| Energy | Biomass | Genetics | Micro-organisms | Phyto-chemistry | Bio-synthesis | Separation technologies | Biorefinery |

Biorefinery

The challenge can be formulated thus: can “Biorefineries” be designed in such a way that they are scale-neutral, emission-free and energy-and watersaving, at the same time as they separate biomass in components that are all so commercially viable that they leave no waste?

The possibility to separate bioresources at a local and regional level can have positive social effects. Farmers have often inherited not only a property but also a tradition which forces the children, which the farming cannot support, to find an income in some major city. From the 60ies and up until now the low market prices of agricultural commodities have also favored larger farms, more extensive mechanization and a downsizing of the labor force.

New biotechnologies, associated with an efficient knowledge-transfer, however now permit a region to diversify its crops and to upgrade its rawmaterials in local, employment-generating, facilities.

Information technology creates many opportunities to bridge many of the social cracks which are inevitable at the transition from a modern to a postmodern knowledge society. The latter may for instance help to counteract excessive urbanization by favoring dispersed economic activities including natural product upgrading. This may in fact be a prerequisite for “sustainable development”.