Bioenergy News Links and Briefs

Cool Planet Energy Systems thinks they can make advanced biofuels for $1.50 a gallon.

The company has a test facility in Camarillo, CA that creates fuel by pressing feedstock between plates under high pressure, and then placing the plates in a device called a fractionator. This process results in a release of a gas which is then captured and then converted, using catalysts, to a liquid. _PO

A Korean team of researchers has managed to increase production yield of butanol from glucose through improved genetic engineering of the microbe Clostridium Acytobutylicum

Using a systems metabolic engineering approach, researchers in Korea have improved the butanol production performance of Clostridium acetobutylicum, one of the best known butanol-producing bacteria. A paper on their work is published in mBio, an open access journal issued by the American Society for Microbiology (ASM).

A promising new way of breaking down cellulose into cheap sugars earns a patent.

Poet's approach to converting cellulose into sugars is a bit more energy intensive:

The Andritz technology is a two-stage process that includes a vertical reactor, an interstage washer and then the continuous steam explosion technology (Advanced SteamEx, a trademarked process) to draw out available sugars from the cellulose material. It’s those sugars—through Project Liberty’s proprietary enzyme and yeast technologies—that get converted into ethanol. _BiomassMag

Calysta's "Bio-GTL" uses bioengineered organisms to produce chemicals and fuels from methane.

The US Navy continues to develop its ability to produce its own liquid fuels from biomass

The need to develop reliable biomass supply chains

Biomass is a less dense, less concentrated a form of potential energy, as compared to fossil fuels or nuclear energy. But biomass can be grown almost anywhere on Earth, land or sea, year after year after year.

As better biomass crops are developed, better ways of densifying biomass are created, and better ways of converting biomass into energy are perfected, bioenergy becomes more viable in competition with other energy sources -- particularly in geographically isolated areas.

But realistically, for the near to intermediate future, relatively inexpensive energy from conventional and unconventional fossil fuels will remain inexpensive enough to keep most forms of biofuels from the competitive marketplace.

Nevertheless, as breakthroughs continue to be made in terms of better yields and greater efficiencies of supply and production, bioenergy will grow more competitive.

More Information on Recent Bioenergy Advances

Schematic of Renmatrix Plantrose Process

Renmatix (formerly Sriya Innovations), which exited stealth mode earlier this year, unveiled its Plantrose process, a supercritical hydrolysis process to produce sugars from biomass with less expense. At Renmatix’s demonstration facility in Kennesaw, Georgia, the company has already scaled its process to convert three dry tons of woody biomass to sugars daily.

Access to non-food derived low-cost industrial sugars, the foundation of the emerging bio-industrial economy, can enable a significant shift from petroleum-based fuels and chemicals to cost-effective bio-based alternatives. There are 3 general approaches to breaking down biomass for clean technology applications in the market place today: enzymatic hydrolysis, acid hydrolysis, and gasification. Renmatix’ is a new, fourth approach. _GCC

Brian Westenhaus takes a closer look at the new D2 bio-substitute from Berkeley's Joint Bioenergy Institute. The group is taking a microbial synthesis approach, which is aiming for high energy efficiencies of production. Expect this development to require a few more years to mature and scale to industrial proportions. This effort is likely to eventually utilise the low cost cellulosic sugars of the type being developed by Renmatrix, above.

Meanwhile, bio-butanol producer Gevo is working on producing a high quality bio-jet fuel for the US Air Force.

Gevo uses synthetic biology and metabolic engineering to develop biocatalysts (fermentation organisms) to make only isobutanol via fermentation at high concentrations—i.e., without the typical expression of co-products. The initial generation biocatalyst operates on fermentable sugars from grain crops, sugar cane and sugar beets. Gevo has already produced renewable gasoline and jet fuel that meet or exceed all ASTM specifications. The company is now developing a new generation of biocatalysts that can use the mixed sugars from biomass to produce cellulosic isobutanol. _GCC

Gevo plans to produce a wide variety of fuels and chemicals, using its basic isobutanol product as a starting point.

East SF Bay company Amyris is teaming with tyre maker Michelin to develop a process to produce bio-isoprene in quantity. Amyris is affiliated with Berkeley's JBEI (mentioned at top) and is at the forefront of the production of high value chemicals to substitute for petroleum feedstocks in many areas.

An interesting article from Biofuels Digest that attempts to explain the evolution and increasing sophistication of approaches to biofuels.

Energy from biomass has the potential to displace most of the current uses for petroleum, over time. This is a counter-intuitive assertion, but it is well supported by the trends in technology and by the potential resource base of biomass growth -- including the growth of micro-algae, macro-algae, halophytes, conventional biomass crops, biomass waste, forms of biomass currently being developed, and other forms of biomass.

The mindset of energy and resource scarcity is a self-limiting mindset which is not supported by developments in the real world.

Biofuel Briefs

Renmatrix announced an improved process for deriving cheap industrial sugars from cellulosic biomass. Cheap cellulosic sugars will be key to converting to biomass as feedstock for fuels, plastics, chemicals, etc. rather than using petroleum.
h/t Brian Wang

The US DOE Joint Bioenergy Institute at Berkeley has announced a new biofuel substitute for number 2 diesel. The D2 substitute is called bisabolene, and is produced from both E. Coli bacteria and S. cerevisiae yeast.
h/t Brian Wang

UK scientists are working to improve photosynthesis efficiency for better food, biomass, and fuels production.

