As the world rages on with food vs. fuel debate, one company is bringing to life solutions, which will provide options for overcoming this issue.  Praj Industries, the global biofuels technology Company, committed to innovative, environmental-friendly solutions for production of biofuels, has achieved a breakthrough technology for production of bioethanol from lignocellulosic feedstock which will address the food vs. fuel issue in terms of creating alternate agri-waste feedstock for ethanol production. This was announced by Pramod Chaudhari, Chairman - Praj Industries, following the inauguration of its new R & D facility, Matrix-the innovation centre in Pune. “We have already filed a patent for this technology”, shared Pramod Chaudhari.

Praj has established a world-class R & D centre, which was inaugurated, by KV Kamath, Managing Director & CEO, ICICI Bank and Prakash Telang, Executive Director, Tata Motors on 21st April, 2008 at Pune.

Having realized very early on, the need for balancing feedstock’s for growing demand for biofuels, Praj began working towards alternate non-food energy crops including 2^nd generation feedstock’s over past few years.  In the first phase, Praj has come up with technology for sweet sorghum (another non-food energy crop) to ethanol, which is now in commercialization phase, with the first dedicated plant based on sweet sorghum is currently under construction. This process has already been patented.

 “When we drew up our plans for the advanced R & D facility, the focus has been on nullifying the impact of feedstock on food and animal feed as well as in terms of conserving natural resources like water and land”, added Pramod Chaudhari.

Praj undertook a three-fold approach towards this end:

1. Innovative process technology for 2^nd generation biofuels:

Praj Matrix-the innovation centre has achieved a breakthrough technology which involves a novel pre-treatment process for agri-waste followed by use of a specific micro-organism for fermentation. Lab scale studies have been successfully concluded. Further work on improved economic viability is now underway.

Praj has already  filed a patent for the process.

Pramod Chaudhari mentioned that “Praj is in step with global development in this area. Commercialization of this technology is already on the drawing board” 

2. Process Development for high-energy ethanol blends:  For long, detractors of ethanol have been claiming that ethanol does not have equivalent energy content as gasoline.  Instead of spending energy in debates, Praj decided to take up this issue headlong.

Praj Matrix-the innovation centre has achieved a breakthrough in developing a high-energy ethanol mixture, having 25 % – 35 % more energy content, which could be directly blended with gasoline. This has been achieved by developing a special micro- organism, which converts simple sugars in to high-energy ethanol mixture. Praj industries has filed two provisional patents, for the process as well as for the product recovery.

Company plans to work with Oil Marketing Companies for commercialization of product blend.

3. Strategic Focus on Crop Sciences – Now Farm-to-Fuel Model: Early on Praj took steps to integrate the knowledge of crop sciences with biofuels, as sustainability should be demonstrated at all levels.

Following its success with sweet sorghum, Praj has created a separate division which deals with plant tissue culture, variety selection, farm yield study, cultivation practices especially for 2nd generation energy crop cultivation including algae for biodiesel. This division will also address issues like post-harvest management, which is also critical to such crops.

The division will provide knowledge of new crops, including 2^nd generation energy crops like grasses (miscanthus, switchgrass) for ethanol production; Jatropha (waste land cultivation), Pongemia as well as safflower for biodiesel production.

The Company is also exploring tie up with suitable business partners to take this forward across globe.

Praj Matrix - The innovation centre

Since inception, Praj has been focused upon innovative technologies, which provide sustainable solutions.  First time round Praj invested in R & D way back in 1989 wherein it concentrated upon employing biotechnology for developing cutting edge processes for ethanol production based on varied feedstocks. 

Spread across 5 acres of land, Praj’s state-of-the-art R & D facilities, Matrix-the innovation centre, consists of 12 laboratories, 7 clean room facilities, cellulose to ethanol and biodiesel pilot plant.  It also houses brewery laboratory as per European Brewing Convention standards. 

Praj is adding to its existing R & D manpower pool many more highly qualified professionals from different faculty including biotechnology, microbiology, Engineering and PhDs.

Focused on biotech related R & D, Matrix-the innovation centre is con-currently working on other industrial biotech programs.  Praj is looking at related expansion in other industrial biotech products/processes.  This will enable Praj to leverage its facilities as well as its capabilities in biotech domain.

“We believe that Matrix-the innovation centre is a unique biotech R & D, not only for biofuels, but also for an array of industrial biotech process studies.    It is the only one of its kind, which has integrated facilities for industrial and agri-biotech. We will concentrate on ‘last mile’ technologies for industrial biotech which will create its own milestones, said Mr. Chaudhari.

Sourced From: Genesis Burson-Marsteller