Corn-Based Polymer Production Begins

DuPont, Tate & Lyle Begin Production Of Corn-Based Polymer That Can Replace Petroleum

(AP)  The nation's top energy official hailed on Friday the innovation behind chemical giant DuPont Co.'s new $100 million bioengineering joint-venture with multinational agri-processor Tate & Lyle PLC to produce a new biology-based polymer.

The Loudon plant is churning out a product derived from corn that the companies say can directly replace and improve upon petroleum-based ingredients in everything from carpets to clothes to cosmetics, saving energy and using renewable resources at the same time.

“The work that will be done here is on the leading edge of a biotechnology revolution, which I believe will change the way we power our cars, our trucks, our homes and our businesses,” Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said during a formal opening ceremony.

The plant is expected to make 100 million pounds of its bio-product annually. The plant may not reach full capacity for another year, but it already has shipped 85 rail cars of its bio-product since November.

“Up to this point, we have been focused on recycling products and putting that back in other products,” said Jeffrey S. Lorberdaum, CEO of carpetmaker Mohawk Industries. “This is allowing us to take the next step in environmental sustainability.”

By the fall, Mohawk will be marketing a line of carpet made entirely from the bio-ingredient from the Loudon plant.

DuPont and Tate & Lyle say their corn-based propanediol, or Bio-PDO, will find new uses because it helps fabrics take dyes more brilliantly, carpets become naturally stain resistant, face creams be gentler to the skin, and airplane de-icers biodegrade.

“It is the most significant invention since nylon,” DuPont Chairman and CEO Charles “Chad” Holliday Jr. said in an interview with The Associated Press. The Wilmington, Del.-based company invented nylon in 1935.

“The functionality of this product is what really differentiates it,” Iain Ferguson, chief executive of London-based Tate & Lyle, told the AP. “That gives us something which has a real edge.”

The Loudon plant, about 35 miles south of Knoxville, uses corn sugar or glucose from an adjoining Tate & Lyle ethanol plant. An E. coli bacteria modified by DuPont scientists breaks down the glucose through a fermentation process much like making beer.

The result is a clear liquid compound that might be used in a quickly growing range of products, including fabrics, cosmetics, liquid detergents, boat hulls, ski boots and runway de-icers.

Brent Erickson, an executive vice president at the Biotechnology Industry Organization in Washington, D.C., said that while DuPont and Tate & Lyle are not alone, the commercialization of their Loudon plant was a significant development in what he termed the third wave of a biotech revolution that began 20 years ago in medicine and then agriculture about a decade ago.

“It has gone beyond the doctor's office into consumer goods and other products that we never imagined,” he said.

Holliday and Ferguson said they have factored rising corn prices, driven in part by growing demand for biofuels, into their equation.

Steven Mirshak, president of the DuPont-Tate & Lyle Bio-Products joint venture, said the price of the companies' Bio-PDO base is “similar” to nylon. A chemical version of the product was discovered in the 1940s but was too expensive to make.

“But with our new process using biology, we are able to produce PDO at a cost point where we can develop direct applications of its use in a variety of markets,” he said, replacing petroleum counterparts.

Corn-based substitutes for petroleum are good for the environment, but experts have said they also contribute to a rise in global food import costs, making it harder for developing countries to feed their populations.

Holliday said DuPont brings an unusual perspective to the corn supply situation. The company also owns the major corn seed brand Pioneer and is devoting considerable resources to increasing its productivity.

“Every time you get something like this where you get a price increase, you get further investment in agricultural production,” Ferguson said. “And there is clearly considerable further potential to raise the yields.”

[erasmus6]

"We can worry about how bright our carpet is once every kid on the planet has a full belly. Otherwise using food grade items for anything but food is just plain immoral." posted by brainworms1

And what they are using now isn't immoral? We will just have to grow MORE corn, that's all. I doubt that MORE kids will be going hungry because of it.

[incog-nito]

The big question is: Is it OK to eat your corn-based carpet if you're really, really hungry?

[eccentric506]

Bio fuels----wow--- and they think that corn is the answer== sugar beets are a more vaible energy source than corn in that the starch is there as well as the sugar needed to produce ethanol, and the yields per acre are much higher. Additionally the cost per acre for production is less. its a win-win situation

[cfin5]

All methods of energy production should be implimented in their regional area of raw materials. Ethanol from corn in the corn belt. Ethanol from sugarcane in respective climate. And energy from wind, solar, geothermal, in there most efficient and likely to succeed areas.......Anything to get our financial/energy concerns away from the middle east headgame. Keeps the money hear where they spend it here......And uhm,...Make these efforts free of forgein ownership completely or you know what will happen with that!

[tomtomasters]

SugarCane is the answer for Ethanol and probably for many other useful products, but because the geographic location of the USA is in the North, corn is their only reasonable choice of crops. If America was smart they would start using the ocean as a platform to grow sugarcane.
check out this site:
http://www.sugarcitycane.com

[mepeg]

I hope they label the products they manufacture as having corn! This way those of us with allergies to corn derivatives have a fighting chance to avoid them, unlike the constant battle we face daily with the hidden corn in food.

[bmsbms29]

It's about time!

But they also need to seek other forms of fuel - Soybeans -better in our cars than our tummies.
(check out Soy Dangers!)
And there is SugarCane.

And they need to find cheaper ways to get the oil in the U.S. in areas where the gases were allowed to burn out just so they could get to the oil.
I'm not an expert - but because the gas was allowed to burn, it has become much harder & more expensive to extract oil.
South Arkansas is one example. There is a lot of oil underground - just too expensive to extract it.

[brainworms1]

We can worry about how bright our carpet is once every kid on the planet has a full belly. Otherwise using food-grade items for anything but food is just plain immoral.

Besides, how much energy is used to produce this bio-propanediol? No doubt this is just another corporate financial scam like ethanol (subsidized by us tax slaves).

[delfmast]

This product's commercialization may offer leverage, with our awakening horror of the actual price of petroleum purchased from the terrorist financiers, of despotic Middle Eastern terror financiers to break OPEC's death grip on energy, plastics production, and other areas of international trade. Recent threats by OPEC, to react unfavorably to our inevitable drive to cleaner liquified coal transport fuels, and North American oil sands and shale sources that promise to put despotic oil regimes into penury, provide an omen of hope,that those who enslave the peoples of the Levant will be hoist on their own fixed oil prices. We need to quit our silly bickering about the utility of ethanol, vis a vis other biofuels, outlaw the incandescent lightbulb, and allow our farmers in every nation to be weaned from the welfare programs that comprised French, American, and other nations farm subsidy programs, enslaved our criminal political class to spoiled farmers, and starved the world's poorest peoples.Food, Freedom, and no more WTO violating farm subsidy programs justify trying out any biofuel approach. Who cares which is more efficient, let the market places work it out, while farmers enjoy market prices for their crops, freed of the disaster of welfare, and the loss of decency that all subsidy grovelers endure. www.editorialstaff.net

[amazedd]

Soylent Green 2 the people!

[Keypinitreel1]

Its getting to the point where mans dependence on fossil fuels is beginning to be a barrier holding us back from achieving and being all that we can be technologically and earth consciously.

[freckster]

Sugar cane needs to be included in the equation for ethanol production. It can take some pressure off corn as a food source. Using sugar cane can also help the economies of the Caribbean by restoring demand for cane sugar versus corn syrup.

Solutions are out there. Politicians and oil magnates are too busy stuffing their pockets with money to take notice. The only discovery they are interested in is how they can make the same kind of money from biological options and still maintain such central control.

[cfin5]

I think this is great! It is good to read some good news for a change.