Houston based Terrabon Inc. is voted "most transformative technology" by readers of Biofuels Technology, an online site. Terrabon's technology is expected to transform both the biofuels and the water treatment industries.

British Columbia is becoming a world-class provider of biomass energy

More on Renmatrix' recently unveiled industrial-scale cellulosic sugar process:

Renmatix’s PlantroseTM process is the first to break down cellulose at industrial scale through supercritical hydrolysis, which utilizes water at elevated temperatures and pressures to quickly solubilize cellulose. The supercritical state of matter has long been utilized in industrial processes including coffee decaffeination and pharmaceutical applications.

Before the arrival of the Plantrose process, supercritical water had never successfully yielded sugar from biomass at significant scale. The process breaks down a wide range of non-food biomass in seconds, uses no significant consumables and produces much of its own process energy. Current methods of breaking down biomass require expensive enzymes or harsh chemicals, and can take up to three days to yield sugars. With its water-based approach, Renmatix is able to provide cellulosic sugar affordably and on large-scale.

“Sugar has game-changing potential for the bio-based fuels and chemicals market,” said John Doerr, a partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Renmatix board member. “The Renmatix breakthrough enables access to affordable non-food based sugar on an industrial scale.” _Renmatrix

Let's just hope the Obama administration stays away from advanced biofuels research. We need bio-substitutes for petroleum too badly to allow it to receive the famous kiss of death from the current US regime.

Bioenergy News

Cambridge Mass. startup Joule Biotechnologies changed its name today to Joule Unlimited. Joule received a fresh $30 million in funding, and its pilot plant in Texas is scheduled for completion this summer.

The growing 40-employee company plans to use its new funding for its pilot plant underway in Leander, Texas, which is expected to test its solar fuels. The funds, which are also expected to later fund its demonstration efforts, came from undisclosed institutional and private sources that joined Flagship Ventures, Joule’s founding venture capital investor. Sims wouldn’t disclose how much the company has raised to date.

...The funds are also anticipated to support developments in genome engineering, bioprocessing, and hardware engineering to optimize productivity and generate product samples, offering validation of the company’s process beyond the lab.

On the biology side, Joule has advanced its diesel product, produced from the same Helioculture process that makes its ethanol. Sims said the company has already shown the production possibilities of diesel and can start demonstrating at a faster pace.

“Once the piloting is done, we are going to be very focused on diesel,” he said.

A demonstration facility is expected to follow the pilot plant in the summer of 2011, with a commercial facility in 2012 centered on diesel. Sims said Joule expects to be fully commercial by 2013. At full-scale production, the company projects producing up to 15,000 gallons of diesel per acre annually, at costs as low as $30 per barrel equivalent. _CleanTechMedia

French oil giant Total is investing in Coskata -- cellulosic ethanol plasma gasification startup. Coskata also has ties to General Motors.

BP and DuPont are teaming together in the bio-butanol company Butamax. Their plans are quite ambitious in comparison to other bio-butanol startups.

We are coming online this year. The UK demonstration plant commissions in Q3, and is designed to help us prove out the integrated technology. We’ll enter the US market and be commercially viable in late 2012 and early 2013, and at commercial scale. Our focus will be ethanol plants retrofitted to biobutanol , and the sales of licenses to other plants that can retrofit to biobutanol. We are also looking at entering Brazil on a commercially viable basis in 2013. Our focus there will be exports to strategic markets, including US and Europe.

...We needed to have a technology that could be applied to an existing plant – its an add-on, There are two areas when you retrofit, one is in the fermentation, one is distillation. We have an advanced yeast technology, in that we have altered yeast to make other alcohols. The discovery that Dupont and BP have been working on is a yeast that can produce at commercial scale and cost.

... We are at a threshold where its time for us to seek out partners. demonstrate biobutanol at an energy equivalent basis – not volume – at partity with bioethanol – Discovery is still moving towards our commercialization target of having parity with ethanol on an energy equivalent basis [note: the same production cost per BTU of fuel energy] and by 2013 we will have that commercial viability. _BiofuelsDigest

A study of New York biomass resources concludes that New York state could supply 16% of its liquid fuel using biomass to liquids technologies. 16% may not sound like much to some observers, but in reality it is a huge quantity to trim from the liabilities ledger for any economic jurisdiction.

Naturally Scientific claims to have made a deal with China to build 6 $50 million facilities to produce bio-oils using CO2 and cell cultures. The cell culture approach is distinctly different from conventional biomass, seed oil, or microbial approaches to producing bio-oils. It will be fascinating to learn more details as they come out.

