BASF (Ludwigshafen / Germany; www.basf.com) and Purac (Gorinchem / The Netherlands; www.purac.com) have finalised their plans for a succinic acid joint venture – see Plasteurope.com of 03.08.2011. The new company, to be called Succinity and based at Düsseldorf / Germany, will start up its first 10,000 t/y production facility in late 2013 at an existing fermentation plant currently being modified at Purac’s Montmélo site near Barcelona / Spain. The original plans had called for a nameplate capacity of 25,000 t/y.

No start-up date has been given for a second, 50,000 t/y plant to be built at an undisclosed location. “The investment decision for this facility will be made following a successful market introduction,” the jv partners said in a statement.

BASF and Purac parent company CSM (Diemen / The Netherlands; www.csm.nl) have been jointly researching succinic acid since 2009. The companies said their “complementary strengths” in fermentation and downstream processing have led to “a sustainable and highly efficient manufacturing process” based on the proprietary microorganism “Basfia succiniciproducens.” This is claimed to be capable of metabolising a variety of renewable feedstocks into succinic acid, as a competitive ecological alternative to petrochemical raw materials.