Since the Digest was launched in July 2007, we\u2019ve had the privilege of telling the amazing success story of the bioeconomy\u2014 new applications, companies, and platform technologies have been pouring out of research labs and many of them are deploying rapidly at commercial scale. If you\u2019ve seen the rise of renewable diesel, the expansion of renewable natural gas, the wide dispersal of advanced vegan foods, or the revolution in omega-3s, plastics, fabrics, protein, skin care and more, you\u2019ve seen it too. What began as a handful of technologists working on a handful of feedstocks to produce one or two key molecules has become a rainbow of amazing stuff.<\/p>\n
Along the way, we formed a few few observations that we\u2019ve tucked away in the back of our journalist\u2019s notebook \u2014 we hope some will amuse and provide some insight.\u00a0 They\u2019re short, and in alphabetical order, and we would like to celebrate our 12th birthday by sharing them with you.<\/p>\n
Thank you to each one of our 3,829,576 readers \u2013 you\u2019ve made this an awesome ride.
\nThe Futurol advanced biofuels demonstration plant in Champagne-Ardennes, Framce
\nAble was I ere I saw lignin.<\/p>\n
Ah, the clear thinking and pain tolerance that flows from the use of Someone\u2019s Else\u2019s Money.<\/p>\n
Absolutely, as Rogers and Hammerstein said, Climb\u00a0 Ev\u2019ry Mountain, except the Thermodynamic one<\/p>\n
A friend in DC is a friend indeed.<\/p>\n
A person who makes their living selling research will usually try and sell you some more.<\/p>\n
Algae are not puppies, they are little wolves.<\/p>\n
Algae, I heard somewhere, is ancient Arabic for \u201cthe company grows slower than the biomass does\u201d<\/p>\n
Allow us to summarize. You can finance a liquid renewable fuel as long as the market is solid, especially if you are making solids, and the market for solids is liquid, and your liquidity is solid. Adding solids to your liquids will make you more solid, and eventually more liquid. If you know what I mean. In other words, to get altitude, all you need is a little more grounding. So that clears up that.<\/p>\n
Opening of Algenol\u2019s pilot scale facility in Ft. Myers, Florida
\nAmong feedstocks, waste makes haste.<\/p>\n
As Jennifer Holmgren says, never fall in love with a feedstock.<\/p>\n
As Napoleon said: Never make decisions based on assumptions about what the other guy is thinking<\/p>\n
Ask any poppy farmer \u2013 distributors rule the earth unless interrupted by cartels.<\/p>\n
Ask not what the oil majors can do for you, ask what you can do for the oil majors.<\/p>\n
At the opening of the Dupont Cellulosic Ethanol plant (now Verbio) in Nevada, IA
\nBacteria are using you, not the other way around.<\/p>\n
Before embarking on a biofuels venture, chew and digest a car, just for practice.<\/p>\n
Big Oil, Big Chemicals, and Big Ag will be the only enduring friends you will have.<\/p>\n
Build the smallest thing you can.<\/p>\n
Beauty is in the eye of the debtholder.<\/p>\n
Before you invest, check the mass balance.<\/p>\n
Enerkem\u2019s commercial-scale plant in Edmonton. Alberta
\nClimb one hundred feet above your proposed site \u2013 whatever you can see, that\u2019s your feedstock.<\/p>\n
Confuse the enemy and plant seeds of doubt<\/p>\n
Refueling with biofuels at sea, central Pacific Ocean
\nDate what you see in the lab, marry what you see in the demo<\/p>\n
Darn it, why can\u2019t microorganisms understand plain English?<\/p>\n
Do not begin an algal biofuels adventure until you have found an affordable way to get the algae out of the water, or the water out of the algae.<\/p>\n
Don\u2019t expect a government hand-out, or a hand-up, but if you expect a hand-slap, you might be pleasantly surprised.<\/p>\n
Don\u2019t think gallons per acre, think dollars per acre.<\/p>\n
Don\u2019t\u2019 think megatonne, think negatonne<\/p>\n
Dude, it\u2019s the residue.<\/p>\n
Opening of the Novozymes enzymes plant in Blair, Nebraska
\nEasier to use an organism than make one.<\/p>\n
Eat humble pie at every meal.<\/p>\n
