The National Bioeconomy Blueprint: Meeting Grand Challenges
（国家生物经济蓝图：应对未来重大挑战）
Rina Singh
Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO), Washington, DC
Rina Singh, PhD, is Senior Policy Director in the Industrial Biotechnology section at BIO
The Obama administration officially released the National Bioeconomy Blueprint on April 26, 2012, following six months of gathering and analyzing public comments. While the original request for comment issued by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) asked for input on the grand challenges to be addressed by building a bioeconomy, the blueprint as released addresses five federal bioeconomy strategic objectives to realize the full potential of the US bioeconomy and highlights early government-supported achievements aimed at meeting those objectives.1,2 The Blueprint presents a vision of “a previously unimaginable future” enabled by the bioeconomy, including liquid biofuels derived directly from CO2, biodegradable biobased plastics, tailored food products, personalized medicine, and environmental monitoring. It also indicates that the bioeconomy has emerged as a priority for the Obama administration as a path to economic growth, prosperity, and societal benefits.
The Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO), in response to the Request For Information (RFI) for building a 21st Century Bioeconomy, submitted recommendations for building the biobased economy sector of the overall bioeconomy as a series of discrete smaller challenges in health, food, energy, and the environment.1 Those discrete challenges represent stepping stones toward broad commercialization of industrial biotechnology applications within biorefineries in the industrial and environmental sector. BIO also proposed a Biobased Economy Jobs and Development Act legislative platform that would support the industry as it continues to progress toward commercialization.3
The Grand Challenge （生物经济重大挑战）
In April 2012 the rollout process began with US government officials at the White House describing the blueprint in detail; they included the Secretaries of Health and Human Services, Secretary Sebelius, and of Agriculture, Secretary Vilsack, and the President's science advisor, John Holdren.4 This followed a panel discussion by academic and industry representatives at the White House, under the direction of moderator Bonnie Bassler, PhD, Professor of Molecular Biology at Princeton University, on ways in which investments and innovations contribute to the American bioeconomy. The four panelists included Keith Yamamoto, PhD, Professor of Cellular and Molecular Pharmacology, Executive Vice Dean of the School of Medicine, and Vice Chancellor for Research at the University of California, San Francisco, who focused on health; Joel Cherry, PhD, Senior Vice President, Research Programs and Operations at Amyris (Emeryville, CA); Per Pinstrup-Anderson, PhD, H.E. Babcock Professor of Food, Nutrition and Public Policy, and J. Thomas Clark, Professor of Entrepreneurship at Cornell University, focused on food; and Rina Singh, PhD, Senior Policy Director from BIO, focused on the environment. The panelists described their experiences and discussed the most promising avenues of research and how to bring their respective fields of interest to fruition.5
We call industrial and environmental biotechnology the “third wave” of biotech innovation, because the industry began with healthcare applications, then brought agricultural applications to market, and is now commercializing industrial and environmental applications. Industrial biotechnology is the application of life sciences to conventional manufacturing and synthetic processes. It uses conventional and/or genetically enhanced microbes to create novel industrial processes and produce new products. Biomanufacturing can lower production costs, reduce or prevent pollution, and enhance resource conservation.
The Bioeconomy Blueprint will help unleash biotechnology to bring us cleaner, safer, and healthier technology for biofuels, renewable chemicals, and bioproducts. In the 1800s, petroleum replaced whale oil; we are going through a similar period of change now. BIO's members hold a vision for a future in which biorefineries—instead of petroleum refineries—will dot the landscape. We will see hundreds of new and clean biomanufacturing facilities being built to process renewable feedstocks into fuels, chemicals, plastics, and other value-added products. This vision includes cleaner air and water, sustainable farming practices, and less reliance on fossil fuels. It suggests a replacement of toxic chemicals with safer bioproducts.
Biorefineries will also create hundreds of thousands of new careers for highly skilled workers in all regions of the United States. Manufacturing applications that will transform how we make and use energy could come from biotech innovations we cannot even imagine today. One day we may even see biological computers or biological fuel cells that can produce clean fuel for our cars or our homes; all we will have to do is add sugar and water to generate power. We may see the advancement of biological pollution cleanup technologies beyond bioremediation, such as organisms that can consume the CO2 produced by power plants and use it to make clean burning hydrogen or natural gas, or possibly compostable bioplastics.
