Yield improvement through synthetic biology for a palm oil alternative from fermentation
Lead Participant:
SUN BEAR BIOFUTURE LTD
Abstract
Palm oil is everywhere. It is in food, cosmetics and biofuels. It is in 50% of our supermarket products. Palm oil is unique in the vegetable oil market; it melts in your mouth, is great for cooking and is a high-yielding crop. However, palm oil is one of the biggest carbon emitters due to loss of tropical rainforest and peatland to make way for plantations - it contributes over 500 million tonnes of CO2e, \>1% global emissions, from 19 million hectares of tropical land. It has caused significant habitat loss, including for the Orangutan and Sun Bear, and all too often smallholder farmers do not receive a fair price for their produce.
The UK Government has committed to reaching Net Zero by 2050; 20% of UK emissions stem from agriculture and the food supply chain. These emissions must be tackled if we are to reach net zero.
Sun Bear Biofuture is a UK-based company using synthetic biology and precision fermentation to make an alternative to palm oil. We are optimising a naturally oil-producing yeast strain to produce our oil from food waste quickly and efficiently. Our process saves 4kg CO2 and 2000m2 of land for every kg of palm oil - a saving in both cases of 80%. We are working with the RLALab at Imperial College London on this project to optimise our strain's ability to produce fats quickly and efficiently. Feedstock costs are prohibitively expensive for scaling fermentation processes in fats - maximising lipid yield is vital if we are to have the greatest environmental impact. This project will enable a sustainable palm oil alternative to be produced domestically at scale in the UK, creating jobs in biotechnology and food production and reversing a substantial trade deficit.
This builds on the work we carried out as part of our Fast Start award, project 10045430 "Alternative feedstock for precision fermentation of oil", which has allowed us to develop our yeast modification capabilities and investigate alternative feedstocks.
The UK Government has committed to reaching Net Zero by 2050; 20% of UK emissions stem from agriculture and the food supply chain. These emissions must be tackled if we are to reach net zero.
Sun Bear Biofuture is a UK-based company using synthetic biology and precision fermentation to make an alternative to palm oil. We are optimising a naturally oil-producing yeast strain to produce our oil from food waste quickly and efficiently. Our process saves 4kg CO2 and 2000m2 of land for every kg of palm oil - a saving in both cases of 80%. We are working with the RLALab at Imperial College London on this project to optimise our strain's ability to produce fats quickly and efficiently. Feedstock costs are prohibitively expensive for scaling fermentation processes in fats - maximising lipid yield is vital if we are to have the greatest environmental impact. This project will enable a sustainable palm oil alternative to be produced domestically at scale in the UK, creating jobs in biotechnology and food production and reversing a substantial trade deficit.
This builds on the work we carried out as part of our Fast Start award, project 10045430 "Alternative feedstock for precision fermentation of oil", which has allowed us to develop our yeast modification capabilities and investigate alternative feedstocks.
Lead Participant | Project Cost | Grant Offer |
|---|---|---|
| SUN BEAR BIOFUTURE LTD | £153,371 | £ 107,360 |
People |
ORCID iD |
| Ben Wilding (Project Manager) |