Even bad companies can make money in great times, great companies make money in bad times<\/p>\n
Every feedstock will eventually cost too much.<\/p>\n
Everybody in the world has the best catalyst.<\/p>\n
Everything tracks oil prices.<\/p>\n
Opening of the POET-DSM cellulosic ethanol plant in Emmetsburg, IA
\nFats and fast are two different things.<\/p>\n
Find the smartest people in the world, then hire someone else.<\/p>\n
First comes the cash flow, then the world domination.<\/p>\n
The ENI cellulosic biofuels plant in Crescentino, Italy
\nHalf of your cost will be the pipes.<\/p>\n
High oil prices make investors want to fund fossil fuel projects, not alternatives.<\/p>\n
History is like the greatest constitutional monarch of all. As majestic, diverting and entertaining as it is, history has no direct power over us. It only retains the power to encourage and to warn, and in that endeavor, the closer we are connected to history and see ourselves inside the story, the more we draw lessons of real value, and that is why the story of our friends, relations, neighbors, fellow citizens and ancestors is something that can be of real value to study.<\/p>\n
Hit your milestone, or someone surely will hit you.<\/p>\n
How Green Was My Valley of Death<\/p>\n
Checking out biomass at a Lallemeand facility
\nI wish that the world was a lot more like Iowa.<\/p>\n
I Wood iI I Could<\/p>\n
If you are making CO2, you are losing carbon.<\/p>\n
If you are thinking long-term, think about it in Mandarin.<\/p>\n
If you make a million using someone else\u2019s garden, they are going to want it back.<\/p>\n
In finance, begin with the exit in mind.<\/p>\n
In life, you do not get what you want, or what you deserve, or even what you negotiate. You get what everyone else overlooked at the time.<\/p>\n
Indirect impacts will never be well enough understood for policy purposes.<\/p>\n
Groundbreaking at the Clariant advanced biofuels plant in Romania.
\n\u201cInvictus revisited\u201d<\/p>\n
Out of the market that buries me
\nBlack as the pits of Chicago or Seoul,
\nI \u201cthank\u201d whatever gods may be
\nFor my unconquerable shorts and trolls.<\/p>\n
In the fell clutch of my quarterlies
\nmy plan now but a mushroom cloud
\nUnder the bludgeonings of analyses
\nMy shares are nuked, my team is cowed<\/p>\n
If I overpromise did, and underdeliver too
\nAnd loometh not Bulls but market Bears,
\nYet in the shareholder lawsuit queue
\nShall ye find me hustling preferred shares<\/p>\n
It matters not how bad the data
\nHow sadly our pilot fails
\nI shall reposition this: just a beta
\nTomorrow, friends, we find the Holy Grails<\/p>\n
Navy Secretary Ray Mabus and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack speak at the launch of the Great Green Fleet, San Diego, CA
\nIt is not what you know, or who you know, but what you do with who you know.<\/p>\n
It rained all night the day I left, the biomass was dry, the hype so hot, we burned to death,\u00a0 investor don\u2019 you cry<\/p>\n
In a Moore\u2019s Law environment, the number of suckers born every minute doubles every two years.<\/p>\n
Incentives are like people, cutest when they are young and small.<\/p>\n
Investor at the climate change pitch event:\u00a0 I was shaken, not stirred.<\/p>\n
If you think 100 Years of Solitude was bad, try pitching biofuels in Silicon Valley<\/p>\n
If your technology is uncool, put \u201cnano\u201d on the front of it.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a small step from Wonder Crop to Blunder Crop<\/p>\n
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood field questions at ABLC
\nJohn Benemann tells me, if algae looks good, we\u2019re in big trouble.<\/p>\n
\u201cJoint venture\u201d is an Old English phrase meaning \u201cyou\u2019re paying for it\u201d.<\/p>\n
The Qualitas Health commercial algae site in Columbus, NM
\nLand use change is caused by land zoning, not crop prices.<\/p>\n
Let Not Your Motto Be: 1, 2, skip a few\u202699,100.<\/p>\n
Look it up, the oldest profession is agriculture, the second is stock-jobbing.<\/p>\n
The 1944 Soybean-based car celebrated at the Petersen Automotive Museum, Los Angeles, CA
