Question of the Week - Aug 21

Did you know that RYAM is resorting to the use of genetically modified yeast (GMO yeast) in France and how do you feel about that if RYAM were to do the same here in Fernandina? 

BACKGROUND:

• Currently, RYAM's mill cooks or digests wood chips in a sulfurous acid base to extract the cellulose used in making its cellulose specialty products.   

• The residual leftover from this acid sulfite pulping process is a slurry of spent sulfite liquor commonly called "red liquor."

• This red liquor contains various types of sugars that can be chemically treated and fermented.

• One type, glucose, is easily fermentable by baker's yeast, but other types, various sugars called hexoses and pentoses, are more difficult to ferment.

• RYAM is resorting to the use of genetically modified yeast strains (GMO yeast) at its pilot ethanol plant in France to obtain more complete fermentation and thus increased ethanol yields.

• RYAM's proposed ethanol plant here in Fernandina, based on its French pilot facility, is designed to flush spent yeast and unfermented biomass to RYAM's existing wastewater system to be treated and released into the Amelia River along with other effluent from its mill.

• Any escaping genetically modified organisms (GMOs) not effectively killed in this process, or released into the air during fermentation, or by accident, pose a risk of interacting with and altering native microbial ecosystems in the Amelia River and may introduce novel proteins into aquatic food chains.

• The scientific community is still evaluating potential long-term harm from the unregulated use of GMO yeasts in ethanol production.

Share your thoughts with us!