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California firm unveils new ‘ecosystem’ that produces bioethanol

California-based sustainable energy production company Greenbelt Resources Corp. has unveiled a new waste-to-energy interconnected system designed to produce half a million gallons of bioethanol from a variety of feedstocks.

The system is called Paso Robles ECOsystem (PRECO). PRECO utilises such feedstocks as waste trub from the nearby Firestone Brewery and winery wastes from the over 310 wineries in the local area.

"PRECO is the solution to a challenge inherent in current local-scale technologies—their size. Unlike many traditional industrial-scale production technologies currently in operation, PRECO is designed and optimized for small to medium sized operations such as agricultural and beverage processors," says Darren Eng, Greenbelt Resources CEO.

He added: "Our ecosystem concept enables the cost-effective transformation of wastes into value-added bioproducts including potable water."

According to Greenbelt, PRECO will be the first independently owned, local-scale bioethanol solution in California and is tailored to utilise the local Paso Robles supply of agricultural and beverage residues.

The ecosystem can also be custom-designed to transform the feedstocks of any local area into bioethanol and bioproducts. The resulting bioethanol will be sold into California's transportation market under the state's Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS), leading to higher revenues.

The legislation was designed to lower toxic tailpipe emissions and carbon dioxide, a climate change gas. According to Greenbelt, California represents potential project revenue of nearly $1 billion.

According to the company, its technology has had several endorsements from state and local officials and business owners.

Green letter

William J.Orts, research leader of bioproducts for the USDA, wrote in  letter to California Energy Commission chair  Robert B Weisenmiller:  "As research leader of the Bioproducts and Biofuels Research at the USDA's Western Regional Research Center (WRRC), I share (the) vision to create a transformative commercial biorefinery based upon strategies that will work in California...

“Addressing how we deal with the many carbon-based by-products is an important issue in agriculture and ag-related businesses... (it is) a business model to deploy hundreds to thousands of systems across the country and around the world. Successful deployment... will solve local waste issues while creating local sources of ultra-low-carbon renewable fuel.

“I confirm to you that our team at the USDA has confidence in their process and aim to help them toward success by making our equipment and expertise available to them, because their success will prove beneficial to California's (rural) economy."

 





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