News

In Canada, discarded food from the kitchen table is to be the latest waste product used to generate biofuel. A $57 million (€41 million) refinery is going to be built in Quebec City and construction will begin this summer. The federal government is awarding $17.7 million to the construction of this plant, while the province is adding a further $16.5 million. The majority of the cost will be…
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In 2008, Georgia Power announced that one of its plants would convert from burning coal to burning woody biomass in an attempt to generate green electricity. The conversion of Plant Mitchell would make it the largest biomass plant in the country and was given the go-ahead last March by the Georgia Public Service Commission. Plant Mitchell was due to be operational in June 2012, after…
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Leading the way in the development and commercialisation of cellulosic ethanol, Verenium Corporation and energy giant BP have extended their original 18-month partnership. Scheduled to terminate on 1 February, the collaboration will now expire one month later, on 1 March 2010. In a joint venture with BP that is expected to be extended yet again during these approaching weeks, Verenium is…
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With a string of investments under its belt since 2005, including SiC Processing, Ostara, Hydrodec and Solar Century, growth capital investor Frog Capital’s most recent investee comes in the form of the German company, agri.capital. Now one of Europe’s largest biogas producers, Munster-based agri.capital employs 130 people over 46 electricity production sites. The firm has a fitted…
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The Netherlands-based energy major Shell and Brazilian ethanol manufacturer and trader Cosan have formed a joint venture (JV) to produce 2 billion litres a year of ethanol. The $12 billion (€8.6 billion) JV will also generate power, and the supply, distribution and retail of transportation fuels. ‘We see joining with Cosan as a way to grow the role of low-carbon, sustainable biofuels in the…
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In Florida, the fate of Algenol’s future biofuel production facility is in the hands of Lee County officials. Close to receiving the three votes needed for the construction of a $10 million (€7.2 million) research lab, new corporate headquarters and a production utility in Lee County, not everyone appears to be on board. With the money being taken from the county’s $25 million economic…
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Two internationally renowned companies, Mitsubishi Corporation and Weyerhaeuser Company, have signed a Strategic Memorandum of Understanding and will now discuss the possibilities of joining forces and heading into the biomass-to-energy industry. Mitsubishi, Japan’s largest general trading company has over 200 bases in approximately 80 countries and could join forces with Weyerhaeuser, one of…
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New Delhi, India-based Mavens Biotech is planning to set up three biomass power plants with a total capacity of 30 MW. The Rs 700,000,000 (€10.8 million) investment on the proposed power project is likely to be met with internal accruals and debt, M D Kanther, chairman of the company, says. The company reported net sales of Rs 37.14 crore in the nine month ending 31 December 2009 compared to…
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UK utility provider British Gas will build five biomethane demonstration projects to inject purified biogas into the UK’s national gas grid for use by consumers. The projects are due to come online in mid-2010, with the first biomethane project seeing the construction of a plant to purify raw biogas from Thames Water’s Didcot sewage works. Thames Water and Scotia Gas Networks already…
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The UK is proving a popular site for biogas projects – Germany-based MT-Energie has now begun construction on two 1MW biogas plants in southern England. The plants, one north of Oxford and the other near Bognor Regis, are nearing completion and both should be operational by Q2. Support such as Feed-in Tariffs, two ROCs offered for anaerobic digestion and the possibilities offered by the…
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The UK is getting greener with its launch of renewable energy tariffs starting from April. The Department of Energy & Climate Change (DECC)’s system will offer a comprehensive system of tariffs for biogas injected into natural gas pipelines, and renewable heat. Renewable heat technologies meet just 0.6% of UK heat demand, but by 2020 the government aims to meet 12% or more of the UK’s…
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The Port of Rotterdam figures for 2009 show there was a substantial decline in the handling of soyabean oil, sunflower oil and rapeseed oil. Biofuels (biodiesel, ethanol and ETBE) were also down. The moderate sugar harvest put pressure on Brazilian exports of ethanol. This was compensated for partly by imports of ethanol from Spain and France via Rotterdam. Imports of biodiesel fell due to…
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The construction of three new plants could soon be underway in Hungary. With a draft government decree issued last month making one of the refineries a priority project, the process of obtaining the necessary documentation will be decreased. The new plants are to be built in the Hungarian towns of Dunaföldvár, Kaba and Dunaalmas. Already a priority project, the facility in Dunaföldvár will…
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