News

Crop company Agrisoma Biosciences has finished the first closing of its Series A financing round, expected to total $8 million through 2014. Cycle Capital Management led the financing round, which included participation of BDC Venture Capital, one of Agrisoma's current equity investors. Certified sustainable by the Roundtable on Sustainable Biomaterials (RSB), Carinata is the world's first…
Read More »

EU authorities has given the go ahead for Airbus' new long-haul A350 plane to start flying. Deliveries of the next-generation aircraft will be sent to its first client Qatar Airways shortly. The new A350 plane has been manufactured to help the European airline catch up with Boeing's efforts to create long-haul, fuel-efficient planes. Using light composite materials, the A350-900 reduces fuel…
Read More »

Cellulosic ethanol production could help create up to 9 million cellulosic D3 renewable identification numbers (RINs) in 2014, if active plants reach full capacity, suggests Genscape. Data and market specialist Genscape has released its white paper, Outlook for 2014 cellulosic production and D3 RINs, which looks at the current state of biofuels. In the paper, the company says that if full…
Read More »

Argentina's cooperatives association (Aca-Bio) has started work on a $130 million ethanol plant outside the city of Villa María. The plant will process 380,000 tonnes per year of corn, which will produce 125,000 cubic metres per year of biofuel. Excess steam will power a turbine that will then be used to power the plant. Operations will start in February. 
Read More »

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) will give a $91 million (€72 million) loan guarantee to help Cool Planet Energy Systems build a new biofuel plant in Louisiana. The facility will be built at the Port of Alexandria, Louisiana, and will produce renewable fuels and biochar, a bioenergy by-product. Pine chips will be converted into high octane petrol and aromatic blendstocks. Cool…
Read More »

Swedish Taurus Energy has partnered with France-based CIMV, and sent a proposal to the EU Commission detailing the construction of a demonstration plant for the production of ethanol from biomass. The plan is for the demonstration plant will be built in France. Taurus Energy will be responsible for the yeast-based fermentation step in the process and the demonstration plant will be built in…
Read More »

The Lufthansa Group is operating its LH 190 flight from Frankfurt to Berlin Tegel using a 10% blend of the new biofuel component farnesane. This is the first scheduled flight in Europe to run on this sugar-based bio-kerosene fuel mix. A rig test at Lufthansa Technik's facility in Hamburg last year, as part of the EU's 'Blending Study' project preceded Lufthansa's flight. Lufthansa has also…
Read More »

Renewable energy technology provider INEOS Bio is restarting its new cellulosic ethanol plant in Florida after contamination forced it to decrease production considerably. The company has upgraded the facility's technology and is also finishing the installation of equipment to remove impurities from one of the plant's process streams. As a result, this contamination has disrupted production. The…
Read More »

DuPont Industrial Biosciences (DuPont) has selected Murex to market cellulosic ethanol produced from its 30 million gallon plant in Nevada, Iowa. Once completed, the facility will be the largest cellulosic ethanol plant in the world. The Nevada biorefinery will use all parts of the corn stover – the stalks, leaves and cobs. 'We are excited to work with an industry leader such as DuPont to…
Read More »

Germany's biofuel consumption was 2.9 million tonnes in the year to October, a drop of 8.9% compared with the first 10 months in 2012, reports the country's economics agency BAFA. Despite a 0.5% increase in total road fuel consumption, bringing the total to 43.75 million tonnes and blending rates dropping for all biofuel types, the overall consumption still fell. There was however a 9.5% increase…
Read More »

A new ethanol plant may be built in Onida, Iowa, US. Plans started earlier this year for a facility that is capable of producing 70 million gallons per year of ethanol and 200 tonnes of distiller’s grain. ‘What ethanol has done for agriculture is help balance supply and demand,’ says Walt Wendland, who, along with Chris Schwarck, has been involved in the start-up of several…
Read More »

The European renewable ethanol association, ePURE, has appointed Robert Wright as its new secretary general. Wright will start this position immediately. Wright has over 20 years' experience working in European Union public policy and public affairs and has previously worked for the EU Commission and in the energy and high technology sectors. 'I am delighted to be joining ePURE and to take up the…
Read More »

Swiss Jatropower, a developer of Jatropha curcas seeds and associated agronomic technologies, has acquired a large majority of Quinvita’s assets. Quinvita grew these activities over a period of seven years through their breeding programme and agronomic evaluations and experiments in several Asian, African and Latin American countries and scientific collaboration with numerous research…
Read More »