Bioenergy News

A Marketwatch look at algal fuels projects expanding into commercial scale

Biomass sugars to gasoline production plant in Madison, Wisconsin, from Shell and Virent

The six biofuels processes pursued by the National Advanced Biofuel Consortium

Saving the world with biomass biofuels

A route to $0.50 a gallon hydrocarbon fuels via a French invention

Scottish advances in synthetic biology could lead to new approaches to microbial bioenergy

Genetic engineering, synthetic biology, microbial tweaking, and catalytic and process breakthroughs all hold enormous process for accelerating production of significant quantities of sustainable bioenergy and biofuels.

But even without dramatic breakthroughs, the incremental improvement of biofuels processes will lead to a slow, steady replacement of fossil fuels by bioenergy. This ongoing replacement will not go unnoticed by energy traders and analysts -- particularly once the mass of biofuels advances beyond the ethanol stage.

Camelina, Salicornia, Cellulosic, Jatropha, Pyrolysis . . .

Here is more from MIT's Technology Review on the large UAE desert salt water farms growing salicornia for fuels and high value chemicals. The project also incorporates fish and shrimp aquaculture, and the cultivation of mangroves.

A European aerospace group is collaborating with Singapore's ASTAR to assess opportunities to convert algal oils into jet fuels.

A $50 million Dupont plant is already producing ethanol from cellulose. The US federal mandate is to have 16 billion gallons per year production capacity for cellulosic ethanol by 2022.

A little-known weed called camelina may become the "go-to" crop for biodiesel, for temperate climates.

Daimler AG is invested in jatropha cropping projects in India. Jatropha produces a high quality oil that can be used for either fuels or high value chemicals. Scientists worldwide are attempting to create ideal jatropha varieties, and to discover the optimal jatropha growing methods for various soils and climates.

Thermochemical processing of biomass to fuels, including gasification and pyrolysis, is a hot research topic behind the scenes.

A new approach for the electrolytic creation of hydrogen gas may bring hydrogen back into discussions for electrical storage at large wind or solar power installations.

These approaches are generally small scale, local and regional approaches. But that is where the focus needs to shift -- away from the hyper-centralised approaches that have gotten the global economy into such turmoil.

If you secure local and regional energy, power, employment, and economic activity, then swings in global finance have far less catastrophic impact on most ordinary people.

Bioenergy Brief

Biofuels Digest has an interesting look at the top 20 biofuels ventures, and who is investing in them.

Brian Westenhaus points to a US company in Brazil that intends to peg the price ceiling of oil at $60 a barrel.

Check Biotech looks at an algal research lab in Spain to learn how soon we can expect commercial production of algal biodiesel.

Beer breweries are beginning to produce 50% of their own energy needs by gasifying waste products of fermentation. via Ecofriend

Bioenergy is not a green fad. It is where a significant part of tomorrow's energy and fuel will come from.

BTL, Black Liquor Gasifiers, Diesel Fuel Cells etc.

Finland's Neste Oil continues to lead the pack for production of ingenious biofuels methods. Now it is teaming with Enso to build a BTL pilot plant for producing biocrude from forestry waste.

The demonstration facility at Stora Enso Varkaus Mill includes a 12 MW gasifier. It will be used to develop technologies and engineering solutions for a commercial-scale plant. The demonstration process units will cover all stages, including drying of biomass, gasification, gas cleaning and testing of Fischer-Tropsch catalysts.

Swedish Chemrec AB is now operating a demonstration plant to produce syngas from "black liquor", a waste product of the paper and pulp industry. Formerly considered a pollutant and a significant disposal liability, black liquor appears to be quickly becoming a valuable revenue stream for these companies.

The development plant, DP-1, has a capacity of 20 metric tons of solids per day, is oxygen-blown and has an operating pressure of 30 bar(g). It gasifies black liquor, a by-product in the kraft process, using the Chemrec entrained-flow, high temperature technology. This technology is differentiated in that from a renewable feedstock in a single step it achieves full char conversion and produces a gas which is very low in methane and tars&mash;important characteristics of synthesis gas for production of synthetic motor fuels or chemicals.

The US DOE Pacific Northwest National Lab is developing a process to reform diesel fuel for use in portable fuel cells, using pressurised steam. Such a process could allow autos, trucks, trains, etc. to run off more efficient diesel powered fuel cells instead of diesel engines.

Biofuels Digest has an update on progress from Coskata and Zeachem.

ZeaChem confirmed that it is developing both fuels and chemicals on C2, C3, C4 and C5 platforms, including the two-carbon cellulosic ethanol and four-carbon biobutanol. Eggeman said that the company can also produce the two-carbon ethylene, an intermediate used to make plastics and other products, which is a $26 billion market, and also can make ethyl acetate from the C2 platform for a $3 billion market for that product. ZeaChem also is targeting the 3-carbon propylene, a $10 billion market.

Bioenergy News Update

Bioenergy has progressed far beyond ethanol from maize. A lot of money is being invested to develop the most economical ways of extracting useful energy from biological organisms, from micro-organisms to macro-organisms.

Procter and Gamble is teaming with microbe specialists LS9 to develop important chemicals from biomass, which P&G will use in production of proprietary products. Such high-value chemicals are likely to become profitable before LS9 microbe-produced biofuels.

