By Joe Beeton

If NovaSpec brand base oil were just another ester or vegetable oil product, chances are itd be overlooked. But as Novvi LLC prepares to ship the first renewable API Group III base oil from its plant in Houston next month, CEO Jeff Brown is quick to explain why the market cant afford to ignore it.

As he told LubesnGreases during a late-August visit to the companys headquarters in Emeryville, Calif., NovaSpec is unlike any base oil the market has seen. Its not a Group V synthetic ester, and its not a vegetable oil.

Yes, it is derived from a renewable source, and yes, its recyclable, biodegradable and nontoxic. But NovaSpec is in a league of its own, Brown said, because its all those things – plus its made from a hydrocarbon, which elevates it to the same performance playing field as petroleum based lubes. Its key raw material is beta-farnesene, a pure hydrocarbon derived from renewable plant sources.

Novvi is an independently run 50/50 joint venture between Amyris, a California-based biosynthesis technology company, and Brazils Cosan, the largest sugar producer in the world. These co-owners provide two critical components: abundant supplies of sugarcane, and exclusive access to Amyris patented biosynthetic fermentation process in the lubricants market.

Amyris uses genetically engineered yeast cells to metabolize sugar through highly controlled glucose pathways. University of California Berkeleys Jay Keasling pioneered the process almost a decade ago when he reprogrammed a yeast cells DNA to metabolize sugar in a way that synthetically produces artemesinic acid, a molecule that can be used to combat malaria. Today, millions of malaria cures a year are delivered to Africa royalty-free, using Amyris technology.

Amyris next turned to the energy industry, selectively making a molecule (now branded as Biofene) for use in jet fuels, plasticizers, tires, coatings, scents and surfactants, as well as other pharmaceuticals. Novvi is the vehicle driving Biofene into lubricants, additives and base oils, and was launched with $10 million in funding from Cosan and equally valuable intellectual property rights from Amyris.

The technology reinvented the whole supply chain. We go from fully renewable organic feedstock to petrochemical drop-in in one bioconversion step, said Brown.

Because NovaSpec is a hydrocarbon, it can be used anywhere a petroleum product is used, he added, which distinguishes it from other renewable base oils in the market. We [have] the first green technology that can drop into any petroleum based lubrication system, Brown asserted. Nobody else has the ability to do that.

Typically, synthetic oils must be completely segregated in a petroleum based system, Brown continued. You cant ship the oils the same, you cant store them the same, you dont have the same water-safety protocols. Seals and other equipment parts might be compromised, and operators need to be trained to properly manage the material to avoid commingling.

NovaSpec, however, can be dropped in as a partial or full replacement in a petroleum system at any stage of its life cycle. At its end of use, you can put our oil and mineral oil in the same drum, and the rerefiner or recycler will treat it all the same way, Brown said. It can directly replace petroleum, and perform at a better level.

Novvis senior vice president of business development, William Downey, put it another way. How often does the lubricants market get a brand new base oil technology thats broadly applicable? That hasnt happened since gas-to-liquids technology which was 20 years ago. Prior to that it was hydro­cracked Group II and III about 40 years ago, and before that PAO, 60 years ago. If you do the math, Novvis base oil is the first one to come along thats on par with those as far as applicability and performance goes.

Novvi believes these features will catapult its base oils into passenger car motor oils, a market segment that no vegetable or ester based lubricant has been able to penetrate on a significant scale. And you cant build a giant refinery or a big plant in the lubes world if youre not going to sell engine oil, Brown said. Engine oils are 50 percent of the market. If fundamentally, your technology does not allow you to make automotive engine oils, it means youre never going to get the scale required to be successful.

Novvis will be the first renewable, biodegradable technology to penetrate and start to make a difference in this space, he added. This is because it is the only renewable, hydrocarbon based Group III base oil that has passed the API/SN engine oil program using 100 percent of its base oil in a finished lubricant formulation.