\nMaize is a craze, cane\u2019s insane, but grass and wood are always good.<\/p>\n
Make all your failures fail quickly.<\/p>\n
Malthusians and Luddites are everywhere.<\/p>\n
Many bad things start with the pretreatment.<\/p>\n
Measure twice, cut once, overpromise nonce<\/p>\n
Meet a spec, let someone else make one.<\/p>\n
Microalgae is the wild, wild wet.<\/p>\n
Money smalls like terpenes and terpenes smell like money<\/p>\n
More important than land use change is land use intensification<\/p>\n
More important than peak oil is peak investor patience.<\/p>\n
More valuable than diamonds and the harder to find is the hard data<\/p>\n
At a nexus of sugar cane biofuels and renewable hydropower, Brazil\u2019s Igassu Falls forms an imposing border between Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay
\nNetwork like crazy. No one can do it alone.<\/p>\n
Never enter a field that is exactly five years away from commercialization.<\/p>\n
Never move water, no matter what they tell you.<\/p>\n
No matter what you think you are inventing, you are inventing something else.<\/p>\n
No one knows anything about tomorrow.<\/p>\n
No one will give you infrastructure for Christmas.<\/p>\n
Abengoa\u2019s waste-to-energy plant in Salamanca, Spain
\nOde to [Redacted Company Name]<\/p>\n
A
\nBiopharma
\nCompany
\nDoesn\u2019t
\nEver
\nFail,
\n(=Grants
\nHath, er,
\nIndefinitely
\nJammed up)
\nKaput?
\nLudicrous!
\nMy
\nNASDAQ IPO (if
\nOutlandish)
\nProgresseth
\nQuite
\nRegally,
\nSure-fired,
\nTrust me!
\n(Until
\nVengefully
\nWe are
\nX-rayed and
\nYelds\u2019re
\nZilch)<\/p>\n
Paul Kamp\u2019s Led Zeppelin tribute band rocks it out at a Renewable Fuels Association event
\n\u201cOff we go, into the wild green yonder\u201d doesn\u2019t quite cut it any more<\/p>\n
One amazing success will drive a thousand admirers on to your Band Wagon<\/p>\n
Opponents don\u2019t really want biofuels to exist without subsidies, they want biofuels to go away.<\/p>\n
Propel Fuels pioneered a slew of new outlets in Southern California, including this one in Claremont, CA.
\nPartner early and often. Things go better with Koch.<\/p>\n
People are interested in their opportunity, not your opportunity.<\/p>\n
People never exaggerate so much as after a pilot, during a conference, or prior to a cap raise<\/p>\n
Petrochemical companies are filled with very smart, often very frustrated people.<\/p>\n
Plants have had 500 million years to learn how to protect their sugars.<\/p>\n
Prepare for the worst. It\u2019s coming.<\/p>\n
A cheeky Hot 30 photo vote from Genomatica
\nSeek truth, seek wisdom, and above all seek hydrogen.<\/p>\n
Sell a problem, deliver a solution, not the other way around<\/p>\n
Sing your musical scales with Julie Andrews and me: \u201cDOE spray me fast a lot of dough\u201d<\/p>\n
Smart people follow fuel prices, smarter people follow fish meal prices<\/p>\n
Solve one very big problem and partner for everything else.<\/p>\n
Somebody didn\u2019t tell you something important.<\/p>\n
Someone else is doing it too.<\/p>\n
Someone in the oil industry is laughing right now at your concept of scale.<\/p>\n
Petrobras\u2019s impressive R&D facility in Rio de Janeiro
\nThat fourth law of Thermodynamics, also known as the Law of the Conservation of Experts, states that everything will be described as impossible until you pay me enough to state otherwise.<\/p>\n
The autobahn of excess leads to the palace of restructuring.<\/p>\n
The bad news with jatropha is that no one has ever domesticated it.\u00a0\u00a0 The good news with jatropha is that no one has ever domesticated it.<\/p>\n
The devil is in the demo.<\/p>\n
The funny thing about Stealth mode is that no on notices you, until it\u2019s too late for you.<\/p>\n
The genome is the mother of all opportunity.<\/p>\n
The only limitation on the power of propaganda is the rate at which people fall for it.<\/p>\n
The just-compelted ZeaChem demonstration facility at Boardman, Oregon
\nThe road to Hell is paved with compelling spreadsheets.<\/p>\n
The secret of life is in Tom Sawyer, that is, getting everyone to paint the fence for you<\/p>\n
