News

A partnership between Clariant, Haltermann and car manufacturer Mercedes-Benz is to road test biofuels in Germany. Haltermann takes cellulosic ethanol produced from wheat straw by Clariant and mixes it with conventional fuel components to form a new fuel which, over the next 12 months, will be available to test fleet vehicles at a specially-equipped petrol station on the Mercedes-Benz site in…
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UPM's first fleet tests of renewable diesel have proved that its BioVerno works in cars just as well as any regular diesel, the company has announced. The fleet tests were conducted by the VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, starting in May last year and running until early 2014. Tests focused on investigating UPM's renewable diesel in terms of fuel functionality in engine and fuel…
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Valero Renewable Fuels has purchased a 110-million gallon, idle ethanol plant at an Indiana port on the Ohio River, the company announced on Friday. The San Antonio-based energy company bought the plant, based at the Port of Indiana-Mount Vernon from Aventine Renewable Energy. Bill Day, Valero's spokesman, believes the company will be able to begin production at the plant within the next few…
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Addax BioEnergy's plant, which processes ethanol from sugarcane and is the first of its kind in Africa, is due to start production soon. Sierra Leone's president, Ernest Bai Koroma visited the Addax BioEnergy plant on Saturday in the run up to its start date. The plant will produce about 85,000m3 of ethanol and approximately 100,000 MWh of renewable power per annum. The sugarcane estate is…
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Haryana, India, has opened and started operations at the state's first ethanol plant in the Panipat Cooperative Sugar Mills. US company, Geo Cam, has set up the plant with Panipat Cooperative Sugar Mills, which has a capacity of over 45,000 litres and 2.5 crore (€300,000) worth of modern technology. The mills will produce ethanol for approximately 300 days of the year. 'The Union government…
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Renewable energy provider, Patriot Renewable Fuels, has hired Leifmark for the first stage of a plan to co-locate an Inbicon Biomass Refinery on the site of Patriot's 110 MMgy grain to ethanol plant. Leifmark, a group of bioenergy marketing specialists, is using its Incibon patented technology to create a custom Project Definition. The plant, located in Annawan, Illinois, will process about 1320…
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The Brazilian government gets ready to test a higher percentage of ethanol in commercial petrol. Over the next two months, testers will analyse the viability of increasing the mandatory blend of the biofuel in petrol. Ethanol is currently blended into petrol at the maximum of 25%. Despite no information released on what higher blends will be measured, the cane industry has announced it plans to…
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Targray, a US biodiesel supplier, has obtained its International Sustainability and Carbon Certification (ISCC) accreditation under the SCS Global Services Responsible Biofuel Programme. In obtaining ISCC certification, Targray has provided evidence of compliance with environmental, social and traceability criteria, and qualifies biomass or biofuel companies for legal recognition under the…
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China Aviation Oil, Asia's number one jet fuel buyer, is requesting up to 1.5 million barrels of jet fuel for August to September, a tender document reveals. This is approximately 27% lower than what the company required in its previous tender and is now looking for four jet fuel cargoes of 240,000 to 300,000 barrels each for loading periods. The cargoes are to be loaded from either South Korea,…
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Switzerland-based MBP Group, a waste fats and oils collector, has earned the Roundtable on Sustainable Biomaterials sustainability certification for its commitment in waste material collection, commerce and distribution. 'Sustainability was—and still remains—a key ingredient of our business activities and its success. We are pleased to see that our company was certified according to…
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A fire has broken out at Abengoa Bioenergy's ethanol plant in Madison, Illinois, US. At approximately 9.45am on Tuesday 24th September, a fire broke out in a corn silo following an electrical shortage. Despite firefighters spending four hours containing the fire, there was no major damage. No one was injured.
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Abengoa has officially opened its second generation cellulosic ethanol plant in Hugoton in the US state of Kansas. Construction on the biorefinery finished in mid-August and it began producing cellulosic ethanol at the end of September. It has the capacity to produce up to 25 million gallons per year. The plant utilises only second generation biomass feedstocks such as non-edible agricultural…
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Scandinavian airline Norwegian has operated its initial biofuel-powered flight. On Tuesday 11 November, the aircraft flew from Bergen to Oslo with close to 50% biofuel. The airline hopes to contribute towards making aviation carbon neutral by 2050 through developing new technologies and frameworks. Bjørn Kjos, CEO, Norwegian, says: 'We have a clear goal to reduce CO2 emissions by 30% per…
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Leaders of Sustainable Biofuels (LSB), an industry coalition to promote advanced biofuels, met on 4 December at the European Parliament with Members of the European Parliament, Commission representatives, and stakeholders in Brussels. LSB, which is chaired by UPM's Marko Janhunen, is pushing for a strong EU-wide sub-target for advanced biofuels in the context of ILUC directive. Marie Donnelly,…
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