An All-Pro QB: From Qore via Qira, BASF gets Biobased BDO

September 24, 2023 | Jim Lane

News arrives from Qore headquarters in Eddyville, Iowa that Qore will produce QIRA bio-based 1,4-butanediol (BDO) at Cargill’s biotechnology campus and corn refining operation in Eddyville under a big offtake contract with BASF. Via its new QIRA supply deal, BASF will expand its existing offer of BDO derivatives with bio-based variants, with the first commercial quantities are expected to be available in Q1 2025.

The BDO story

It’s a partnerfest, as all good bioeconomy projects are. First of all, the BASF and Qore customer partnership. Beneath that, the JV between Cargill and HELM AG that carries the Qore name. Beneath that, the underlying BDO process technology from Genomatica upon which the global bio-based BDO revolution is based. Finally, a shot-out to the deep expertise of the operators at Eddyville, the corn growers of southeastern Iowa, and the state of Iowa for developing a renewable chemicals incentives program. Whew.

The low carbon gambit

Using QIRA enables BASF to produce BDO derivatives with a PCF lower than the corresponding fossil-based chemicals. BDO derivatives based on QIRA have the same physical and technical properties compared to those based on fossil-based BDO.

The BDO market

Yep, a world without BDO is tough to imagine. It’s a precursor for PolyTHF, the starting material for elastic spandex and elastane fibers that are used for a wide range of textiles, for example swimsuits, sportswear and underwear, but also outerwear such as shirts and stretch jeans. There’s THF, too, widely used in pharma.

And, PolyTHF is a starting point for thermoplastic polyurethanes (TPU) — think elastic hoses, films, cable sheathing, and think automotive industry.

In fact, BASF has five different production plants for PolyTHF in Europe, North America and Asia Pacific — so, one day, who knows how much bio-BDO might be demanded.

But wait, as the old Ginsu knife commercials said, there’s more. Other applications include thermoplastic polyetheresters, polyetheramides and cast elastomers for the manufacture of wheels, for example for skateboards and inline skates.

The Qore backstory

As we observed in 2021 when the Qore project got underway:

In the world of industrial transition, there’s an awful lot of “Later” in corporate planning and not very much “Now”. So, there’s often a lot of chatter about “net zero by 2050”, for example, the key word in that phrase being “2050”, which is another way of saying that “none of us making this announcement will actually be working in these same roles and companies when it comes time to redeem this pledge”. All too many companies remind us here in Digestville of how Esmerelda sang in The Hunchback of Notre Dame, “And though I will die / Long before that morning comes / I’ll die while believing still / It will come when I am gone.”

Some companies, some projects have found that there’s an alternative to the Leisure of Later in the Power of Now. Here’s one. Novamont’s proven the process technology at a smaller scale in Europe. Now, we’re looking at 65,000 tons per year.

Cargill’s VP Jill Zullo told me, “Consumers really have seen, people in true lockdown saw the water in the canals in Venice and we’ve seen the mountain peaks appearing in the Indian skies. There’s a connection we are all now feeling between the things we do in our daily lives and impact on the environment. We’ve seen it. That has driven consumers to be more demanding. Consumers and brand owners are looking for the ways like never before.”

“It’s been a long time coming, we’ve been hard at work. A couple of good things that happened along the way, Genomatica licensed before to Novamont and they have done a great job scaling. We are going to a larger scale. We knew we could scale this in term of the feedstock and supply chain, we wanted to find the right partners.”

Where could Bio-BDO go?

As we observed in 2021, here:

First, it’s a ‘second commercial’ for this process. As hard as it is to get a first commercial built, think how many first commercials never lead to a second for a long, long time — sometimes, ever. That’s real validation that the process works on all fronts — as a process, the economics, the customer acceptance.

Second, global capacity for bio-based BDO is now in the 100,000 tons per year range. That’s a lot of yoga pants. We’re starting to see ‘change the world’ volumes.

Thirdly, here’s a shift on the applications. Novamont wanted bio-based BDO, more or less, for their compostable bioplastics. Qore is aiming much more broadly — here come the spandex and everything else.

93 percent lower emissions than conventional materials — could it go lower?

“Indeed, there could be more,’ Zullo told The Digest. “We have ideas for even more improvements, we want to be pragmatic, 93 percent reduction, we think there’s more room. All of those, sustainability numbers, cost and consumer demand.

Reaction from the stakeholders

The principals, we are happy to report, are proud and deighted.

“QIRA is the perfect drop in product, enabling the industry to switch to more sustainable alternatives fast and seamless,” explains Jon Veldhouse, CEO of Qore and continues: “By switching to QIRA the product carbon footprint (PCF) can potentially be reduced by up to 86% compared to fossil-based BDO.”

“By gaining access to QIRA, we can offer our customers significantly larger volumes of BDO derivatives that not only have a reduced carbon footprint, but also a guaranteed physical content of the renewable feedstock,” says Wolfgang Müller, Global Strategic Marketing, BASF Intermediates division. “We are thereby further diversifying our existing portfolio of sustainable solutions, which already includes biomass-balanced products, low PCF products and products manufactured according to BASF’s ChemCycling® approach.”1

“We are proud to partner with BASF to bring more sustainable material solutions to the market. This collaboration demonstrates that QIRA is an important alternative to fossil-based BDO and thus significantly improves the sustainability of its derivates,” says Jon Veldhouse, CEO of Qore. “QIRA is an innovative platform chemical that can be used in various applications across markets such as apparel, automotive and electronics.”