You know that an industry has come of age when publishers begin to rank the biggest, the most popular, or in the recent case of Biofuels Digest, the “hottest” companies. Just this week, Biofuels Digest, an online daily bioenergy news service, posted its rankings of the “50 Hottest Companies in Bioenergy” for 2008-09. The list recognizes innovation and achievement in bioenergy development.

The top five companies (from first to fifth) are as follows: Coskata, Sapphire Energy, Virent Energy Systems, POET and Range Fuels. You can review the other top companies at http://biofuelsdigest.com/blog2/2008/12/22/behind-the-50-hottest-companies-in-bioenergy-rankings/

Checkbiotech.org noted that among the top 50, 17 are active in cellulosic ethanol development, and several are developing algae-to-energy systems or producing other advanced biofuels or waste-to-energy technologies. The companies range from start-ups, funded by venture capital and corporate investors, to new divisions of established companies such as DuPont, Genencor, and Honeywell.

Rankings were established by a Biofuels Digest panel. They ranked companies by focusing on three main factors: quality of the intellectual property owned or developed by the company; the amount of due diligence done on the company by public and private investors; and measureable progress toward commercialization.