The Energy Blog

EPA Raises Raises Requirements for Renewable Fuels

An item of interest to ethanol producers and other supporters of ethanol is this announcement by EPA, as further clarified by this announcement by EERE:

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced on November 17 that the 2009 renewable fuel standard (RFS) will require most refiners, importers, and non-oxygenate blenders of gasoline to displace 10.21% of their gasoline with renewable fuels such as ethanol. That requirement aims to ensure that at least 11.1 billion gallons of fuels will be sold in 2009.  . . . While the RFS requirement is increasing by about 23%—from 9 billion gallons in 2008 to 11.1 billion gallons in 2009—the percentage requirement is increasing by nearly one third, from 7.76% in 2008 to 10.21% in 2009.

The larger relative increase in the percentage requirement reflects the fact that fuel consumption is expected to be lower in 2009, so a greater percentage of renewable fuel is needed to reach 11.1 billion gallons of renewable fuels. . . .

FYI: Benefits of Combined Heat and Power in Corn Ethanol Plants

To date, CHP and ethanol industry stakeholders have recognized that the efficiencies of CHP could further improve energy use patterns of dry mill ethanol plants, but the levels of impact have been unclear.

This paper by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Combined Heat and Power Partnership summarizes an analysis of state-of-the-art natural gas-, coal-, and biomass-fueled dry mill ethanol plants—comparing energy consumption and CO2 emissions of the ethanol production process with and without CHP systems.  . . .

The analysis shows that the use of CHP can result in reductions in total energy use of almost 55 percent over state-of-the-art dry mill ethanol plants that purchase central station power rather than use CHP. With certain CHP configurations, CO2 emission reductions from using CHP to displace central station power even exceed the CO2 emissions from the CHP system and ethanol plant, resulting in negative net CO2 emissions for the plant compared with base case conditions. . . . more

I had thought that plants employing CHP were more common than indicated in this report.  . . . No wonder power consumption is such a big concern.  Of course lower power comes at the price of higher capital costs, but after all these plants are part of the energy industry that should be aware of these costs.  And when are these plants going to start using part of their product to generate their power requirements?  Get with the program!

Ethanol Blends can Provide Better Fuel Economy than Gasoline

Recent research findings show that mid-range ethanol blends - fuel mixtures most likely between E20 and E30 - can in some cases provide better fuel economy than regular unleaded gasoline, even in standard, non-flex-fuel vehicles.

Previous assumptions held that ethanol's lower energy content directly correlates with lower fuel economy for drivers. Those assumptions were found to be incorrect. E20 and E30 ethanol blends outperformed unleaded gasoline in fuel economy tests for certain autos. The tests were conducted using four 2007 model vehicles: a Toyota Camry, a Ford Fusion, and two Chevrolet Impalas, one flex-fuel and one non-flex-fuel. Contrary to Btu-based estimates of fuel economy for ethanol blends, three of the four vehicles tested achieved their highest fuel efficiency not on gasoline, but on an ethanol blend. Mid-level blends of ethanol E20 (20% ethanol, 80% gasoline) and E30 (30% ethanol, 70% gasoline) offered the best fuel economy in these tests.

• E30 offered better fuel economy than gasoline (a 1% increase) in both the Toyota and the Ford.
• E20 offered better fuel economy than gasoline (a 15% increase) in the flex-fuel Chevrolet.
• The non-flex-fuel Chevrolet more closely followed the Btu-calculated trend for fuel economy, but did experience a significant improvement over the trend line with E40 (40% ethanol, 60% gasoline), indicating that this may be the “optimal” ethanol blend level for this vehicle.

Vapema, Developer of Membranes for Ethanol/Vapor Separation Receives Can$21.5 Million in Funding

Vaperma Inc., Quebec City, QC, provider of advanced gas separation solutions aimed at reducing energy costs and carbon footprint, has received Can$ 21.5 million in a second financing round.

The company will use proceeds from this financing to commercialize its Siftek(TM) membrane-based ethanol/alcohol dewatering system, to expand all corporate operations and to accelerate the growth of its membrane business.

Vaperma has developed a lower cost solution to remove water from ethanol blends by entirely replacing rectification column and/or dehydration unit such as molecular sieve and extractive distillation with a membrane separation system. Conventional ethanol/alcohol distilleries are known to consume huge amounts of steam. Vaperma's Siftek(TM) system has been tested successfully for over a year in an operating corn-based ethanol plant in Canada.

Vaperma Siftek™ hollow-fiber polymeric membrane enables the dewatering of a 40:60 ethanol to water vapor mixture into a 99+% w/w fuel-grade ethanol product. There is no need to rectify the ethanol/water blend after evaporation. By replacing the rectifier and the molecular sieve used in a conventional ethanol plant, energy savings as high as 40 % are possible with the innovative membrane permeation process developed by Vaperma. This is equivalent to a cost reduction of 6.4 ¢/Gal (1.7¢/L).

Vaperma has teamed up with Canada's largest producer of ethanol, Greenfield Ethanol (GFE- previously Commercial Alcohols Inc.), to prove its Siftek™ membrane technology prior to its industrial scale commercialization, projected for 2008.

Ethanol from Biodiesel Byproduct

Biotech reports that scientists have found a way to convert glycerin, a byproduct of biodiesel production into ethanol.

Ramon Gonzalez and Syed Shams Yazdani have identified the metabolic processes and conditions that allow a known strain of Escherichia coli to convert glycerin into ethanol through an anaerobic fermentation process.

Gonzalez found that ethanol from glycerol is 39 cents cheaper to produce than ethanol from corn. Feedstock costs per gallon were 53 cents for corn, versus 30 cents for glycerol. Per gallon operating costs were 52 cents for corn and just 36 cents for glycerol. . . . more

I would think this technology would only be applicable to larger biodiesel plants, of which there are not too many in the U.S., but probably more in Germany.

Maize for Biofuels: The Ultimate Energy Crop

According to research conducted by Fred Below at the University of Illinois (U of I), maize may prove to be the ultimate U.S. biofuels crop. This comes at somewhat of a surprise, because U of I has been studying and advocating Miscanthus for some time.

The chief advantage of maize, when grown in the Midwest, is that it requires much less nitrogen fertilizer input than corn because it does not produce any ears.  The sugar is in the stalks, not in the ears and is in the form of sucrose, fructose and glucose.

This differs from conventional corn and other crops being grown for biofuels in that the starch found in corn grain and the cellulose in switchgrass, corn stover and other biofuel crops must be treated with enzymes to convert them into sugars that can be then fermented into alcohols such as ethanol.

