Natural gas constitutes an enormous energy and chemical resource for the US where the recoverable amount is estimated to be 2000 trillion ft3. However natural gas is a poor transportation fuel because of its inherently low energy density and therefore it needs to be converted into liquid fuels at competitive prices. There are various existing chemical routes but are not competitive for producing liquid fuels as they suffer from both high capital costs and low conversion efficiency. Bioconversion is a promising alternative because of the high specificity and high process energy efficiency. This invention describes microbial strains capable of growing and/or metabolizing methanol as a carbon and energy source with simultaneous CO2 fixation. The novelty of the invention is the ability for an engineered strain to incorporate methanol into central metabolism where it can then be converted to various products most importantly butanol by pathway engineering. Additionally the organism is capable of simultaneous carbon fixation. Applications: Production of biofuels and industrial chemicals
1) High energy efficiency 2) Low operating cost as the strain uses methanol which can be produced cheaply 3) High specificity