Taking the scale-up challenge head-on, the company began producing its base oils on Sept. 6, with 12,000 t/y (250 barrels a day) of capacity and an eye to adding more. Its plant is located on the site of toll-producer Texas Molecular Chemical. Novvi owns capital and hardware at the plant, while TMC is contracted to operate it.

This partnership helped Novvi leap out of the starting gate. Were utilizing TMCs people and capability while we invest the capital to move to the next stage of our plan, under which North American capacity will climb to 100,000 t/y, Brown pointed out. Meanwhile, were leveraging all of TMCs and Novvis knowledge and capability. We dont need to build a guardhouse and a weigh scale, and a hydrogen pipeline and rail spurs – all of that is there already for us to use. That saves a lot of money, and of course we cant under­estimate the value of TMCs people and day-to-day management of a chemical plant.

The plants location on the Houston Ship Channel has supply chain benefits as well. Brazilian sugarcane has the best life-cycle assessment of any renewable feedstock, so we leverage the sugarcane which Amyris uses to manufacture and distill farnesene in Brazil, he said. Amyris then ships it directly to Houston, so that it can go directly into production.

At the plant, farnesene feedstock is oligomerized with linear alpha olefin and undergoes a boron trifluoride process. The oligomerization produces a soup of dimers, trimers, tetramers and unreacted monomers. The final stage is a distillation step that separates the mixture into different base oil cuts, including 3, 4 and 7 centiStoke grades and one thats nearly 20 cSt.

The work doesnt stop there, but also extends to private-label lubricants. We are a base oil company, but we need to provide formulations and finished products to show people what NovaSpec base oil can do, Brown explained. Were not going be out in the market with the Novvi brand, but we will provide formulation capability to enable our customers to more easily get started up and get going.

Other outfits – including Solazyme, Biosynthetic Technologies and Elevance – have cropped up in recent years with their own renewable base stocks, and each is distinct. We often get lumped with Solazyme. They use sugar from Brazil, too, Brown explained. But Solazymes technology uses chemically engineered algae to make a high-oleic triglyceride oil.

Biosynthetic Technologies process is not analogous with Novvis either. BT makes a Group V synthetic ester, starting with high-oleic canola oil and adding an ester functionality.

Elevance has developed a proprietary metathesis technology, starting with palm oil and using it to create a range of molecules, including esters, olefins and glycerin. In this aspect, Elevance seems comparable to Novvis parent Amyris, with a focus thats broader than lubricants alone.

For all of these renewable ventures, the greater rival is petroleum base oils, which hold over 95 percent of global lubricants demand. PAO is our closest analog. Our molecules are so similar. But again, PAO is not renewable, and its not always biodegradable. Were bringing the environmental side and a better business proposition. Its a no-brain decision for our customers and consumers to pick a renewable and biodegradable alternative if its the same cost and equal or better performance.

Novvis value comes from its hydrocarbon based chemistry and its unique ability to drop into the petroleum supply chain, Brown reiterated. We didnt need to invent any new catalyst, were going to run in the same infrastructure, and we dont need to pay any penalties along the way throughout the whole supply chain, based on how our base oil gets there, how its handled, or any of that. This makes it a much more cost-effective proposition along the way, and will certainly aid in adoption.

With commercial production under way, Brown said that the key challenge will be to effectively market the novel base oils value.

We are working to differentiate our attributes, because we dont need someone to buy NovaSpec base oils when a Group I works just as well. If you want a new premium product that works in highly demanding applications and is also environmentally responsible, for example meeting Ecolabel regulations, youre not going to find that anywhere else.

The market wont have to wait long to see how NovaSpec fits in. One of the reasons weve been really quiet up until now is that theres so much talk from the green companies, and they all have so much potential, but no one ever actually delivers it, Brown concluded. We want to be the company that actually delivers. We want to be measured by our actual accomplishments in the marketplace.