It also is easier for farmers to integrate into their current operations than some other dedicated energy crops because it can be easily rotated with corn or soybeans, and can be planted, cultivated and harvested with the same equipment U.S. farmers already have. Finally, tropical maize stalks are believed to require less processing than corn grain, corn stover, switchgrass, Miscanthus giganteus and the scores of other plants now being studied for biofuel production.

VeraSun Energy Suspends Construction of Refinery

VeraSun Energy Corporation (NYSE: VSE) announced on October 2 that it was suspending construction of a 110 million-gallon-per-year ethanol biorefinery due to current market conditions. The company expects that construction will be resumed in 2008 if market conditions improve. The company had only completed site grading and preparation work on he effected plant.

"We believe it's important to be mindful of the current market conditions and manage our business accordingly," said Danny Herron, VeraSun Chief Financial Officer and Senior Vice President. "Given the abrupt change in market conditions that have seen ethanol prices drop nearly 50 cents per gallon in the last 60 days, it is prudent for us to adjust our current pace of expansion. Due to Reynold's early stage of development, we believe it is wise to suspend investment until the market provides an acceptable return."

"We have a large business that we are growing rapidly with four facilities continuing under construction," said Don Endres, VeraSun Chairman and CEO. "We remain confident in the outlook for our industry and believe that with ethanol currently priced at a dollar less than gasoline, it provides a great value as a high-octane, clean-burning renewable fuel that will drive additional blending throughout the nation."

Priced at a dollar less than gasoline, blending ethanol with gasoline now reduces the price of gasoline, but does not provide as great a profit margin for producers as it previously did. This is evidence that market forces are at work and the out of control expansion of corn ethanol producers will be moderated. Although I support the development of the ethanol market, it is time that subsidies on corn ethanol be reduced so that cost reduction improvements to biorefineries will be implemented. See the previous post on Poet to see what cost reduction practices are being planned by one producer.

Update: Loan guarantees for improvements to reduce cost would be OK for corn ethanol. Full subsidies for cellulosic ethanol would be OK until processes are more developed and costs are under control.

Poet Becomes Largest Ethanol Producer in World, May be first to Produce Cellulosic Ethanol

On September 14 POET Biorefining, formerly the Broin Companies, opened their 21st ethanol production facility, a 65 million gallon per year plant that brings Poet's total capacity to 1.1 billion gallons per year of corn ethanol, making POET the largest producer of ethanol in the world.

The facility, the 27th (including administrative facilites) constructed by POET since they were founded 20 years ago, is equipped with technology that decreases its environmental footprint. That technology includes POET’s patent-pending BPX™ process that eliminates the need for heat in the cooking process of producing ethanol, reducing energy usage by 8-15 percent in comparison with conventional plants. It will also be outfitted with a regenerative thermal oxidizer that eliminates up to 99.9 percent of air emissions.

The BPX process is a patent-pending raw starch hydrolysis process that converts starch to sugar, which then ferments to ethanol without heat. The process not only reduces energy costs, but also releases additional starch content for conversion to ethanol, increases protein content and quality of co-products, increases co-product flowability, potentially increases plant throughput and significantly decreases plant emissions.

POET Biorefining - Portland, IN will utilize 22 million bushels of corn from the area to produce 65 million gallons of ethanol and 178,000 tons of Dakota Gold Enhanced Nutrition Distillers Products™ per year. The $105 million facility will provide around 40 jobs with an annual payroll of about $2 million.

Growth in Biofuels Production Remains Strong

Growth in the biofuel industry remains strong for both ethanol and biodiesel, according to a presss release for the Soyatech's Biofuels Index, newly updated for Q2 2007. However, the data also shows signs that the corn-based ethanol build out may be leveling off.

Soyatech's Biofuels Index, which tracks planned and actual build-out of biofuels production capacity, reports dramatic growth in planned capacity for ethanol plants over the past year, from 6.761 billion gallons per year (BGY) as of July 1, 2006, to 13.03 BGY as of July 1, 2007 - an increase of 93%. During this same period, growth in ethanol capacity under construction increased 199%, from 2.417 BGY to 7.226 BGY.

During Q2 2007, total online capacity for ethanol increased by 564 million gallons per year (MGY), or 10.7%, from 5.289 BGY to 5.853 BGY. Capacity in planning rose by approximately 6% during the quarter.

However, the Index also points to a slight leveling off in construction of ethanol plants during Q2 2007 - the first time since the Index began tracking these numbers. According to the Index, capacity under construction decreased slightly by 1.7%.

"While the percent change is too small and the time frame too short to identify this as a definitive trend, we understand from industry sources that it is more difficult to secure debt financing for new refineries due largely to increased equity requirements on the part of banks providing this funding. We suspect that an additional cause may be constraints on the amount of corn available as a feedstock to produce ethanol," said Jacob Golbitz, director of research for Soyatech and its parent company, HighQuest Partners.

E3 Biofuels' Efficient Closed-Loop Ethanol Plant in Operation

E³ BioFuels inaugurated the world's first closed-loop ethanol plant fueled largely by biogas from animal waste instead of coal or natural gas on June 28. The energy-efficient, low-cost Genesis Plant, located in Mead, Neb., began commercial operation in April 2007, doesn't contribute to global warming and actually reduces air and water pollution.

E³ BioFuels' patented technology brings together three proven components into a single, closed-loop system:

1. A large cattle feedlot or dairy that produces large quantities of cow manure needing treatment.
2. An anaerobic digester that transforms the cow manure into biogas.
3. An ethanol plant that runs on the biogas instead of natural gas or coal, and whose leftover wet grain is fed back to the cattle.

At the Genesis plant the patented closed-loop ethanol system produces energy by combining manure, collected from an adjacent 28,000-head cattle feedlot, with thin stillage, a cellulosic byproduct of ethanol refining. The hot liquid mixture is decomposed inside an anaerobic digester, where bacteria extract methane-rich biogas that is used to fire the plant's ethanol boilers. Traditional ethanol refineries are fueled by coal or natural gas.

Important Lower Cost Technology Demonstrated for Ethanol Production

GreenField Ethanol and Vaperma, announced they have completed a successful trial demonstration of new technology to save 40% of the energy costs of the ethanol production processs by using Verpanas new membranes to seperate water from an alcohol-water mixture producing a 99 per cent fuel-grade ethanol product that will dramatically improve the ethanol production process. The Vaperma process allows for significant energy savings because the membrane eliminates distillation and molecular sieve units.