LS9 has engineered a proprietary microbe to produce UltraClean™ diesel in a one-step process. They have discovered a way to exploit the pathway that microbes use to make energy-rich fatty acids for the synthesis of cell membranes and energy storage compounds, and divert them for their own purposes. Inside the fermentor, the microbes and feedstock sit in water, so the oil-like fuel compounds rise to the surface and can be easily collected, much more efficiently than the energy rich distillation process necessary to produce ethanol.

Schirmer says they are currently using sugar cane as a cost-effective option and estimates an 80 percent reduction in carbon footprint compared to petroleum-based fuels.

"It is a bridge feedstock. Once second generation feedstocks come online we will be able to convert production over to them quickly and achieve even greater reductions in greenhouse gas emissions," says Schirmer. _Bioenergy

In addition to microbial approaches, chemists are becoming much more sophisticated in the transformation of biomass to high energy fuels.

The petrochemical industry makes a wide variety of products from fossil resources such as fuels, plastics and commodity chemicals. Biomass could theoretically be used to make the same or similar products, however the high oxygen content of biomass-derived raw materials prevents their direct use as fuels or chemicals.

Robert Bergman, Jonathan Ellman and colleagues at the University of California, Berkeley, have developed a selective one-pot, formic acid-mediated deoxygenation technique for converting polyhdroxy compounds, such as biomass-derived carbohydrates, to alkenes in high yields.

An efficient 1,2-deoxygenation method, involving an unexpected mechanism, was found for simple diols and for biomass-derived polyols _Bioenergy

Such approaches to deoxygenation of biomass have the potential to replace geo-petroleum in the production of hycrocarbon chemicals -- and eventually in the mass production of fuels.

Both the microbial approaches and the pure chemical approaches will need to find high value chemical product niches as soon as possible, in order to help attract investors and to help finance ongoing research into scaling processes for high volume production of liquid fuels.

Meanwhile back in the tropics, jatropha curcas plantations are being planted in the Philippines, South Asia, across Africa, in the Caribbean, and in Latin America. Jatropha has the potential to be far more ecologically friendly than palm oil as a plantation crop. Jatropha grows on more marginal soils, with less water and less cultivation than palm. Jatropha can also be inter-cropped with a large variety of other plant species -- including food crops. Since jatropha oil is inedible, biodiesel produced from it should not be seen as a food vs. fuel struggle.

Never Bet Against Biology

Microbe matchmakers create "bug buddy" mixed cultures of micro-organisms that turn each others' waste products into fuel.

Synthetic biology can create new types of microbes and microbe communities for biofuel production (instead of "match-making" among existing types of microbes)

New method to screen microbes more quickly for biofuel synthesis potential

New Oregon "waste to biobutanol" initiative (Diesel Brewing)

Promise of economic expansion from intensive enzymatic "cellulosic biomass to ethanol" conversion in China

Compared to the huge expenditures in oil, gas, coal, and nuclear energy, next generation biofuels and bioenergy is still small potatoes. But every multi-billion dollar industry had to start somewhere.

This planet is special for its ability to produce massive amounts of new biomass every year. But biomass is not a zero-sum game. As long as we have enough sunlight and CO2, we can expand our biomass production as much as we want. There is no shortage of land -- microbes and algae can grow in the desert, along the seashore, on seastead floating bioreactors, and on high-rise microbe / algal "farms."

Never bet against biology. It is almost certain to have the last laugh.

Bioenergy Still a Hot Topic Despite Plentiful Oil, with Prices Seemingly Stuck on Low Setting

Oil prices remain low compared to the last few years, with oil supplies plentiful into the near term at least. And yet interest in bioenergy continues to heat up. This is a good sign, and indicates that when the next artificial oil shock hits, humans may have an alternative option to the traditional "peak oil death chant."

Brian Westenhaus looks at a promising new method of combining Fischer Tropsch and gasification, which will consume CO2 rather than produce it.

A warning to Obama from Oregon environmental expert

Will straw become the new coal, oil, and gas?

A joint Scots - Irish venture aims to produce energy from seaweed.

Algae to fuel focus of intense interest at the National Renewable Energy Lab

Michigan expects to occupy a fine place at the biofuels table

Biofuels News Roundup from New Energy Focus

Bioenergy Momentum

Although the cost of oil is currently low, it will eventually rise again. It is important to develop bioenergy sources such as ligno-cellulosic fuels and algal fuels before oil rises again into the "demand destruction" levels of summer 2008. Fortunately, research into several forms of bioenergy continues due to momentum built over the past few years.

UW Madison researchers have developed an interesting two-step process to produce furans from lignocellulose.

The key to the new process is the first step, in which a novel solvent system converts cellulose into the renewable platform chemical 5-hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF), from which a variety of valuable commodity chemicals and fuels can be made. A paper describing the process was published in the 11 Feb issue of the Journal of the American Chemical Society.

Professor Ronald Raines and graduate student Joseph Binder, a doctoral candidate in the chemistry department, developed the unique solvent system—N,N-dimethylacetamide (DMA) containing lithium chloride (LiCl)—that enables the single-step synthesis of HMF with “unprecedented yield” from untreated lignocellulosic biomass, as well as from purified cellulose, glucose, and fructose.

