No. 6: A new yeast for higher efficiency and lower cost biofuel made of a nonfood plant (October 4, 2011)

Toyota Motor announced that it would put biofuel made of a nonfood plant into practical application toward 2020. The biofuel the company has been developing is cellulosic ethanol made of Pennisetum purpureum Schumach that is a nonfood plant growing in the tropical zone. The yeast that it developed using the recombinant DNA technology made it possible to apply 87% of the raw sugar to ethanol, 3% higher than the rate achieved by the current technology. It wishes to make cellulosic ethanol as low as gasoline by simplifying the production process of biofuel. It plans licensing and alliance with other companies because a huge investment of several ten billion yen will be required to build a plant for mass production.

Because biofuel made of food plants is affected by the price fluctuations of food plants like sugarcane and corn, Toyota plans to grow Pennisetum purpureum Schumach by itself and develop an integrated technology necessary for all the stages from production of raw materials to purification. Leaves Pennisetum purpureum Schumach will be used for feed for cows and stems for the raw material of biofuel and industrial materials. It is also planning to build a hybrid vehicle that uses biofuel.