GreenField Ethanol, Canada’s largest ethanol producer while Vaperma is an emerging developer, manufacturer, and supplier of advanced hollow polymer fiber membrane gas separation systems.

Vaperma’s process is unique to the industry and has the potential to revolutionize the alcohol production process. Their Siftek™ polymeric membrane system allows high selective separation of water from various gas mixtures and organic vapors. Vaperma membranes are heat and solvent resistant. Membrane based technology offers an alternative to conventional processes for the “dewatering” of ethanol and natural gas and the removal of CO2.

Vaperma Siftek™ membrane enables the dewatering of a 40:60 ethanol to water vapor mixture into a 99+% w/w fuel-grade ethanol product. There is no need to distill (rectify) the ethanol/water blend after evaporation. By replacing the distallation column and the molecular sieve used in a conventional ethanol plant, energy savings as high as 40 % are possible with the innovative membrane permeation process developed by Vaperma. This is equivalent to a cost reduction of 6.4 ¢/Gal (1,7¢/L).

China May Switch to Non-Food Fuel Crops for Production of Ethanol

BEIJING, June 10 (Xinhua) -- China may switch entirely to non-food energy crops such as cassava, sweet potato, sorghum (not commonly used for food in China) and cellulose sources to producing ethanol fuel as a substitute for petroleum, said a government official.

The country will no longer approve projects designed to produce ethanol fuel with food crops, an official of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) told a seminar on China's fuel ethanol development held in Beijing on Saturday.

Are Ethanol Pipelines a Good Idea?

Iowa Congressmen Leonard Boswell has introduced bipartisan legislation to increase the availability of alternative fuels at gasoline stations across the country. The legislation calls for funding a study to find out whether underground pipelines would be a good way to transport ethanol and biodiesel.

The bill, if it passes Congress and becomes law, will direct the U.S. Department of Energy to conduct an ethanol pipeline feasibility study to analyze the technological, economic, regulatory and financial issues in transporting ethanol via dedicated ethanol pipelines. This legislation will also direct the energy department to research the technical factors that prevent transportation of ethanol and bio-diesel in existing pipelines.

While I support the ethanol industry, especially the cellulosic ethanol industry, this idea has limited appeal to me.  Without doing any analysis it would seem to me that all the ethanol that could be produced could be consumed within 500 miles of its point of production.  Cellulosic ethanol can be producd in a much wider area than corn ethanol which reduces the need for pipeline. The ethanol that is necessary as an additive to gasoline, for areas beyond 500 miles, can be moved by rail or truck tanker as is done today.  We must look foreword to the production of biobutanol that can be transported in existing pipelines. We will always have a need for some liquid fuels, but as plug-in hybrids and EV's become available the need for liquid fuels will be reduced and we will have the time necessary to develop biobutanol and a distribution network before U.S. petroleum reserves become critical.

According to IEO2007 world production of unconventional liquids (including biofuels, coal-to-liquids, and gas-to-liquids), which totaled only 2.6 million barrels per day in 2004, is projected to increase to 10.5 million barrels per day and account for 9 percent of total world liquids supply in 2030. They project that petroleum production will increase enough to produce the balance of 118 mbd of liquid fuels needed by that date.

I do not believe that 109 mbd of petroleum will is possible in 2030, more like 90-95 mgd, but I do believe that plug-in and EV's can be produced in large enough quantities to fill in the gap. I also believe that the production of biofuels could be quite a bit higher than projected by IEO.

Lanza Tech Bacteria Produce Ethanol from Carbon Monoxide

A New Zealand company, LanzaTech, based in Auckland, announced that it had developed a fermentation process in which bacteria consume carbon monoxide and produce ethanol. Khosla Ventures has invested $3.5 million in the company to establish a pilot plant and perform the engineering work to prepare for commercial-scale ethanol production.

LanzaTech's innovation lies in using a bacterium to produce ethanol not from a carbohydrate, but from a gas, carbon monoxide. Carbon monoxide is a waste product of a number of industrial processes, including the production of steel.

This technology could produce 50 billion gallons of ethanol from the world's steel mills alone, turning the liability of carbon emissions into valuable fuels worth over $50 billion per year at very low costs and adding substantial value to the steel industry. The technology will also be a key contributor to the cellulosic biofuels business as it can convert syngas produced through gasification into ethanol.

Malaysian Company Claims it will Produce 1.7 billion gallons per year of Ethanol

Biopact reports fresh news about that 'mysterious' energy crop called Nypa fruticans (also known as 'nipah' or 'mangrove palm'): Pioneer Bio Industries Corp Sdn Bhd (PBIC) claims it will be able to produce a startling 6.48 billion liters (1.7 billion gallons) of nipah palm ethanol per year when its planned refineries in Malaysia's North-Western Perak State begin operations in 2009. This amount is roughly equal to 780,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day. ...

Ethanol can be obtained from fermenting the sugar-rich sap that can be tapped continuously from the trees' inflorescence. Nipah has a very high sugar-rich sap yield. According to one study, the palm can produce 6,480-15,600 liters of ethanol per hectare, compared to 3,350-6,700 liters/hectare from sugarcane. ... more

I always thought that tropical and semitropical countries had great potential to produce large quantities of ethanol at low cost and improve their economies at the same time.  This is another proof that this is happening.

Bush seeks to scrap current ethanol standard

Reuters, March 20, 2007 -- The Bush administration has proposed scrapping the current U.S. renewable fuels standard that requires ethanol  ...

Under the legislative proposal sent to Congress on Monday, the new standard would require U.S. ethanol and alternative fuel consumption to reach 10 billion gallons in 2010.

The alternative fuels standard would then slowly rise through 2014, and ramp up the following three years to reach 35 billion gallons annually in 2017. ...

In addition to ethanol, alternative fuels under the bill would include biodiesel and motor fuel made from municipal solid waste, natural gas, hydrogen, coal-derived liquid fuels, electricity and other fuels to be determined by the Energy Department. ... more

The change in definition of renewable fuel requirements from only ethanol to the other listed fuels makes attainment of the 35 billion gallons annually goal by 2017 more achievable, as I have stated previously.  Combined with greater emphasis on PHEVs and BEVs our greenhouse gas emissions and dependence on foreign oil can be greatly reduced. The coal liquids should be required to be produced from coal mined in an environmentally consious manner and the CTL process be required to sequester all emissions.

Surging corn prices tighten ethanol financing

As the main ingredient for ethanol rises to $4 per bushel and oil prices dip, many are concerned about an industry shake-out.

