 "Signing of agreement for the DBT-Pan IIT Centre for Bioenergy")
The Department of Biotechnology (DBT), under the Ministry of Science and Technology, has formalised virtual centre for research on advance biofuel technologies like cyanobacterial bio-fuels, bio-fuels from micro-algae, ligno-cellulosic biomass to biofuels and also on techno-economic and life cycle analysis.
The Department of Biotechnology has launched the DBT-Pan IIT Centre for Bioenergy, a virtual centre spread across 5 Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT); Bombay, Kharagpur, Guwahati, Jodhpur, and Roorkee and coordinated by IIT Bombay. A memorandum of agreement was signed between DBT and the participating 5 IITs on Sep 3, 2015.
The first virtual centre for collaborative research will focus on the thematic areas of research in advance biofuel technologies.
The collaboration initiated in January 2015 and engaged a research team from the five participating institutes consisting of 32 investigators who have been working on bioenergy and will jointly undertake research activities in the following thematic areas: cyanobacterial biofuels, biofuels from micro-algae, ligno-cellulosic biomass to biofuels and techno-economic and life cycle analysis.
Though the first virtual centre, it is the fourth centre in bioenergy research set up by DBT in addition to the DBT-IOC Centre for Advanced Bioenergy Faridabad, DBT-ICT Centre for Energy Biosciences, Mumbai and DBT-ICGEB Centre for Advanced Bioenergy, New Delhi. This is also the largest among the four bioenergy centres in terms of investigator participation.
The centre also aims to develop a mutually beneficial relationship with the bioenergy industry in India. The main objective of this centre is to develop advanced technologies in the area of biofuels, paving the way for a sustainable solution to the energy crisis.
