DuPont and Biotech

Petrochemicals go into just about everything that isn't made of corn, cotton or hemp. The New York Times has an interesting story about DuPont seeking biotech substitutes for petrochemicals:

The company has allocated nearly 10 percent of its $1.3 billion research budget to extracting ingredients from carbohydrates — things that grow and can be infinitely replaced — rather than from hydrocarbons, which are mined or drilled and readily depleted.
DuPont already makes 10 percent of its products from nonpetrochemical substances, and Charles O. Holliday Jr., DuPont's chief executive, expects to increase that to 25 percent by 2010.