Renewable Methanol

Renewable methanol is produced from carbon dioxide and hydrogen as formed either from renewable electricity, or from sustainable biomass.

The main driver for the production of renewable methanol is the need to decouple society from its dependency on fossil fuels or food production.

The greening of the industrial sector and of the ground and sea transport sectors are seen as main outlets of the further development of renewable methanol.

Following the expansion of green methanol, biotechnological applications might become a realistic option in the large-scale bioproduction of circular compounds by either natural or synthetic methylotrophs. However, history has taught us that methanol as fermentation feedstock is very challenging.

The key hurdle in applying methanol in biotech productions is its relatively reduced nature. Inherently, serious problems occur in supplying sufficient oxygen into the water phase of large fermenters. In current bioprocesses as based on sugars, oxygen supply also is a relevant complication, but considerably less critical than in the case of methanol.