Climate change and a declining source of fossil fuels are among some of the most pressing challenges facing us in the 21^st century. In order to meet these challenges, numerous solutions have been identified, and developing a renewable, sustainable source of biofuels is one of them. Isoprenoids are a large and diverse class of natural products assembled from 5-carbon building blocks that can potentially be converted to fine chemicals and fuels like isoprenol. There are two distinct pathways for the biosynthesis of isoprenoid precursors: the deoxy-D-xylulose 5-phosphate (DXP) pathway of bacteria and the mevalonate pathway of fungi and animals. We have developed a heterologous E.coli production system that expressed the S. cerevisiae mevalonate pathway and produced high levels of the key intermediate, mevalonate, which was subsequently converted to isoprenol. The overproduction of isoprenoid precursors in E. coli is a major step toward the development of a generic host for the large scale production of isoprenoid natural products leading to renewable fine chemicals and biofuels.