News & Events

By Marianne Lavelle for
National Geographic News

By now, well into the 21st century, at least some U.S. cars were supposed to be running on an exciting new power source—clean fuels refined from corn husks, timber waste and tall, fast-growing grasses.

But the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, acknowledging that not a single facility is yet producing this advanced “cellulosic” ethanol, has proposed dramatically scaling back a federal program to promote the fuel for the second straight year.

Instead of requiring that the oil industry blend 250 million gallons of cellulosic ethanol into the gasoline sold at the pump next year, as Congress envisioned under the Renewable Fuels Standard program, the EPA said July 12 that it intends to cut the 2011 mandate to 5 million gallons. That’s the same level of cellulosic ethanol the EPA required this year, even though Congress had originally set a 2010 goal of 100 million gallons. … more

Qteros’ John McCarthy

By Kyle Alspach

Cellulosic ethanol company Qteros Inc. plans to have its new research and development facility in Chicopee operational by the end of the year, company CEO John McCarthy said in an interview today.

The Marlborough-based company plans to open a new 15,000-square-foot building that will allow for larger-scale fermentation than in Marlborough, McCarthy said. The company had originally outlined plans for the project in October. He said he did not have a dollar figure for the cost of the project, but said it’s “not anywhere near the dollars bantered around about for many pilot plant facilities.”

The facility, on the border between Chicopee and Westover Air Reserve Base, will help the company to gather more data in its effort toward commercializing its cellulosic ethanol production process, McCarthy said. The process is based on the Q Microbe, a naturally-occurring anaerobic microorganism developed in part by Women to Watch honoree Susan Leschine, a UMass-Amherst professor who co-founded Qteros in 2006.

The Q Microbe has worked with materials including wheat straw, sugar cane, switchgrass and corn cobs, according to the company. Qteros received a patent for the process in March, and the company intends to license the technology to cellulosic ethanol producers.

The new facility in Chicopee may also serve organizations other than Qteros, McCarthy said, though he said no final decisions have been reached.

Qteros has 50 employees currently, a figure that has doubled in the past year-and-a-half, McCarthy said. The company plans to add staff gradually in coming years. Qteros has received about $30 million in investment in recent years and plans to raise additional capital over the next 6 to 12 months, McCarthy said.

By Kyle Alspach

Cellulosic ethanol company Qteros Inc. is backed by BP Plc. funding through the oil giant’s venture capital arm, BP Ventures. But renewable-fuels firms such as Qteros could get a bigger boost from BP — inadvertently — in the fallout from the oil disaster in the Gulf.

That’s according to John McCarthy (pictured at right), CEO of Marlborough-based Qteros, who is well-qualified to comment on both renewable fuels and BP. Not only has he worked with BP in his current post, but previously, as an executive at Verenium Corp. in Cambridge, he spearheaded that company’s joint venture with BP to develop and commercialize cellulosic ethanol.

McCarthy recently spoke with Mass High Tech about the Gulf situation and what it means for companies involved with non-food-based ethanol and other renewable fuels.

Q: What could the oil disaster mean for cellulosic ethanol firms?

A: I think there is now a rejuvenated focus on this broad area of energy security. I think what the Gulf disaster has done is publicly expose us, yet again, to why this is such a serious problem. It’s way beyond cellulosic ethanol, or frankly even biofuels. It’s a much broader issue.

Q: How could this play out?

A: Things are going on in D.C. Influential politicians are using this as a platform to catalyze movement for biofuels, which I think is good. But I have a strong sense that like 9/11, with the passage of time, this thing will wane again. But I’m still encouraged by some of the things I’ve seen in the wake of the disaster — a renewed awakening of how serious this problem is. … Even if directionally nothing comes out of the Gulf disaster, I think we’ll be left with a recognition that this is not an Obama thing nor a Bush thing. It transcends administrations.

Q: Does this help to prove that the costs of producing oil versus producing biofuels aren’t so far apart?