...In step two, Raines and Binder convert HMF into DMF. Starting by applying the solvent to corn stover, the team then removed the chloride ions from the resulting crude HMF by ion-exclusion chromatography in water. This separation step prevented the chloride from poisoning the copper hydrogenolysis catalyst. They then subjected the crude HMF from corn stover to hydrogenolysis in 1-butanol with a carbon-supported copper-ruthenium catalyst and obtained a 49% molar yield of DMF, similar to that obtained by Dumesic and his colleagues using HMF that contained trace chloride. _GCC

Until now, cellulose has been resistant to breaking down into its constituent sugars. This quick one step method for cellulose to HMF, then the quick second step from HMF to DMF -- a potentially useful biofuel -- may bring about an important shift in the treatment of cellulosic waste from forests, cities, and farms.

The process of converting the "black liquor" waste product from pulp/paper works into useful energy is being expedited by a Swedish company with a US subsidiary.

Chemrec’s black liquor gasification (BLG) technology converts the black liquor waste stream from the paper pulping process into synthesis gas. The synthesis gas can then be processed into a variety of fuels—likely dimethyl ether (DME) and methanol (MeOH), although fuels such as Fischer-Tropsch diesel (FTD), Synthetic Natural Gas (SNG), or hydrogen are also possible. _GCC

And don't forget the promise of algal biofuels. Plans to incorporate algal bioreactors into the overall energy scheme of Scottish distilleries may give algal fuels the push they need to break through into the mainstream.

The bioreactors are glass panels that contain water and algae. When carbon dioxide is percolated through the panels, the algae strips out the carbon atoms, which are made into biodiesel.

The process also produces proteins that could be used to enrich spent grain from the distillery so that it is suitable for sale to fish farmers. _Bioenergy

Notice that the distillers are trying to maximise the utility of byproducts of the main processes. Combining spent distillers grains with the protein from spent algae would make a more valuable fish and animal feed. Even more elaboration in the use of waste byproducts is coming, to increase efficiencies and profits.

A Million Ways to Get Rich Here Are Two:

Free market economies offer abundant opportunities for personal advancement and enrichment. Within the bio-energy field, two ways of making it big include producing the bio-energy yourself, or facilitating the production of bio-energy by someone else.

NextStep Biofuels Inc. plans to get wealthy via the production of cellulosic ethanol from tree-based waste products.

OMAHA, Neb. - NextStep Biofuels, Inc., an Omaha-based cellulosic ethanol development company, has signed a 20-year feedstock procurement contract with Arkansas-based wood processing giant The Price Companies.

The contract calls for The Price Companies to supply NextStep annually with up to 500,000 tons of woodchips, bark, pulpwood and other tree-based waste products for conversion into cellulosic ethanol.

“There are three key pieces to the cellulosic puzzle: technology, feedstocks and operations,” explains NextStep President Kevin Dretzka. “There are a lot of sharp companies out there with viable cellulosic technologies, but that doesn’t mean they know how to secure price-stable access to feedstocks, identify and permit sites in strategic locations or cost-effectively build and operate bio-refineries.” _Bioenergy

In the example above, The Price Companies plan to acquire more wealth by supplying NextStep with ample feedstock to meet production goals.

Two companies that plan to act as technology facilitators for bio-energy producers are Promethegen and Proteus. Promethegen specialises in advanced microbe technology for converting biomass feedstock to fuel.

Promethegen’s approach includes using genetically altered microbes that enhance the biomass fermentation-to-fuel process. The targeted biomass can be composed of a wide variety of organic matter, such as sugar cane or corn, cellulose or wood waste.

The company’s offering will include both the microbe technology and processes connected with the conversion, said Johnsen. It will be easier to sell Promethegen’s highly productive microbes and process improvements to the existing ethanol and biodiesel production plants instead of trying to build its own facilities, said Johnsen. _Bioenergy

Proteus is a biotech company specialising in producing valuable proteins and enzymes. It plans to team with Syngenta to produce special enzymes for next generation biofuels production.

Protéus is a worldwide recognized biotechnology company which focuses on the discovery, engineering and manufacturing of proteins of industrial interest, and on the development of innovative protein-based bioprocesses. The efficiency of Proteus' technology platform has been demonstrated by the successful track record of the company in the life sciences industry, including healthcare, chemistry (fine or specialty chemicals), environment and bioenergy.

Protéus reinforces the competitive edge of its clients by providing them new industrial solutions and new industrial property rights. The comprehensive offering of Protéus includes industrial manufacturing capabilities to accelerate the development, the industrialization and the time-to-market of its clients' new products.

In order to fulfill this mission, Protéus possesses unique proprietary technologies including an exclusive biodiversity (source of new genes), protein engineering tools (for the delivery of bespoke enzymes for industrial application) and a protein manufacturing platform, allowing use of proteins as new industrial biocatalysts.

_Bioenergy

So you see that some companies make the end product, and a host of other companies act as facilitators for the "producer." This type of relationship works all the way down the line in a market economy, as the facilitators are themselves "producers" who utilise facilitating companies themselves.

It is important to teach children such market relationships as they grow older -- particularly children who display an interest or aptitude in business or entrepreneurship.