Reuters, March 21, 2007) -- Financing for ethanol plants has tightened as rising corn prices have made it tougher for producers to turn a profit and an industry shake-out could follow, according to sector bankers and executives.

The price of corn, the main ingredient of U.S. ethanol, has risen to $4 per bushel, making it more difficult for ethanol plants to turn a profit. At the same time, oil prices have fallen since peaking at more than $78 a barrel last summer, cutting into demand for a lower priced alternative. More

As far as I am concerned this is good news because the building of corn ethanol plants must be slowed.  We are fast approaching the limit of corn production without drastically limiting the amount available for food.  Cellulosic plants are not too far off and we will have to wait for them until rapid growth in the ethanol industry can resume.  Besides the energy efficiency of cellulosic plants is much better than for corn ethanol plants.

The Need for Both Biofuels and Battery Based Vehicles

Based on the response to this mornings post on the governments cellulosic ethanol program, I think some of you may have misunderstood the reasoning behind The Energy Blog supporting this cellulosic ethanol program and some of the basic causes and remedies of The Energy Revolution. Our most pressing energy problem is our decreasing supplies of increasingly expensive oil for the transportation industries. The high use of petroleum products for transportation is one of the primary causes of global warming (the other being coal fired power plants, which will not be discussed in this post), fortunately the solution to the problem of increased use of petroleum products also decreases the emissions of global warming gases.

This is not a short term problem, but one that has taken years to develop and will take years to solve. The timing is hard to pin down. I believe we have passed the peak production of inexpensive sweet crude oil. Each year we are now using larger quantities of expensive (either to harvest and/or refine) oil, whether it be sour oil, very deep offshore oil, heavy oil or perhaps eventually shale oil. At some time, as prices of oil go up, market forces will cause the use of oil to decrease. This would require changes in lifestyle, some of which would be beneficial, as there is much waste and some of which could reduce the the standard of living that we have become used to. More use of mass transportation and driving more efficient vehicles are certainly required. 

Ethanol Forces Farmland Prices Up

Farmland the new hot property
Jeff Wilson, Bloomberg News, February 21, 2007

Farmland from Iowa to Argentina is rising faster in price than apartments in Manhattan and London for the first time in 30 years.

Demand for corn used in ethanol increased the value of cropland 16 per cent in Indiana and 35 per cent in Idaho in 2006, government figures show. The price of a Soho loft appreciated only 12 per cent, while a pied-a-terre in Islington near London's financial district gained 11 per cent, according to realtors.

This is evidence that corn ethanol is reaching its peak and that we need to place a moratorium on new corn ethanol plants and wait for cellulosic ethanol to be cost effective.  How about placing some emphasis on biodiesel from algae and clean up our CO2 emissions from power plants.

High Grain Prices Threaten Viability of Ethanol

Biofuels growth hit by soaring price of grain
Fiona Harvey, Kevin Morrison and Mark Mulligan, Financial Times, February 22 2007

High grain prices are threatening the nascent biofuels industry ...

Corn prices reached another 10-year high for the second successive day when it touched $4.31 a bushel, up five cents on the day. But the doubling of corn, a main feedstock for US ethanol producers, over the past year at a time when oil prices are at the same level they were 12 months ago has raised questions over the viability of the biofuels industry without heavy government support. ...

Brazil is the world’s biggest producer of ethanol, and its industry will be unaffected by high grain prices because its producers use sugar cane rather than wheat. Converting sugar to ethanol is more efficient than using wheat, and Brazilian companies are widely acknowledged to be the world leaders in efficient techniques to convert sugar cane to fuel. ...

 

Ethanol, Biodiesel Directory of Retail Stations

New Alternative Fuel Directory Features Over 2200 E85 and Biodiesel Retail Locations Nationwide

Feb. 21 - USA Energy Independence Publications announces the first ever directory covering both E85 Ethanol Fuel and Biodiesel Fuel retail stations nationwide. Designed to help the Flex Fuel Vehicle (FFV)-vehicle and diesel-powered vehicle owners find local retail outlets for these fuels, the directory also features a buyers guide for 2007 and earlier model Flex Fuel vehicles. Updated quarterly, the 70 plus page directory is available as a single copy sale for $19.95 or as a subscription with discounts for yearly subscribers. The directory may be ordered from USA Energy Independence Publications, 1776 S Naperville Rd. Ste 201A, Wheaton, IL 60187 Or by calling 630-221-1778. Most credit cards accepted.

Government Nets Out Positive on Ethanol, Biobutanol Coming to US

Expert: Ethanol industry will grow

Jerry Perkins, Des Moines Register, February 21, 2007

... Keith Collins, the U.S. Department of Agriculture's chief economist, has estimated that the ethanol-fueled increase in corn prices lowered federal payments to farmers by $6 billion last year. Dinneen said $2.7 billion from the ethanol industry in new federal tax revenues meant that taxpayers gained a return on their investment in government subsidies paid to ethanol producers.

... Biobutanol ... could be marketed in the United States as early as 2010, said Dennis Magyar, industry manager for North America for DuPont Biofuels. ...

Magyar said the partners are looking for a U.S. site to build a biobutanol plant. He said biobutanol will complement - not compete with - ethanol.

Iowa is a contender for the plant, he said. That's because existing ethanol plants can be retrofitted to make biobutanol. ...

Process Improvements Reduce Ethanol Costs

Engineers Devise New Process To Improve Energy Efficiency of Ethanol Production

Carnegie Mellon University press release, Jan. 26, 2006

Carnegie Mellon University chemical engineers have devised a new process that can improve the efficiency of ethanol production, a major component in making biofuels a significant part of the U.S. energy supply.

Carnegie Mellon researchers have used advanced process-design methods combined with mathematical-optimization techniques to reduce the operating costs of corn-based bio-ethanol plants by more than 60 percent.
   
The key to the Carnegie Mellon strategy involves redesigning the distillation process by using a multicolumn system together with a network for energy recovery that ultimately reduces the consumption of steam, a major energy component in the production of corn-based ethanol.
   
"This new design reduces the manufacturing cost for producing ethanol by 11 percent, from $1.61 a gallon to $1.43 a gallon," said Chemical Engineering Professor Ignacio E. Grossmann. ... "This research is also an important step in making the production of ethanol more energy efficient and economical."

Ethanol Production Update

The headlines on the latest Renewable Fuels Association (REA) press release are: October production ties all time high, yearly production, demand for ethanol up more than 25%.

