Description
LS9, the Renewable Petroleum CompanyÔ, is a privately-held biotechnology company that has developed products and technologies that directly overcome the primary hurdles facing the widespread adoption of renewable transportation fuels. Pushing the frontiers of synthetic biology and industrial biotechnology, LS9 has created industrial microbes that efficiently convert renewable feedstocks to a portfolio of "drop in compatible" hydrocarbon-based fuels and chemicals. LS9 DesignerBiofuelsÔ products are equivalent to petroleum, compatible with existing fuel distribution and consumer infrastructure, renewable, and cost competitive with petroleum products without subsidies. LS9's unique technology provides a means to precisely control the structure and function of its fuels, enabling a portfolio of products that meet the diverse demands of the petroleum economy. 2. What does the name "LS9" mean? LS9 stands for Life Sciences #9. LS9 was the ninth life sciences company started by Flagship Ventures. The name has stuck ever since. 3. Who is behind LS9? LS9 was founded by two well-respected venture capital firms, Flagship Ventures and Khosla Ventures, along with two of the leading scientists in the field of synthetic biology, Chris Somerville (Director of the Carnegie Institution and Professor of Plant Biology at Stanford University) and George Church (Director of the MIT-Harvard US-Dept. of Energy GTL Center and Professor of Genetics at Harvard). Lightspeed Ventures Partners is now an investor in LS9 as well. LS9 receives scientific advisement and employs some of the top minds in the fields of synthetic biology, metabolic engineering, microbiology, enzymology, genomic bioinformatics and chemical engineering. 4. How large is the market opportunity LS9 is pursuing? The global petroleum markets are astoundingly large. According to the BP Statistical Review of World Energy, world oil consumption for 2006 was 83.7 million barrels per day or almost 1.3 trillion gallons per year. To put that number in perspective, in the time it took you to read the last two sentences (roughly five seconds), the world consumed over 200,000 gallons of fuel. In the last 41 minutes, the world consumed 100 million gallons of petroleum - the equivalent annual output of a commercial ethanol plant. If LS9 achieved 1% global market share, we would be a Fortune 150 company. 5. What is Renewable PetroleumÔ technology? LS9 has developed Renewable PetroleumÔ technology to efficiently and economically produce DesignerBiofuelsÔ products by fermentation of renewable feedstocks. LS9 has engineered well-characterized industrial microorganisms to express previously undiscovered metabolic pathways that convert fatty acid intermediates to a diversity of petroleum products with >90% energetic efficiency - the highest efficiency of known biological routes to these compounds. This translates into efficient land and feedstock use and directly addresses tensions between food versus fuel production. From a production standpoint, LS9 products can be produced by processes similar to ethanol fermentations but with approximately 65% less energy input. 6. What are DesignerBiofuelsÔ products? LS9 DesignerBiofuelsÔ products are a family of fuels that have properties indistinguishable from those of gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel and are derived from natural sources of sugar such as sugar cane and cellulosic biomass. To satisfy the thousands of end-use applications for petroleum, LS9 has developed products that can either go directly into vehicles or be sent to a refinery for further processing. LS9 DesignerBiofuelsÔ products overcome a number of the key challenges associated with first-generation biofuels, including compatibility with existing infrastructure, product diversity, product economics, and quality consistency. 7. What advantages do your products have over traditional petroleum products? LS9 DesignerBiofuelsÔ products have the same energetic content as traditional petroleum products and are completely compatible with current petroleum infrastructure and applications, but are made from renewable feedstocks yielding significant carbon-dioxide emission reductions relative to traditional crude oil consumption. LS9 fuel products also contain no carcinogens like benzene and only trace amounts of sulfur. By producing these products biologically via fermentation, LS9 helps empower an agriculturally based fuel economy and can decrease the political tensions posed by scarce fossil reserves. 8. How do DesignerBiofuelsÔ products compare to ethanol, butanol or other biofuels? LS9 DesignerBiofuelsÔ products stand to fundamentally change the biofuels landscape and set the stage for widespread product adoption and petroleum displacement. LS9 hydrocarbon biofuels have higher energetic content than ethanol or butanol and have fuel properties that are essentially indistinguishable from those of gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel. LS9 products overcome a number of key challenges associated with first-generation biofuels, including infrastructure compatibility, product diversity, product economics, and quality consistency. 9. How much will these products cost? LS9 DesignerBiofuelsÔ products will be cost-competitive with $40-50 per barrel crude oil without subsidies. 10. Have you successfully made these products? When will the product be available? When will I be able to fill my tank with LS9 products? We have proven our technology in the lab and are now in the midst of rapid commercialization, including a pilot facility leading to large-scale commercial production in three or four years.
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