The winner is the one who mastered the value chain, not the use case<\/p>\n
The world is stranger than a lab.<\/p>\n
The world will only be changed by ideas that make money for someone<\/p>\n
There are lies, damned lies, and scale-up projections.<\/p>\n
Mechanizing the sugar cane harvest, S\u00e3o Paolo state, Brazil
\nThere are very few successful fuel producers for very good reasons.<\/p>\n
There is no green premium, just a green pillory you get to sit in once in a while.<\/p>\n
There is no patent on foolishness, it is in the public domain and used all too frequently.<\/p>\n
There is not a food shortage, there is an income distribution problem.<\/p>\n
There isn\u2019t enough fresh water for anything, much less everything.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s too much oxygen in your bio-oil.<\/p>\n
Think twice about getting the upper hand over a Brazilian.<\/p>\n
Groundbreaking at the Fulcrum BioEnergy Sierra Biofuels plant near Sparks, NV
\nThis Magic Microbe \/
\nSo Different and So New \/
\nSomeone is Stealing right now \/
\nOut from Under You<\/p>\n
Thou that first reacheth oil price parity and hath unlimited affordable feedstock shall inheriteth the earth.<\/p>\n
Thrilling, your magic algae, until a grazer eats it<\/p>\n
To every presentation on a biofuels investment opportunity, bring a copy of the Second Law of Thermodynamics.<\/p>\n
Too many companies are joined at the hype.<\/p>\n
Try explaining \u201cfood vs fuel\u201d to the horse you\u2019re riding around on.<\/p>\n
The Commonwealth Innovation Forum \u2014 a side event of the 2018 Commonwealth Games in Australia\u2019s Gold Coast \u2014 covered the bioeconomy in depth. Here, Malta PM Joseph Muscat gives a keynote on opportunity.
\nValues drive habits, habits drive actions, actions change the world. So if you want to change the world, start with values.<\/p>\n
Value, like Colonel Kurtz in Apocalypse Now, is found upstream<\/p>\n
Voc\u00eas ser\u00e3o mais felizes se voc\u00ea compreender o que isto diz<\/p>\n
An industry working group huddles at USDA headquarters in Washington, DC
\nWe were for fuels until there were chemicals, and for algae until there was natural gas, for jet fuel until there were fragrances, and for CNG until there were skin creams. We were for enzymes until there were gasifiers, and we were for corn sugars until there were cane sugars, and we were for cellulosic sugars until there were gas streams. We were for biomass until there was fracking, fuel cells until there was Tesla, feed without the fish until there was meat without the cow. And what really annoys those of us who\u2019ve been around in this sector is the lack of policy stability.<\/p>\n
What this world needs is a good five-cent sugar.<\/p>\n
Whup me, beat me, sadly mistreat me, I will never reveal my catalyst<\/p>\n
What this country needs is a good five-cent cigar, and a good 5-cent sugar, and is going to get neither.<\/p>\n
What\u2019s a renewable chemical? It\u2019s a biofuel trying to raise a Series C venture round.<\/p>\n
Write nothing to anyone that you would not feel comfortable seeing on the front page of the Wall Street Journal.<\/p>\n
DSM\u2019s stunning biotechnology innovation center in Delft, Natherlands
\nYou are attacking someone else\u2019s business model and livelihood. Don\u2019t complain when they try and send you to the devil.<\/p>\n
You are not the first one to discover the opportunities in Africa.<\/p>\n
You are the CEO of a corporation called \u201cyou\u201d.<\/p>\n
You better figure out where the phosphorus is coming from.<\/p>\n
You cannot think too small.<\/p>\n
You never know until you know, and then unfortunately you know.<\/p>\n
You think you are developing a technology, but you really are building a company<\/p>\n
Your microorganism has no idea what you are doing.<\/p>\n
You can think win-win, but did Genghis Khan?<\/p>\n
Digestville
\n99.999% of the planet\u2019s people have no idea who you are, or why you matter, and won\u2019t.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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