Products from Plants – from crops and forests to zero-waste biorefineries
A bio-based economy is vital to deliver the sustainable development needed to underpin future societal needs and demands. The potential of plants to use solar energy and manufacture raw material feedstocks offers a way to address the issues of climate change and the environment; the availability of supply, security and cost of fossil resources; and increasing global demand for products and services.
EPOBIO is a Science to Support Policy project funded by the EC in Framework 6 and is entitled: ‘Realising the economic potential of sustainable resources – bioproducts from non-food crops’. The EPOBIO process is defining the science needed to realise the full potential of agricultural feedstocks in the bio-based economy within the three themes of plant oils, biopolymers and plant cell walls in relation to biorefining.
Representatives from DG Agri and DG Research in the European Commission, as well as the USDA will be leading this international workshop with the EPOBIO Consortium. The workshop will focus on the development of second and third generation biorefineries using zero-waste feedstocks, producing multiple products from a crop and providing new opportunities for biochemicals and biomaterials. The workshop will have wide-ranging content, appealing to researchers, policy makers, industrialists and research funders. The future strategic development of biomanufacturing through biorefining, as well as the relevant regulatory and policy issues will be set within a global context and industrial perspectives for sustainable development.
For further information, including the workshop programme, please visit:
http://www.epobio.net/
Keywords
bio-based economy
