It was the culmination of a 6-month long joint endeavour between the UK Science & Innovation network (S&IN) and the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) – a 2-day UK-India-Brazil-Africa programme on ‘green chemistry for sustainable production of biofuels’ held subsequent to the 5th IUPAC international conference on green chemistry, in Durban, South Africa.
I partnered with my S&IN counterpart, Fikiswa Majola, based out of the British Consulate General, Cape Town and the RSC (Helen Driver, Vibhuti Patel, and Elizabeth Magalhaes) to deliver a 2-day programme in Durban from August 21-22. Our basic motivation behind this joint initiative was to learn about the synergies and common interests among the participating countries and explore the potential for bilateral and multilateral research collaborations in this emerging domain of ‘green chemistry for biofuels production’. Being a chemist myself, I was hooked since the start of this project!
The UK and India have already established research partnerships in the biofuels area. In 2013, under the sustainable bioenergy and biofuels (SuBB) initiative, which is jointly funded by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council and Department of Biotechnology, four UK-India research projects were funded, with each country contributing over £4M. For instance, one of the joint projects focused on engineering “enzymes, bacteria and bioconversion processes that will help to produce advanced biofuels from waste rice straw”, and then, there was a project targeted at making biofuels from seaweed.
We held a networking reception and dinner on the evening of August 21st, which was kindly hosted by Chris Trott, British Consul General based in Cape Town. Chris appreciated the joint efforts of UK S&IN and RSC, and supported the cause of international research collaborations. Besides the workshop delegates, members of the local research community in Durban were also present at the reception.
The workshop on August 22nd was held in the conference room of a high-rise hotel, overlooking the sunlit Indian ocean. The milieu couldn’t have been more inspiring! We had a total of 29 delegates representing the UK, India, Brazil, South Africa, Ghana, Tanzania, and Ethiopia. Over a few group discussions, interspersed with lunch and refreshment breaks, the participants broached a range of issues. These included research challenges in achieving ‘clean’ production of biofuels, opportunities for international collaborations, best practices – ongoing and desirable, strengths and research needs of the participating countries, and future plans to sustain research partnerships.
Several institutes in the UK are pursuing research topics related to green chemistry and sustainable biofuels production. For instance, the University of York houses the Green Chemistry Centre of Excellence, which is headed by Prof. James Clark. Read my earlier interview with him here. Aston University hosts the European Bioenergy Research Institute, which focuses on the methods of generating energy from biomass waste and residues.
As the invigorating day of discussions on biofuels, green chemistry, sustainability and international synergies drew to a close, Prof. James Clark deftly assembled the various parts of the puzzle together over a couple of flipchart papers! He suggested that we address the issue of sustainability in biofuels production on three levels – feedstock, process, products. Also, the academic research community must consider engaging with farmers/growers, chemical industry, and companies wanting more than one product. Moving forward, several recommendations were proposed: i) an action group of chemists-for-biofuels for planning/implementing international research projects; ii) engaging young researchers to inject energy and fresh ideas; and iii) involvement of corporate partners to help catapult laboratory scale technologies to the marketplace. A report on the proceedings of the workshop will be published in the coming weeks and notified through an update on this blog!
The idea of a follow up meeting in Brazil, led by the country delegates, to sustain the momentum generated as a result this workshop garnered unanimous support. That sounded really encouraging! I was elated about the fact that we set the ball rolling! If you’re interested in participating in future follow on activities on this topic, please drop me a line and I’d be happy to make the relevant introductions.