A: If there is such thing as a silver lining behind this disaster, it’s that it has put a fine point on the risks associated with (oil production.) For oil company executives, the cost of doing business is not what they’ve thought it is.

Q: So the energy landscape has changed to some degree?

A: (With the oil disaster) it’s so visible, at so many levels. There’s no putting the genie back in bottle on this one. Like with 9/11, I think this has created a major political awakening. What we do with that, we’ll have to see.

In Florida, Biofuels Digest announced the winners of its “30 Most Transformative Technologies of 2010″ poll. The publication’s readers submitted more than 48,000 votes from 3,500 ballots during the three-week voting process.

The readers chose between transformative bioenergy technologies at more than 250 companies, universities and national laboratories, including 100 organizations that received write-in votes. … more

In Massachusetts, Qteros has been gaining heavy support in the Transformative Technologies poll – far more than you get from marshaling all the friends, Romans and countrymen associated with a 50-person, early-stage company in the business of consolidated bioprocessing. … more

By Ryan McBride

If only funding for biofuel startups were as omnipresent as spilt oil in the Gulf. That’s not the case, of course, as biofuel firms have struggled to find cash. Yet Qteros, a Marlborough, MA-based developer of cellulosic ethanol, has a plan to remove some of the typical financial aches from its business.

Qteros, which has raised nearly $30 million in venture capital to date, has developed an experimental process for making ethanol from plant waste and other non-food sources that could someday make the cost of biofuels competitive with fossil fuels. John McCarthy, CEO of the startup, joined the company in January after engineering a $90 million partnership between his previous employer, the Cambridge, MA-based biofuel developer Verenium (NASDAQ:VRNM), and the energy giant BP (which is, of course, at the center of the oil spill crisis in the Gulf of Mexico). … more

Moving the next generation biofuels industry forward will require a number of changes to the current political and industrial climate, according to John McCarthy, president and chief executive officer of Qteros, developer of the Q Microbe, an organism that facilitates the production of cellulosic ethanol.

McCarthy joined Qteros in January 2010 most recently from Microbia, Inc. He was also previously executive vice president at Verenium Corp., where he was the chief architect of Verenium’s growth from a small privately held business into a publicly traded company, including the establishment of Verenium’s partnership with oil giant BP. Qteros’ investors currently include investment firms Venrock and Battery Ventures, along with industry players BP, Soros and Valero.

Qteros’ goal is to “to introduce into the marketplace a fully commercially available consolidated bio-processing process that would drive to the lowest-cost economic position for cellulosic ethanol production,” McCarthy told Ethanol & Biofuels News during a re- cent interview. He spoke with EBN to discuss his company’s progress and to share his view on what the industry needs to progress in the near term.

» Read full article

By Holly Jessen

In the past 20 years, John McCarthy Jr. has used a self-described passion for science to leverage funding for scientific companies. More recently, he’s turned his attention specifically to alternative energy companies. “I love bringing together great scientists with great business people,” he tells Ethanol Producer Magazine.

That’s exactly why Massachusetts -based Qteros brought him on as president and CEO. The industry veteran spoke with EPM shortly after he took the helm at Qteros, which is perfecting its trademarked and patented Q Microbe for converting cellulosic biomass directly into ethanol in a single step.

Qteros’ announcement of McCarthy’s new position with the company, crowed about its new leader’s history of managing “transformational growth” and raising more than $1 billion in capital for various life science and bio-based chemical companies. … more

Can the U.S. become energy independent? Steve Fast of WJBC in Chicago spoke with John McCarthy, CEO of Qteros at the BIO International Convention about the future of biofuels, the longevity of corn-based ethanol and where our gas will come from in the future.

» Listen to the interview

By Erin Ailworth, Globe Staff

Qteros, Inc. in Marlborough and the University of Massachusetts Amherst have patented the fermentation method they use to make biofuel, a plant-based alternative to gasoline, using the so-called Q Microbe.

According to the company, the Q Microbe allows Qteros to streamline the process they use to breakdown plant material into sugars that can then be turned into ethanol, making that fuel easier and cheaper to produce. … more