Tim Dafforn is professor of biotechnology at the University of Birmingham, IET vice-president and chair of the IET Policy Oversight Committee.

They say that when one plans for the future, one should look at certainties and construct your plan around them. Paying tax, the law of physics and – in my opinion – the failures of the England cricket team are all certainties in our world, but global climate change represents perhaps one of the most certain certainties of the new millennium.

Given the requirement that we plan to avert this truly existential crisis, it is clear that our technological foundation must move away from its petrochemical base. One clear option is offered by the emerging biotech sector. Biotech is truly one of the only technological platforms that can replace hydrocarbons across wide expanses of our economy. More fundamentally, if managed well, biotech can be carbon-negative and be fed by our waste, leading to a sustainable future. But what are the hurdles?

Well, the hurdles...