Given the ever-growing environmental concerns of global warming and fossil depletion, the shift towards a more sustainable bio-economy with smart use of available renewable resources has become a prominent topic in society, politics, research, and industry. Here, 2nd generation integrated biorefineries, where non-food biomass side streams are transformed into an array of bioproducts, will play a crucial role. Yet, direct hydrolysis and fermentation of complex lignocellulosic residues is challenging and leads to important carbon losses. Alternatively, robust gasification coupled to syngas fermentation is a strongly growing field. Whereas ethanol has been the main target product in this approach to date, acetate is an interesting alternative as a key platform chemical and can furthermore serve as a renewable intermediate for 2nd stage biotechnological processes towards high-value bioproducts. In this light, acetogens can use both CO and CO2 as a carbon source, with H2 as an energy source, and produce acetate in high carbon and energy efficiency. This research strives to fully exploit the potential of non-conventional, underexplored acetogens through smart screening, efficient strain improvement, increasing understanding of their metabolic behaviour, and dynamic kinetic modelling of a continuous syngas fermentation process, ultimately aiming to reach the criteria for techno-economic feasibility and hence industrial viability.