Industries, such as agriculture, food, construction and materials are under immense pressure to transition to sustainable production, reducing CO2 emissions and resource consumption. However, Danish companies and in particularly startups, scaleups and SMEs face significant barriers such as limited access to advanced facilities with technology infrastructure for testing and scaling, including expertise in bioprocessing, biomanufacturing and raw material optimisation.

Despite the global need for sustainable solutions, the lack of technology infrastructure and support for scaling biobased solutions slows innovation and adaptation. The challenge lies in bridging this gap, while also reducing global CO2 emissions, leveraging side streams from industries, and creating competitive, sustainable solutions.

The Biosolutions Technology Center, located at the Danish Technological Institute in Taastrup, provides state-of-the-art facilities and services to support companies in developing, testing, and scaling biobased solutions. By integrating cutting-edge technologies, the centre enables businesses to transition from laboratory concepts to pilot and industrial-scale production in advanced state-of-the-art pilot facilities.

Key solutions include:

• Biorefining: Utilising agricultural and food industry side streams to extract valuable proteins, fibres, lipids and bioactive ingredients
• Fermentation: Scaling up fermentation processes for converting or producing biomass, proteins, fibres, probiotics, lipids, and sustainable materials in pilot bioreactors
• Microalgae production: Leveraging compact photo and heterotrophic bioreactors to produce high-value ingredients like omega-3 and proteins while capturing CO2 from industrial sources
• Downstream processing: Separation, extraction, purification and drying of valuable compounds and produced product
• Sector coupling: Facilitating cross-sectoral integration of biosolutions to create synergies between industries such as food, packaging and cosmetics

The centre also offers tools like AI-driven process optimisation and data modelling, assistance with grant proposals and funding, analysis and evaluation on end-of-life enabling companies to maximize resource efficiency and sustainability.

The centre is delivering measurable impacts on sustainability, competitiveness, and innovation. By 2030, the centre will facilitate at least 100 development and scaling projects annually, offering critical support to startups and SMEs.

This will, amongst other things, contribute to a global reduction in CO2 emissions, minimise environmental impact and foster economic opportunities.

The centre has supported several biosolutions successes, including companies such as Visibuilt and Algiecel (discover the cases below).