(732a) Keynote Talk: Techno-economic and life cycle analyses of bioproducts across a large metabolic space: integrated analysis tools to advanced biomanufacturing sustainability

The development of biofuels and bioproducts, through the deployment of large-scale biorefineries, represents a multifaceted strategy to decarbonize the economy. Maximizing the potential of biofuels and bioproducts requires a comprehensive understanding of various factors, including technological feasibility, economic viability, and environmental sustainability. Under the Agile BioFoundry (ABF) consortium, a Department of Energy (DOE)-sponsored collaboration, we study several biobased pathways to produce advantaged products including fuel intermediates and bioproducts. The ABF integrates advanced computational tools for biological engineering, process design, data analysis, and sustainability modeling tools into a comprehensive and dynamic platform for biomanufacturing microbes and leveraging them to produce several products of industrial interest. In this work, we examine both the economic and environmental aspects of producing biobased molecules through fermentative processes and catalytic upgrading via techno-economic and life-cycle analyses. We discuss the key drivers of costs and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions to identify the potential to achieve economic and environmental sustainability by meeting or exceeding commodity product benchmarks, thus prioritizing future R&D focus areas to help inform decision-making processes tied to the sustainability of new bio-based products.