This Blueprint is not about picking winners and losers; with biotechnology, everyone wins. These will be permanent solutions that will create not just jobs but careers. Industrial biotechnology is a leading force for innovation in America, and innovation is the key to economic health and prosperity. The Bioeconomy Blueprint will help the biotechnology industry produce real, game changing results.
Bioeconomy Blueprint Objectives （《应对《国家生物经济蓝图》战略目标的政策建议）
The five strategic objectives described by the Blueprint include support for investment in research and development (R&D) that provides social benefits, translating research from the laboratory to the market, reducing regulatory barriers, training a national workforce, and developing public-private partnerships that reduce risks for first-of-a kind technologies. These objectives are consistent with both the outline of the OSTP's request for information and with BIO's discrete challenges, which include support for continuing R&D in parallel with commercialization, reducing risk for investment in new technologies, establishing next-generation feedstock supply chains, training a new workforce, ensuring a neutral regulatory atmosphere, reducing barriers to market access, and increasing public awareness. Within the five strategic objectives, the Blueprint describes existing government programs and proposes additional measures that support emergence of the bioeconomy. Some of the proposals are consistent with BIO's proposed legislative platform.
To meet the objective of supporting investment in R&D, for example, the Blueprint highlights joint efforts by the US Departments of Agriculture (USDA) and Energy (DOE) to fund biomass and purpose-grown bioenergy crop research as well as the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) to fund biofuel 2.0 research. The Blueprint also underscores Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA) and National Science Foundation (NSF) programs that support research in biomanufacturing. BIO proposed that all programs be eligible for the full range of biorefining opportunities—advanced biofuels, renewable chemicals, and biobased products. BIO further proposed that the DOE's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, specifically its Advanced Manufacturing Office, fund biomanufacturing projects.
The Blueprint further calls for “unlocking the promise of synthetic biology,” and draws attention to a DOE Biological and Environmental Research program that has committed $30 million to research efforts. Also discussed is an NSF grant program that backed synthetic biology research that led to the development of a method for low-cost high-volume production of the anti-malaria drug artemisinin. BIO's legislative program calls for a DOE grant program for the use of synthetic biology technology to develop sustainable biofuels and renewable chemicals.
To meet the objective of helping companies translate basic research, often performed at universities, into commercial products ready for the market—a process that requires companies to traverse what is often called the “valley of death,” due to the high failure rate—the Blueprint suggests five action items: unlocking access to capital; reducing regulatory barriers; tax relief; additional incentives for small businesses; and connecting entrepreneurs with mentors. Among the existing or proposed programs emphasized by the Blueprint, and consistent with BIO's legislative proposal, are advancing biofuels for military and commercial transportation and strengthening federal procurement of biobased products.
In August 2011, Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, Secretary of Energy Steven Chu, and Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus signed a memorandum of understanding to create a cooperative interagency program that would speed development of biofuels for military aviation and ships. The program promises to invest $510 million in the development of renewable feedstock supplies, technology, and federal commitments for procurement. BIO's legislative proposal calls for a strategic biorefinery initiative and off take authority for the military.
In February 2012, President Obama signed a memorandum to all agency heads calling for enhanced reporting on the agencies' obligations to give procurement preference to biobased products. The USDA's BioPreferred™ Program identifies these biobased products and has developed a consumer label for them, to make them more readily identifiable for purchasers. The memorandum also directed the BioPreferred Program to expand the list of eligible products and develop a reporting program for biobased procurements and an auditing program for biobased products. The US Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry passed a bill in April 2012 reauthorizing and funding the USDA's Biobased Markets Program and other programs under the Energy Title, which is a priority in BIO's Biobased Economy legislative proposal.
