BP continues investment in biofuels

BP has continued to expand into the biofuel industry with a recent investment into biofuel startup CoolPlanet. 

CoolPlanet makes 'negative carbon fuels' using a technology called biomass fractionator, which takes non-food biomass (plant waste, energy crops) and turns it into a drop-in replacement for gas and diesel. Biofuel company KiOR make oil in a similar way, using a catalyst to carbonize biomass called a Biomass Catalytic Cracking Process. 

BP has also invested in biofuel company Verdezyne, which engineers yeast that eats plant sugars and excretes biofuel and biochemicals. The company recently opened a pilot plant for the production of adipic acid derived from nonfood-based vegetable oils using a cost-effective engineered yeast-based fermentation process in California.

Synthetic Genomics, a company that uses genetics to tweak algae to produce fuel, has received funding from BP, as well as a joint development agreement with Mertek Biosciences, with the companies looking to work on making microbial oils for biofuels. These acquisitions and agreements come after an earlier acquisition of $98 million on the biofuel arm of Verenium, which is a start-up that makes enzymes that break down cellulosic biomass into sugars.

The investments are important for the development of biofuels, however, the Environmental Protection Agency commented that only a tiny fraction of the biofuels required by the US mandate will come from next-gen cellulosic biofuels.