In socialist societies, the best way to achieve financial security is by working one's way up the bureaucracy to a nice sinecured position. Maximum security, minimum risk. Of course, in a socialist society a lot of other things are minimised -- desirable things.

Obama brings greatly expanded socialism to the US. This will reduce the type of widespread innovation and risk taking that causes market economies to be so dynamic and unpredictable. The country will suffer and the world will suffer. But who will ever know? (what might have been)

Top Bioenergy Companies and Biofuels Stories

From Biofuels Digest, the top 10 biofuels stories of 2008.

The top 50 Bioenergy Companies ( source). 17 are involved in cellulosic ethanol, 9 are algae fuels companies, and 9 companies plan other types of advanced fuel or energy processes.

1. Coskata
2. Sapphire Energy
3. Virent Energy Systems
4. POET
5. Range Fuels
6. Solazyme
7. Amyris Biotechnologies
8. Mascoma
9. DuPont Danisco
10. UOP
11. ZeaChem
12. Aquaflow Bionomic
13. Bluefire Ethanol
14. Novozymes
15. Qteros
16. Petrobras
17. Cobalt Biofuels
18. Iogen
19. Synthetic Genomics
20. Abengoa Energy
21. KL Energy
22. INEOS
23. GreenFuel
24. Vital Renewable Energy
25. LS9
26. Raven Biofuels
27. Gevo
28. St.1 Biofuels Oy
29. Primafuel
30. Taurus Energy
31. Ceres
32. Syngenta
33. Aurora Biofuels
34. Bionavitas
35. Algenol
36. Verenium
37. Simply Green
38. Carbon Green
39. SEKAB
40. Osage Bioenergy
41. Dynamotive
42. Sustainable Power
43. ETH Bioenergia
44. Choren
45. Origin Oil
46. Propel Fuels
47. GEM Biofuels
48. Lake Erie Biofuels
49. Cavitation Technologies
50. Lotus/Jaguar - Omnivore

Even most of the conventional maize ethanol or soy biodiesel companies on the list have plans to move into cellulosic fuels, algae fuels, or other 2nd and 3rd generation bioenergy projects.

My favourite crop for all-around bioenergy is hemp. But since the dufus government refuses to let farmers grow hemp, there are several dozen other alternatives for normal soil, arid soil, salty soil, and saltwater cultivation. Other than glaciers and other ice cover, very little land area of Earth cannot support some form of biomass or bioenergy crop, given proper support. After a few more years or decades of genetic engineering, bioenergy crops will probably be able to dance and sing.

Biomass to electricity is more efficient, but there will be a continuing need for biomass to liquid and biolipids to biodiesel for along time. Of course, once algae cultivators get all their ducks in a row, and once Craig Venter and his fellow magic microbe wizards develop their full repertoire of tricks, the game will truly be on.

More Small Revolutions in Bioenergy

Synthetic bacteria that can produce ethanol.

"Our new microorganism, called TM242, can efficiently convert the longer-chain sugars from woody biomass materials into ethanol. This thermophilic bacterium operates at high temperatures of 60oC-70oC and digests a wide range of feedstocks very rapidly," said Paul Milner.

The scientists estimate that some 7 million tons of surplus straw is available in the UK every year. Turning it into ethanol could replace 10% of the gasoline fuel used in this country.

The debate about food vs. fuels has occupied a lot of small minds around the world. But there really is no debate--once you take account of the abundant resources of the sea and seawater.

What is the potential for algal biofuels?

"As a transport fuels feedstock, algae can produce up to 10,000 gallons of biodiesel feedstock per acre per year compared to soybeans at 50 gallons per acre and canola/rapeseed at 120 gallons per acre," said Will Thurmond, Chairman of Research and Development for the NAA and author of the Biodiesel 2020 study. _Source

The big drop in palm oil prices is fueling renewed biodiesel production in Southeast Asia. Unlike the great "food vs. fuels crisis" of last spring, no riots are taking place on this news--so it isn't news at all, according to the media.

Finding the most efficient and economical way of shipping fuels and feedstocks will help the fledgeling bioenergy industry find its way. In the early stages, the smallest margins can make the difference between profitability and extinction.

With bioenergy, one uses the feedstock that is at hand. In Louisiana's bayou region, sugar cane grows quite well. Cane is being used as feedstock for a new cellulosic ethanol plant in the bayou--while the technology of cellulosic breakdown is perfected.

The smart operators will make allowances for rapid shifts in feedstock prices and availability. Do not bet your farm on one crop or one bioenergy feedstock.

Bioenergy remains the best near-term renewable energy potential. Solar thermal is getting bigger, and will help--once energy storage improves, and the technology shakeout in the field takes place. The same applies to photovoltaics--although PV will take longer to hit large scale viability due to difficulties with electrical storage vs. heat storage. Enhanced geothermal will eventually be a huge resource--viable from Antarctica to the Arctic to undersea habitats to the remotest island. Others, such as OTEC, wind, tidal, wave etc. will find niche usefulness.