This somewhat contrary to what I have been reading in the popular press, that frequently says demand is down. We are still importing expensive ethanol to meet demand. However, the capacity of new plants probably will double over current capacity in the next two years, making me wonder whether we can absorb that much production, forcing ethanol prices down (that will be good for consumers, but bad for producers).  Further, that production rate will put a strain on corn production forcing prices of corn up and possibly jeopardize our supply of food corn. No significant cellulosic ethanol production will come on stream in the next two years, so that alternative is no relief for corn supplies during that period. We need to put a moratorium on building more corn ethanol plants which only have a small net energy gain, and wait for cellulosic ethanol to become viable. We should stop subsidizing the construction of new corn ethanol plants. 

Direct Alcohol Fuel Cell Partnership Needed

AlgoDyne Ethanol Energy Inc. (OTCBB:ADYN) announced that it is currently negotiating partnerships in the Direct-Alcohol-Fuel-Cell (DAFC) field to provide a cutting-edge system.

In order to produce electricity from ethanol directly, AlgoDyne has devoted substantial development resources to DAFC research. DAFCs generate power through the direct oxidation of alcohol in conjunction with the reduction of oxygen. AlgoDyne’s dedicated team of scientists have achieved significant efficiency compared to existing DAFC designs and anticipate completing a prototype very soon.

AlgoDyne’s proprietary mico-algae-based (phytoplankton) technology provides a powerful means to produce clean, renewable energy from the continual harvest of bio-mass from Photo-Bioreactors. The end result is the production of ethanol, methanol, biodiesel, electricity, coal and animal feed – all in a carbon dioxide neutral way.

Diversified Ethanol Plant Leasing Offers Upgrades to Latest Technology

CHICAGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Diversified Ethanol, a division of Originally New York, Inc (OTCBB:ONYI) has begun its new “Plant Leasing Program” to ensure that the plants the company manufactures will always have the latest technology. Companies are already applying for grants to use cornstalks, wheat waste, and grasses that could be converted into fermentable sugars using more affordable, new technology. Other companies are researching fruit waste. ...

As featured in the latest issue of Ethanol Producer Magazine, Diversified Ethanol has successfully utilized Cold Microwave technology in a small-scale setting, using ultrasonic sound waves to pre-cook corn. Iowa State University has demonstrated up to a 30% increase in fermentable sugars using the technology on a small scale. Moffitt said, “I think that the ‘extra’ starch was always there, it was just locked up in little lipid shells, and now we’re cracking it like walnuts. It was chemically invisible before.” If a company were to make this upgraded technology available to ethanol plants around the world, there could be a substantial savings in the need for feedstock. Such technology could save an average ethanol plant millions of dollars every year. ... more

MIT Engineers Yeast to Improve Ethanol Production

By manipulating the yeast genome, MIT researchers have engineered a new strain of yeast that can tolerate elevated levels of both ethanol and glucose, while producing ethanol faster than un-engineered yeast. The work is reported in the Dec. 8 issue of Science. .... more

Researchers Find Life Cycle Energy Use of MSW-Ethanol Less than Corn-Ethanol or Cellulosic Ethanol

Researchers at Michigan State University and the University of Toronto modeled a municipal solid waste (MSW)-to-ethanol facility employing dilute acid hydrolysis and gravity pressure vessel technology and estimate life cycle energy use and air emissions. They compared their results, assuming the ethanol was utilized as E85 (blended with 15% gasoline) in a light-duty vehicle, with  life cycle assessments of gasoline, corn-ethanol, and cellulosic-ethanol fueled vehicles.

An attractive feature of MSW to ethanol conversion is that the feedstock is available at a negative cost; i.e. disposal facilities charge tipping fees ranging from $15-$100/ton to accept MSW.

They found that the life cycle total energy use per vehicle mile traveled for MSW-ethanol is less than that of corn-ethanol and cellulosic-ethanol. MSW-ethanol use in vehicles reduces net greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 65% compared to gasoline, and by 58% when compared to corn-ethanol.

Converting MSW to ethanol will result in net fossil energy savings of 397-1830 MJ/MT MSW compared to net fossil energy consumption of 177-577 MJ/MT MSW for landfilling. However, landfilling with land fill gas recovery, either for flaring or for electricity production results in greater reductions in GHG emissions compared to MSW-to-ethanol conversion.

Ethanol Industry Growth to Slow, ISU Experts Say

The DesMoines Register reports: Look for a slowdown in the rapid expansion of the ethanol industry, Iowa State University economists cautioned Monday.

Increased costs and delays in ethanol plant construction, transportation bottlenecks in moving ethanol to market, and rapidly rising corn prices all signal that the expansion of the ethanol industry might be cooling, the ISU economists said in a webcast that originated from the ISU campus.

John Miranowski, an ISU economics professor said, The price of crude oil - and the resulting price of gasoline - is expected to remain at levels that make ethanol production profitable.

It is time to take a break in building new ethanol plants, until cellulosic ethanol processes are economical.

Sugar Cane Yields Consistently Increasing

Accoring to a post in Biopact:

At the FO Licht World Ethanol Conference held recently in Amsterdam, director Jacyr  Costa Filho of the Brazilian commodity brokerage Sociedade Corretora De Alcool Trading SA, who has 20 years experience in the sector, announced that by 2030, the ethanol output of a hectare of sugar cane will rise to a staggering average of 13,000 liters, more than twice the current output.

Just like the steady rise of the past quarter of a century, the increased productivity of the coming decades will be the result of a series of new technologies and processes, ranging from the development of high-yield plant varieties to the creation of new planting, harvesting and processing techniques.

VeraSun, GS Agrifuels to Produce Biodiesel from Distillers Grains

VeraSun Energy Corporation (NYSE: VSE), the nation's second-largest ethanol producer, last week announced plans to produce biodiesel from oil extracted from dried distillers grains (DDG), a co-product of the ethanol production process. Similar announcements have been made by GSGF.PK).

Removing the oil from DDG both increases the value of the oil for fuel use, and enhances the resulting distillers grains as a livestock feed by concentrating protein and reducing fat content.

Biodiesel production grew to 150 million gallons in 2006 from 75 million gallons in 2005. The Energy Information Administration projects biodiesel demand will increase to more than one billion gallons by 2010 and double to two billion gallons by 2020.

"Monster Cane" for Ethanol Developed in Japan

It is three meters tall and productive even in poor soil, it holds up in droughts and typhoons, and it yields twice as many stems as most sugarcane. No wonder they call it "Monster Cane."

