KLM Royal Dutch Airlines is launching flights from Oslo to Amsterdam using only biofuel on its Embraer 190 aircraft. During these flights, Embraer SA will be measuring the efficiency of biofuel.

Around 80 commercial flights will be supplemented by biofuel on routes to Paris, Rio de Janeiro and the Dutch Antilles, as well as flights from New York. The biofuel is produced from 100% RSB-certified camelina, according to KLM.

Camelina is an oilseed crop suitable for northern climates. It can be cultivated in relatively dry areas of thin soil as a rotation crop. KLM has used camelina previously as a raw material for sustainable biofuel and chooses to use raw materials that do not have an impact on biodiversity and/or food supply.

Cambodia Prime Minister Hun Sen opened the country's biggest sugar mill, a $360 million Chinese-owned plant, in Preah Vihear that will produce half a-million tons a year, and called for more investment from the world's second-largest economy.

The plant, set in a 43,422-hectare sugar plantation, will also generate about 30 megawatts of electricity from its waste to supply the province. It is part of a three-stage plan to expand the plantation, build an ethanol factory and a fertilizer plant.

Industry Minister Cham Prasidh said the project will see new factories built next year and eventually produce about 50,000 tons of ethanol for export to China and 100,000 tons of organic fertilizer for the plantation, which will be expanded to 60,000 hectares. The combined operations will eventually employ about 21,000 people and produce almost 1.5 million tons of sugar annually.

An enzyme responsible for making hydrocarbons has been discovered by scientists from Texas A&M AgriLife Research studying the green microalga called Botryococcus braunii.

Botryococcus braunii grows in freshwater or brackish water and is found pretty much in all ponds and lakes around the world, as well as in every continent except Antarctica. The alga was found to secrete an enzyme capable of producing large amounts of liquid hydrocarbons, which can be used to make fuels such as gasoline, kerosene and diesel fuel.

The discovery could enable scientists to use it to make large amounts of fuel-grade oil, according to Dr. Tim Devarenne, AgriLife Research biochemist in College Station. Devarenne's lab has been studying the concept of making fuel from algae for four years.

Biodiesel production can be carried out by transesterification using either chemical or enzymatic process. The enzymatic transesterification is more promising as it is environmentally sound. Hence, it is of great value to identify novel lipases which are suitable for biodiesel production.

Qiaojuan Yan from the China Agricultural University cloned a lipase gene (ReLipA) from Rhizomucor endophyticus and expressed it in Pichia pastoris. The recombinant lipase (ReLipA) was then purified and was found to be most active at pH 6.0 and 40°C, and was stable up to 55°C.

ReLipA also displayed 75% of its maximal activity at 0°C, indicating that it is a cold-adapted lipase. It also exhibited broad substrate specificity. Therefore, the recombinant lipase may be a good catalyst in ester synthesis in biodiesel industry. The excellent properties of the enzyme reveal its potential for biodiesel production.

Cyanobacteria are phototrophic prokaryotes that convert carbon dioxide into organic compounds using light energy. They only need inorganic nutrients and can be cultivated in high densities using non-arable land and seawater, making them attractive organisms for the production of biofuels and chemical feedstock. Synechocystis sp. PCC 6803 is one of the most widely used cyanobacterial model strains.

The team of Nadin Pade of the University of Rostock in Germany generated Synechocystis sp. strains expressing plant isoprene synthase (IspS) and capable of producing isoprene. A good correlation existed between ispS expression and isoprene production rate. The cultivation of isoprene-producing strains under NaCl-supplemented conditions decreased isoprene production despite enhanced ispS mRNA levels.

The best production strains produced higher isoprene amounts in the presence of low NaCl concentrations. These results will guide future attempts to establish isoprene production in cyanobacterial hosts.