But ever since humans learned to control fire, bioenergy has occupied the community hearth of hearths. Fossil fuels are forms of bioenergy that take a long time to fossilize. So only nuclear energy--among the large power producers--is non-bioenergy.

More on Biofuels from Camelina and Cellulose

Camelina is a cold to moderate weather oilseed crop with higher oil yields than soy or maize, which can be intercropped with wheat--boosting subsequent yields of wheat. Camelina can grow on marginal land using little water.

In other news, a new carbon-based catalyst for cutting cellulose up into simple sugars for fermentation has been developed at the Tokyo Institute of Technology.

The researchers developed a catalyst consisting of amorphous carbon bearing SO3H, OH, and COOH groups. Although the carbon material has a small surface area, and the acid density is only 1/10th that of sulfuric acid, they found that the catalyst was as effective as sulfuric acid in hydrolyzing cellulose.

Furthermore, the apparent activation energy for the hydrolysis of cellulose into glucose using the carbon catalyst is estimated to be 110 kJ mol-1, smaller than that for sulfuric acid under optimal conditions (170 kJ mol-1). The carbon catalyst can be readily separated from the saccharide solution after reaction for reuse in the reaction without loss of activity.

The researchers attributed the catalytic performance of the catalyst to three factors: its ability to adsorb β-1,4 glucan; its large effective surface area in water; and SO3H groups tolerable to hydration in the carbon material. _GCC

Hawaii is working hard to develope a home-grown biofuel feedstock to make it independent of expensive fossil fuels--that have to be shipped in. Sorghum is being studied as a possible improvement over sugar cane for the island state.

Africa is one epicenter of land acquisition by big money interests, in the quest for big biofuel. While other tropical lands are being used by big money as plantation sites, Africa is receiving a lot of international attention at this time.

Africa offers oil farmers virtually ideal conditions for their purposes: underused land in many places, low land prices, ownership that is often unclear and, most of all, regimes capable of being influenced.

The land is unusable, says the Ethiopian energy and mining minister in Addis Ababa, the country's capital. "It's just marginal land," say officials at the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources in Dar es Salaam. "The whole thing is nothing but positive," says the district administrator of Kisarawe, who is responsible for the Sun Biofuels project. "We have convinced the people." In his rudimentary office, which lacks both a computer and a copy machine, he leafs through the planning documents. _BW

In Africa, the people have very little to say about large projects that may affect their quality of life. Dictators tend to make such decisions without consulting the people. Sadly with the rise of dictatorial socialism in South America, the same is becoming true in the tropical areas of that continent as well.

China and India are leading the way in building vast biofuels plantations in Africa, South America, and Southeast Asia. But European companies are beginning to join the bio-gold rush as well.

Unfortunately, much of this development smacks of "neo-colonialist exploitation", with the dictators themselves as the colonial raj's, and the big money interests in India, China, Europe, etc. as the moneybag financiers.

There are good ways to develop tropical oilseed industries, and there are very bad ways. Guess which ways seem to have the upper hand for now?

Energy from Chickenshit In the Netherlands

A 36.5 MW electricity plant in Zeeland will supply electricity for 90,000 homes in the Netherlands.

The biomass power plant will utilize approximately 440,000 tons of chicken manure, roughly one third of the total amount produced each year in the Netherlands. Many European countries, including the Netherlands, suffer under an excess of different types of animal manure that pollute the environment. Costly methods are used to avoid it being spread out over land, to process it or to avoid creating the excess in the first place. Using the manure as a carbon-neutral energy source has become the most efficient, environmentally-friendly, and cost-effective of all management options.

Interestingly, the biomass power plant is more than merely "carbon neutral". If the chicken manure were to be spread out over farm land, it would release not only CO2, but also methane, a very potent greenhouse gas. By using the manure for power generation, the release of methane is avoided.

The biomass power plant - unique because it exclusively burns chicken manure - has a capacity of 36.5MW, and will generate more than 270 million kWh of electricity per year. The facility is located on the Moerdijk in Zeeland, and will serve approximately 90,000 households. _Biopact

Bioenergy News

Destiny, Florida, is to be the site of a 41,000 acre farm where sweet sorghum, algae, jatropha, and other staple biofuels crops will be grown under varying conditions, to optimise the yield as far as possible. Finding the best varieties which grow under diverse conditions will be invaluable.

At Purdue University, researchers are learning to play the maize genome like a harmonica.

"Maize has the same genes arranged in the same order and on the same chromosomes as the other grasses," said McCann, an associate professor of biological science. "We'll switch genes on and off as we identify them to see what they do. Once we know the genes and their functions, then we can assess which ones might make good targets for modification for enhanced biomass and sugars for processing into biofuel."

A bioenergy company named AXI is attempting something analogous with algal strains. Using non-genetic aqua-farming methods, AXI will assist algal biofuels makers in optimising the best strains of algae for their purposes.

In New Zealand, government scientists predict that growing pine forests on less than 2.8 hectares of poor quality land will be sufficient to fuel New Zealands highway fleets of the future.

Researchers from Texas A&M are developing drought-tolerant strains of maize. Such strains should allow a broader range of growing regions for the crop.

More on the "food vs. fuel" debate.