To meet the objective of reducing regulatory barriers, the President's Bioeconomy Blueprint proposes to improve regulation of emerging technologies, such as synthetic biology. In March 2011, the Obama administration released Principles for Regulation and Oversight of Emerging Technologies, which recognized that synthetic biology is an evolution of biotechnology and genetic engineering. The Blueprint further recognizes that genetic engineering has a 40-year record of safety and sensitivity to ethical, legal, and social issues and that the industry's products have been regulated effectively under the Coordinated Framework.6 As such, any necessary new regulation or deregulation of synthetic biology can proceed from that history. Supported by studies that analyzed decades of research, genetic engineering has had a remarkable history of safe development and production of drugs, crops, foods, and other everyday biobased products. The Blueprint recommends strategic investments in synthetic biology, since the technology has the potential to move the bioeconomy forward in all sectors.
To address the objective of training a new bioeconomy workforce, the Blueprint highlights the Sustainable Chemistry Engineering and Materials program, implemented by the NSF. This and other programs can ensure that companies scaling up commercial production of biotechnology products can fit new employees into the opportunities they are creating.
The Administration's final Blueprint objective is to foster public-private partnerships for the development of new feedstocks, fuels, agricultural products, and export markets. Partnerships such as the USDA's Biorefinery Assistance Program under the Farm Bill are beginning to pay dividends, with first-of-their-kind biorefineries under construction and beginning to start up. The Biomass Crop Assistance Program has already helped farmers in 10 states establish 150,000 acres of new purpose-grown energy crops to supply biorefineries. BIO's legislative proposal includes additional ideas, such as a grant program for repurposing or retrofitting existing idle or under-utilized manufacturing facilities.
The National Bioeconomy Blueprint's focus on policy achievements to date indicates that much of the supportive structure for the emergence of the biobased economy is already in place. What companies at the forefront of commercial development of the bioeconomy need most from government are stable, long-term, and forward-thinking policies. Some policies, such as Farm Bill Energy Title programs or tax incentives for biofuel production, need to be reauthorized and funded by Congress. But they also must be extended to cover renewable chemicals and biobased products.
The grand challenge for the biobased economy continues to be establishing a footing in an economy that continues to be dominated by fossil fuels. The biobased economy holds the potential to produce the consumer goods and fuels that are hallmarks of economic status, are based on homegrown technologies, and support global growth. But that grand challenge continues to require meeting smaller challenges, such as funding ongoing R&D, capital formation, creating a feedstock supply chain, workforce training, neutral regulations, reducing market barriers, and increasing public awareness. The Blueprint describes the Obama administration's policy accomplishments and future recommendations that will help industry to overcome those challenges. There is room for Congress to renew the policies it has established, which are also vital to the industry, and to expand them to cover all aspects of biobased production for the creation of a value chain to generate a robust bioeconomy.
1. Office of Science and Technology Policy, Request for Information: Building a 21st Century Bioeconomy. Federal Register/Vol. 76, No. 196/ Tuesday, October 11, 2011/Notices. Available at: www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/10/12/building-bioeconomy (Last accessed May 2012).
2. White House, National Bioeconomy Blueprint. Washington, DC, April 2012. Available at www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/microsites/ostp/national_bioeconomy_blueprint_april_2012.pdf (Last accessed May 2012).
3. Erickson B, Carr M, Winters P. Meeting the Grand Challenge for Industrial Biotechnology. Ind Biotech 2011;7(6):414–417.
4. Announcing the Bioeconomy Blueprint. Whitehouse Video, April 26, 2012. Available at: www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7pciW7d3h0. (Last accessed May 2012).
5. The Bioeconomy Blueprint Panel. Whitehouse Video, April 26, 2012. Available at: www.youtube.com/watch?v=1lTABO0IrBw&feature=relmfu. (Last accessed May 2012).
6. Federal Register, Coordinated Framework for Regulation of Biotechnology, June 26, 1986. Available at www1.usgs.gov/usbiotechreg/read_file.nbii. (Last accessed May 2012).
转自：Industrial Biotechnology. June 2012, 8(3): 94-96
To cite this article:
Rina Singh. Industrial Biotechnology. June 2012, 8(3): 94-96. doi:10.1089/ind.2012.1523.
Published in Volume: 8 Issue 3: August 16, 2012