Asahi says the new cane variety can produce three times as much ethanol as other strains, and slightly more sugar. It also yields more bagasse, or crushed sugarcane refuse, which is burned to generate the energy to run a sugar-ethanol plant.

Asahi estimates that the yield of the new sugarcane is 16.7 tons per acre (37.4 tonnes per hectare) excluding moisture, which can be processed into 2.9 tons (7.1 tonnes) of sugar, 4.3 kiloliters of ethanol and 9.7 tons (24 tonnes) of bagasse.

This compares with the yield of conventional cane at 7.6 tons per acre (17.4 tonnes per hectare), 0.9 tons (2.3 tonnes) of sugar, 1.4 kiloliters of ethanol and 2.8 tons (7.8 tonnes) of bagasse, which is too little bagasse to produce sufficient energy for a processing plant.

Forbes 2007 Energy Outlook

Forbes.com has much of this weeks issue devoted to a Special Report "2007 Energy Outlook", which has nine articles covering Consumption, A forecast for low cost oil, Discussion of oil supply from: Latin America, Russia, Europe and America, and China; The cost of standby by power, The worlds largest geothermal heat pump system at Fort Knox and an article on ethanol, from the investors viewpoint.

A timely and fairly interesting group of articles, especially for the novice.  The article on consumption has a lot of statistics on how energy consumption is growing. Its too bad they did not include articles on plug-in hybrids or renewable energy. The slant of the articles is as you would expect from big business.

U.S. to Become Exporter of Ethanol

According to this article the U.S. will have an excess of ethanol in the 2007-2008 time period, leading to a virtual stoppage of imports and the need for exports. 

This prospect of exports is made difficult because the cost of producing corn ethanol in the U.S. is $1.10 to $1.40 per gallon, compared to $0.90 per gallon for sugar ethanol in Brazil, the largest exporter of ethanol. At these production costs, U.S. corn ethanol is competitive with $55.00/barrel oil. However the U.S don't have significant storage capacity for ethanol, which creates a need for exports.

Thus we will have a period of time when the need for more E85 stations and increased production of flex fueled vehicles will become desirable.  The economic reason for expanding the ethanol market will be largely driven by the desire to reduce oil imports. Non-economic reasons, such as reduced global warming, are usually not important in the market place unless mandated by law.

Alternative Liquid Fuels from Nuclear Hydrogen and CO2 Emissions

MIT conducted a study, An Alternative to Gasoline: Synthetic Fuels from Nuclear Hydrogen and Captured CO₂, to determine the extent to which nuclear power can contribute to a transition in the transportation sector.

The study concluded that the concept of alternative liquid fuels produced from nuclear hydrogen and captured carbon dioxide is viable. There is abundant CO₂ for use and the hydrogen can be produced with proven technology.

Combining hydrogen with carbon dioxide captured from fossil fired plants to produce liquid fuel, either ethanol or methanol, is a way of producing fuels that could be used with little modification in the production of vehicles, requires few changes in the infrastructure for distributing fuels and is complementary to the production of ethanol from biosources.

A total cycle analysis revealed that the total reduction in CO₂ emissions will be slightly more than 12% for either ethanol use or methanol use. A second benefit would be to decrease a nation’s dependence on imported petroleum.

Khosla's Four Steps to Promote Ethanol

CNNMoney.com reports that, speaking at a Cleantech Venture Forum conference in New York City, Sun Microsystems co-founder and ethanol investor Vinod Khosla outlined four steps he said would help the country use more ethanol.

• a government mandate that 70 percent of all cars sold in the U.S. be flex-fuel - which is having the ability to run on gas, ethanol or other alcohol-based fuels - by 2014, and that 10 percent of all major-branded gas stations in the U.S. sell E85, a fuel that contains 85 percent ethanol.
• the current government ethanol subsidy of 50 cents a gallon should be based on a sliding scale corresponding to the price of oil: 25 cents a gallon if oil is at $75 a barrel ranging up to 75 cents a gallon if oil falls to $25 a barrel.
• lifting tariffs on imports of ethanol from Brazil, a move strongly opposed by U.S. farmers, in exchange for increasing corn-derived ethanol in gasoline from 10 to 15 percent, a move he said was supported by some in the agriculture industry.
• it would be up to to industry or the government to pay for these mandates. He said installing the gas pumps would cost something less than a billion dollars and making cars flex-fuel amounts to $35-$100 a vehicle.

"The president loves biomass, the farmers love biomass, even evangelicals love biomass" because it decreases the county's reliance on the Middle East, he said. "As investors we should make this happen because its good for the country."

New Corn Ethanol Process Cuts Costs, Produces Byproducts and Reduces Water Consumption

According to this annoucement a Purdue University team led by professor Li-fu Chen and research assistant Qin Xu have discovered a new environmentally friendly method to produce ethanol from corn.

"Our process, which we are calling the Chen-Xu Method, not only makes ethanol, but products that are fit for human consumption," Chen said. "This process also produces corn oil, corn fiber, gluten and zein, which is a protein that can be used in the manufacture of plastics so that the containers are good for the environment because they are biodegradable and easily decompose.

The Chen-Xu Method produces about 2.85 gallons of ethanol for every bushel of corn processed. That output is slightly higher than current methods, but the same process that creates the ethanol also creates other marketable products.

Honda to Produce Bioethanol Cars

According to the Daily Yomiur Online Honda Motor Co. is to mass-produce flex-fuel  compact cars that can run on 100 bioethanol, becoming the first Japanese automaker to do so. The company will first start producing and selling the vehicles in Brazil, the top nation in the world in terms of the use of bioethanol in automobiles.

Of the 65,000 or so Civic and Fit models produced in the company's plant in Brazil, the company will switch production of about 30,000 to bioethanol cars.

This announcement is complimentary to their announcement earlier this week that they are developing a process to produce cellulosic ethanol.

Thanks for tip from Green Car Congress

Cilion Releases More Info

Cilion today announced some more details about its money raising efforts, technology and strategy, previous post, one of the industries largest capital raises, totaling over $200 million. They are promoting their plants as being greener and less expensive than standard corn-to-ethanol plants, therefore substantially reducing the consumption of traditional energy sources in ethanol production.

The strategy and technology revelations were: The company's strategy is focused on building plants which are closer to consumers and building the plants near cattle feedlots eliminating the need for fossil energy use for drying distillers grain which will make them not only a low cost producer but also a very environmentally friendly ethanol producer. They plan to operate modular, standardized 55 million gallons per year ethanol plants using India-based Praj technology.

