Biofuels at DuPont -- A Chance to Shape an Industry

Net Impact, Smith's Healthcare Business Association, and the Office of Career Management organized an extremely successful talk by Dr. William Frey, global business director at DuPont Biofuels on November 29, 2006. Frey spoke on DuPont's Sustainable Growth: Bio-based Chemicals and Biofuels. He was joined by his colleagues Dennis Magyar, North America Industry Manager at DuPont Biofuels, and Nathan Arbitman, marketing specialist.

During his 45-minute keynote speech, Frey explained how sustainability is a key issue for DuPonts CEO and described the various steps that the 200-year old company was taking to address this. He cited the fact that DuPonts total energy use is flat since 1990 as evidence that DuPont takes its sustainability responsibilities extremely seriously.

Given the audience of full- and part-time MBA students, Frey addressed several of the business issues facing this industry such as the price of corn, the economic viability of chemical processes, and the need for subsidies. Frey also spoke about the advanced research such as metabolic engineering or cell software that DuPont was undertaking in the area of bio-based chemicals and bio-fuels.

While comparing various energy sources for different sectors, Frey showed how oil has a near total dominance of the transportation sector. Thus, he felt that it is in this sector that the most business opportunity lies. Amongst the various non-conventional alternatives offered for oil in the transportation sector, Frey felt that bio-fuels are the most feasible solution in the near-term.

After Frey's keynote address, Nathan Arbitman gave a short presentation on internship and full-time career opportunities at DuPont. The panelists stressed that the biofuels industry is still in its early days. A career in this industry provides a chance to write history and shape an entire industry.

Pleased after organizing an extremely successful event, Ishwar Chhikara, president of Smith's Healthcare Business Association said, Despite being so close to final exams, we had a great turnout and I think that is mainly due to the high quality of the speakers we had."

 

▓ Sachin Agarwal, MBA Candidate 2007, Smith Media Group