­able feed­stock. Under the terms of the agree­ment, Gen­o­mat­ica will con­tin­ue to advance its pat­en­ted renew­able BDO pro­duc­tion pro­cess tech­no­logy based on sug­ars while BASF will pro­duce renew­able BDO, which will be avail­able in the second half of 2013 for sampling and tri­als. ​“We chose the Gen­o­mat­ica pro­cess because we con­sider it to be excep­tion­ally advanced and reli­able,” said San­jeev Gandhi, Pres­id­ent of BASF Inter­me­di­ates divi­sion, and added: ​“In line with our ​‘We cre­ate chem­istry’ strategy, we aim to offer renew­able BDO and cre­ate addi­tion­al value for our cus­tom­ers, in the plastics, tex­tile and auto­mot­ive indus­tries.” ​“We are pleased to cooper­ate with BASF, the lead­ing glob­al BDO man­u­fac­turer with a world­wide man­u­fac­tur­ing and sales net­work and many years of mar­ket exper­i­ence,” said Chris­tophe Schilling, Chief Exec­ut­ive Officer of Gen­o­mat­ica, and con­tin­ued: ​“This agree­ment high­lights Genomatica’s com­mit­ment to deliv­er­ing innov­at­ive pro­cess tech­no­lo­gies to the glob­al chem­ic­al industry.” BDO and its deriv­at­ives are widely used for pro­du­cing plastics, solvents, elec­tron­ic chem­ic­als and elast­ic fibers. The start­ing mater­i­als for the pro­duc­tion of con­ven­tion­al BDO are nat­ur­al gas, butane, butadiene and pro­pyl­ene. BASF cur­rently pro­duces BDO and BDO-equi­val­ents at its sites in Lud­wig­shafen, Ger­many; Geis­mar, Louisi­ana; Chiba, Japan; Kuantan, Malay­sia; and Caojing, China, and has an annu­al capa­city of 535,000 met­ric tons. BASF has recently announced the inten­tion of build­ing a BDO com­plex in China with a capa­city of 100,000 annu­al met­ric tons. About Gen­o­mat­ica
Gen­o­mat­ica is a tech­no­logy lead­er for the chem­ic­al industry. It deliv­ers new man­u­fac­tur­ing pro­cesses that enable its part­ners to pro­duce inter­me­di­ate and basic chem­ic­als from renew­able feed­stocks. These chem­ic­als serve as the basis for mak­ing sub­stan­tially all of the products that make mod­ern life pos­sible. Gen­o­mat­ica is devel­op­ing a pipeline of man­u­fac­tur­ing pro­cesses for the pro­duc­tion of these chem­ic­als, includ­ing BDO and butadiene, as well as oth­er tar­gets. About BASF
BASF is the world’s lead­ing chem­ic­al com­pany: The Chem­ic­al Com­pany. Its port­fo­lio ranges from chem­ic­als, plastics, per­form­ance products and crop pro­tec­tion products to oil and gas. We com­bine eco­nom­ic suc­cess with envir­on­ment­al pro­tec­tion and social respons­ib­il­ity. Through sci­ence and innov­a­tion, we enable our cus­tom­ers in nearly every industry to meet the cur­rent and future needs of soci­ety. Our products and solu­tions con­trib­ute to con­serving resources, ensur­ing nutri­tion and improv­ing qual­ity of life. We have summed up this con­tri­bu­tion in our cor­por­ate pur­pose: We cre­ate chem­istry for a sus­tain­able future. BASF had sales of €72.1 bil­lion in 2012 and more than 110,000 employ­ees as of the end of the year. BASF shares are traded on the stock exchanges in Frank­furt (BAS), Lon­don (BFA) and Zurich (AN).

Source: Genomatica