While the modern remedy for energy shortages in population dense areas of the world is more nuclear power and judicious use of fossil fuels, in less population dense areas bioenergy will make an increasing impact on energy needs. Over the next 10 to 20 years, bioenergy will grow from its rural and regional bases to displace a larger part of the fossil fuel infrastructures. It will probably take from 2 to 3 decades for bioenergy to substantially displace fossil fuels from high density population areas.

During that entire time, nuclear energy will take on an increasingly important role, as will solar energy (both PV and solar thermal). These electricity producing technologies will work side by side to allow conversion of transportation fleets from a combustion to an electrical basis. At the same time, fuel cells driven by methane, methanol, hydrogen, and other simple fuels (including carbonised biomass) will also begin to drive large proportions of motor vehicles and homes.

Bio-Energy Bites

Grain prices are dropping, and apparently "The Great 2008 Food Crisis" has been called off, for now. This makes maize, soy, rape, and wheat bio-fuels more profitable for producers. Even so, the race to develop alternative feedstocks continues.

The common, everyday beet is beginning to compete for ethanol feedstock. Beet is a hardy plant that grows well in different climates and types of soil.

This may surprise you: the cattail is being explored as an ethanol crop. Cattail has 60% starch, as opposed to 70% for maize. And they don't need planting, watering, or fertilisation.

Ocean kelp is another unconventional feedstock that should do well for ethanol production.

...kelp can be used to make alcohol near the ocean. Kelp could be grown on floating platforms in the ocean and harvested weekly. It grows an average of 10 inches a day. _Bioenergy

In Australia, University of Queensland researchers are placing their hopes on the Pongamia Pinnata, and other energy species.

A hectare of the trees can produce 5500 litres of biodiesel a year – enough to run 100 cars for a year.

All of Queensland's fuel needs could be met by about 1.5 million hectares of the trees – an area about 10 times the size of Brisbane.

The potential for large-scale commercial production is "super high" says Professor Peter Gresshoff, an expert in plant biotechnology and biofuel at the University of Queensland. _Bioeneryg

India is certainly expecting a major payback from its biofuels research. They are probably right to have high expectations, given the large number of bio-energy plants that can thrive in the diverse climates of the sub-continent.

To make sure that long-term bioenergy projects can be placed on a sound economic and scientific footing, researchers at the US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) are exploring the most fundamental processes involved in converting biomass to energy.

"Cellulose and hemicellulose are recalcitrant," Goldberg says. "They don't want to break down. It takes a long time for wood to rot. It even takes termites a long time to break wood down, and they're pretty good at it. Ethanol producers face the same problem. Because of the way these molecules are arranged, it's difficult to get access to the reactive centers in wood and other biomass. What we have done is to study some of the most basic reactions associated with the breakdown of these materials."

With enzymes to speed the reactions, the team used calorimetry and chromatography to measure the thermodynamic property values of several reactions associated with the breakdown of cellulosic and hemicellulosic substances. Because process design and bioengineering benefit from the availability of these values, the data obtained in this investigation represent a "small but significant step toward maximizing the efficiency of biomass utilization," Tewari says. _Bioenergy

This basic but crucial information should assist researchers around the world to select the most efficient approaches to getting energy from biomass.

The race is on for the best way to produce an abundant supply of biofuels. The size of the biofuels infrastructure will necessarily grow rapidly, along with improved processes and economies of scale. Substituting a plentiful commodity for one that is more scarce, is simple economics.

Bioenergy Bites

University of Maryland Biotechnology Institute is prospecting for thermophilic bacteria inside hot springs, to find better ways to convert lignocellulosic biomass to simple sugars for fermentation to biofuels.

The US Department of Energy's Joint Genome Project is cloning several likely plant varieties in an attempt to produce hardier, faster growing biomass.

Indonesia and Malaysia are stepping up biodiesel-from-palm oil production in order to make use of growing stockpiles of palm oil, that the countries stupidly stockpiled in the recent "food crisis" hysteria.

Neste Oil of Finland is investing in New Zealand algae oil research.

Researchers at Texas A&M University, University of Arizona, USDA's Agriculture Research Service in Maricopa, Ariz., and Peoria, Ill., and Terresolve Technologies Ltd. are looking at a wild mustard plant native to the southwestern part of North America, as a biofuel feedstock.

Lesquerella provides an agricultural alternative to petroleum that can grow successfully in less productive environments and support rural economies. This project may yield new industrial products from renewable raw materials and expand on market opportunities for farmers and rural communities.

The Department of Energy is evaluating lesquerella oil products as bio-diesel additives. In addition, studies show that the high level of hydroxy fatty acids in lesquerella increases oil lubricity as compared to other vegetable oils. A private company, Technology Crops International, plans to market lesquerella oil, which could result in a huge market for growers in the Southwest.

It would have been nice if all of this research into better biofuel feedstocks had taken place after the first oil shocks in the 1970s. Of course it would have been better if the US had pursued oil shale production starting ten or twenty years ago, so as not to be held up today by Luddite Senators Salazar and Boxer, and Speaker Pelosi.

Human governments and bureaucracies are not known for their tendency to plan ahead.