In addition to Western Milling and Khosla Ventures, some notable investors were announced including the Virgin Group through the newly formed Virgin Fuels, the Yucaipa Companies and Advanced Equities, Inc. Sir Richard Branson recently launched Virgin Fuels, as part the Virgin Group and brand, and plans to invest up to $400 million in renewable energy initiatives over the next three years. Yucaipa is a premier private equity investment firm that has established a record of fostering economic value through the growth and responsible development of companies. Advanced Equities specializes as a venture capital investment bank, headquartered in Chicago, with institutional and retail sales nationwide.

Cilion still has no information at its website.

Higher Yielding Energy Crops

More miles to the bushel, by Andrew Pollack, published September 8, 2006 in the NY Times, discusses the efforts being made to improve the yield of crops being used to produce ethanol. Seed and biotechnology companies see a big new opportunity in developing corn and other crops tailored for use in ethanol and other biofuels. Selected excerpts:

Syngenta, for instance, hopes in 2008 to begin selling a genetically engineered corn designed to help convert itself into ethanol. Each kernel of this self-processing corn contains an enzyme that must otherwise be added separately at the ethanol factory.

Syngenta is seeking approval of the corn for human and animal food use, not only in the United States but in Europe, South Africa and elsewhere. Syngenta says the amylase enzyme is safe, noting that these enzymes are found in saliva.

DuPont and Bunge announced that their existing joint venture to improve soybeans for food would also start designing beans for biodiesel fuel and other industrial uses.

Ceres, a privately owned supplier of genetics technology to Monsanto, sees a future in switch grass. The company’s greenhouses are filled with versions of tall, gangly grass plants, some developed by conventional breeding and some by genetic engineering.

Mendel Biotechnology, based in Hayward, Calif., said miscanthus could produce well over 20 tons an acre each year. “No planting, no fertilizing, no irrigation,” said its chief executive, Chris Somerville, who is also the director of plant biology at the Carnegie Institution and a Stanford University professor. “You can just cut it every year for 10 years.”

Such prospects are starting to alarm some environmentalists, who worry that altered plants will cross-pollinate in the wild, resulting in forests that practically droop for want of lignin. And some oppose the notion of altering corn to feed the nation’s addiction to automobiles.

Ultrasonic Pretreatment of Corn for Ethanol

Diversified Ethanol a division of James Monroe Capital Corporation (Pink Sheets: JMCP - News) announced that it has successfully used cheap, ultrasonic energy to break down corn--cold, which can result in ethanol plants using 20% less corn to get the same amount of sugars.

In The "Cold Microwave" process, the state-of-the-art ethanol plant pre-cooks the corn mash using the low-energy ultrasonic "cold microwave," and then when it is cooked it can have more valuable sugars released for making fuel.

When a mixture of corn and water is placed in front of a piezoelectric driver, the corn "cooks" in seconds, but is still cold afterwards. This pre-cooking is very cheap compared to the energy required to heat the corn, and breaks-up the corn on a molecular level. Ultrasonic energy can vaporize water, or hard-boil an egg, and now it can make money by making fuel more efficiently.

Cilion Raises Another $160 Million

According to this press release the new company, Cilion, earlier post, formed by Western Milling, a California grain company, and and Khosla Ventures, a venture capital firm to operate modular, standardized 55 million gallons per year ethanol plants has now raised a total of $200 million in three months including $160 million in the latest round of financing, one of the biggest venture capital investments ever in the "clean tech'' field.

The company plans to have 8 plant units in production by 2008 for a total of 440 million gallons per year capacity. By using a variety of innovations they claim that these plants will be cheaper and greener than standard corn-to-ethanol plants, substantially reducing the need for fossil fuels in ethanol production.

They claim the plants will have an energy balance advantage that is 2X that of gasoline with a greater than 90% reduction in petroleum use. They also claim that Cilion will be able to produce environmentally friendlier ethanol in California at a lower cost than ethanol produced in the traditional Midwest corn ethanol plants and delivered to California; and that the ethanol produced is expected to be price competitive per mile driven with gasoline even if oil prices drop to $40 per barrel.

Thanks to Clean Break for the tip.

American Energy Security Study

The American Energy Security Study (AESS) is the official name of the report referred to in the previous post. In a brief review of the executive summary I picked up the following items that give a little more background about the report.

The American Energy Security (AES) Study shows that the United States can eliminate dependence on oil imports entirely by 2030. It establishes a bold plan to replace approximately five percent of imported oil each year for 20 years, beginning in 2010 (see Figure 1 below). Assuming aggressive implementation beginning in 2007, under the SSEB American Energy Security initiatives domestic liquid fuels production and transportation efficiency savings begin gradually after 2010 and ramp up to produce most of the nation’s liquid fuels requirements by 2030.

To establish U.S. energy security and independence by 2030 all feasible supply and demand options must be aggressively pursued. There is no single answer:

• Transportation energy efficiency improvements are important but, by themselves, can contribute only a small portion of the required solution.
• Renewable biomass fuels are a critical part of the portfolio of required initiatives, but can produce less than one-fourth of the required liquid fuels.
• CTL, oil shale, and EOR will all contribute substantially, and all three technologies must be aggressively deployed.

The U.S. is endowed with the largest alternative oil resources in the world. This includes five hundred billion tons of coal (oil equivalent of approximately 750,000 billion barrels), the potential to sustain 1.3 billion tons of biomass collection/harvesting for liquid fuel production by 2030 (oil equivalent of approximately 4.5 million barrels per day to perpetuity), more than a trillion barrels of oil shale liquid fuels, and 80+ billion barrels of oil stranded in conventional reservoirs that are technically recoverable using CO2 injection and sequestration to enhance oil recovery. These resources rival estimated worldwide conventional oil resources of 1-2 trillion barrels.

Proposed Plan to End Oil Imports

American imports of oil could be eliminated by 2030, a new study claims, if the U.S. adopts an aggressive 20 year program of energy efficiency and commercialization of four already-demonstrated technologies for making transportation fuels.The New York Times reported on Saturday that the study sponsored by a nonprofit group of legislators and governors called the Southern States Energy Board, to be released on Monday, urges a crash program to meet fuel needs without imports. The study, authored by Roger Bezdek, claims that more than a million new jobs would be created and the deficit reduced by $600 billion.

The four technologies are:

1. Coal liquefication which would replace 29% of oil.
2. Use biomass to make syngas which would be converted to liquid fuels by a gasification-Fischer-Tropsch (FT) Process.
3. Enhanced oil recovery (EOR) using CO2 produced by the other processes which would also eliminate CO2 emmisions that cause global warming.
4. Production of oil from shale.

The study indicates that oil prices of $35 to $55 a barrel are necessary for these process to be competitive.

The study does not endorse corn ethanol, but it does anticipate the production of cellulosic ethanol, in a process which it points out is not yet commercial.

Fuel Economy and Biofuels: The Answer to our Liquid Fuels Crises

The Union of Concerned Scientists have two articles in its Clean Vehicles series: Fuel Economy: The Single Most Effective Step for Cutting Oil Dependence , and Ethanol: Frequently Asked Questions which are well worth reading and generally support my views as to what we need to do to reduce our dependence on oil imports. They have put some numbers on the scenario that they develop.

Their conclusion is: "The importance of fuel economy is thereby twofold. First, it delivers bigger savings in the near to medium term. Second, it makes it conceivable that biofuels could almost completely replace gasoline for our cars and trucks in the long term because we would need much less fuel."

The top edge of the blue area on this graph indicates the total gasoline demand for our cars and light trucks under a business-as-usual scenario. 

If our average fuel economy is increased  to 40 mpg in 10 years, we have some modest fuel economy improvements beyond that date, and also add in some policies to help reduce miles traveled, all of the oil in the blue area can be saved. The green area represents the potential savings from ethanol, if everything goes well in growing that industry. In the near term our saving from biofuels is modest, but by the end of the period biofuels nearly replace all gasoline usage. Projected demand would drop to the line between the blue and the green.

RE: The False Hope of Biofuels

The Sunday, July 2, edition of the Washington Post had a column titled "The False Hope of Biofuels" which had the basic premise that biofuels could only supply half of our transportation fuel needs by 2025 and that food supplies would be compromised if it did so.  I don't think that any responsible person has argued that we could supply more than 30% of our current transportation fuel requirements, rather a diversity of fuels and conservation methods, featuring plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, will be required to provide relief from our increasingly expensive oil supplies.

In the most authoritative report on this subject "Biomass as Feedstock for a Bioenergy and Bioproducts Industry: The Technical Feasibility of a Billion-Ton Annual Supply", an ORNL study determined that enough fuel could be produced from biomass to meet more than one-third of our current demand for transportation fuels in the U.S. by 2030. As far as the arguments about land usage, the land necessary for producing the biofuels includes currently unused marginal land on which switchgrass or similar crops could be grown, land that is currently idle, and cellulose products produced from forestry wastes and the like, that do not require any additional land usage, as well as a fraction of the land currently devoted to the production of food, which is currently used to produce food for export or to produce food that is bought by the government to subsidise farmers. This study did not include the very significant amount of fuel that could be made from municiple solid waste, or methane from landfills and animal wastes (manure).

The answer to our increasingly expensive fuels is a diversified utilization of several technologies, not just biofuels.  The combination of biofuels; vehicles that use less fuels, such as energy efficient hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs): those made by Toyota, the Honda Insight and Civic and the Ford Escape Escalade; more importantly plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs); all electric vehicles (EVs); fuels made by coal liquefaction; vehicles running on CNG; our remaining domestic supplies of oil; and gains in efficiency made possible by more widespread use of mass transportation are more than sufficient to supply our transportation needs for the foreseeable future, even after allowing for population growth and land needed for growing food crops.

Khosla Ventures, Western Milling Form Cilion, an Ethanol Producer

Western Milling, California's largest grain milling company, and Khosla Ventures, a venture assistance and venture capital firm have formed Cilion.  Cilion will operate modular, standardized 55 million gallons per year ethanol plants.

Using a variety of innovations these plants will be cheaper and greener than standard corn-to-ethanol plants, substantially reducing the need for fossil fuels in ethanol production. 

Cilion plans to have 8 plant units in production by 2008 for a total of 440 million gallons per year capacity.  The first three plants are expected to be in California.  The ethanol production, grain handling, logistics and feed expertise of Western Milling combined with the company building and financial expertise of Khosla Ventures will provide Cilion with a unique advantage.

According to Western Milling President Kevin Kruse, " Cilion will be able to produce environmentally friendlier ethanol in California at a lower cost than ethanol produced in the traditional Midwest corn ethanol plants and delivered to California. When fully operational, ethanol produced by Cilion is expected to be price competitive per mile driven with gasoline even if oil prices drop to $40 per barrel, assuming normal gasoline distribution margins."

All About Ethanol Production

Seeking Alpha gives a detailed description of the ethanol production process being used by Hawkeye Holdings’ (HKI) as extracted from their S-1 filing of May 30. Even more information on the financials of ethanol production can be found in the S-1 filing. Very interesting for those interested in more process details.  Written for the layman. Click to enlarge schematic.

Everything You Wanted To Know About Ethanol Production But Were Afraid To Ask,  Seeking Alpha, May 31, 2006
Hawkeye Holdings form S-1, May 30, 2006

Biomass R & D Initiative

I came across a website Biomass Research & Development Initiative that covers the multi-agency effort, especially DOE and USDA, to coordinate and accelerate all Federal biobased products and bioenergy research and development.

Their feature article for April, is based on the article "The Path Forward for Biofuels and Biomaterials", which appeared in Science  "outlines how advances in genetics, biotechnology, process chemistry and engineering are leading to a new manufacturing concept for converting renewable biomass to transportation fuels and other useful products. In the article researchers at Georgia Tech, Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Imperial College, London outline how the integration of agroenergy crops and new biorefinery technologies will converge in new manufacturing units called biorefineries. " It is an interesting read for anyone with an interest in how biofuels could be developed and the need to accelerate the program.

More blogs about biofuels, alternative energy, renewable, renewable energy, energy, technology

Biofuels in Central America

A Reuters article Central America Eyes Sweet Alternative to Oil described the efforts that Central America is starting to make to produce ethanol and biodiesel.  I have often thought that Central America and the Caribbean countries would benefit both themselves and the rest of the world by producing biofuels.  Their climate is ideal for growing sugar and palm oil which are ideal feedstocks for these fuels. Thier economies could get a big boost from biofuels and make them less dependent on imported oil.

Another article discused the growing production of biodiesel in Indonesia.

They are only taking baby steps at the present, but the future is there for the taking.  If only the US would drop its tariff on biofuels.  I don't believe it would hurt US farmers.  I believe our demand for these products will be nearly insatiable and any supply we can get should be encouraged.

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