Other News

A new biodiesel processing facility, supported by fast food brand McDonald’s Australia, was officially launched in December. The facility, owned by Neutral Fuels (NF), was opened by small business minister Louise Asher in Victoria and is believed to be creating 10 new jobs. NF worked with the Department of business and Innovation to bring the project to life. As its first major customer…
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Energy giant Petrobras’ logistics division Transpetro is set to transport ethanol via barges from its new shipyard in Aracatuba, Sao Paulo. Transpetro will spend $400 million (€302.9 million) on 20 new barges to move 45,000 bl along the Tiete-Parana waterway in 2013, although that realisation is two years behind schedule. The new barges will save approximately 80,000 round-trip truck…
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The Fairmont ethanol plant has now changed ownership from Advanced Bioenergy to Flint Hills Resources as previously reported by Biofuels International. The acquisition was announced on 7 December but the finances have not yet been revealed. It is believed that Flint Hill will be looking to appoint four new members of staff at the plant based in Nebraska. The plant has a capacity of 115 million…
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Dubai-based Lootah Biofuels is set to work with AlgaOil to research using algae for oil extraction outside of man-made ponds. Lootah will work with the Singapore-based algae cultivator at looking at more natural spaces and resources to create biodiesel from algae, particularly within the untouched desert in the region. ‘The potential of biodiesel from algae is very big but, as the mindset…
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It has been reported by trading risk management group CME that corn ethanol production in the US rose 4% during the last week of November. That 4% is a five month high and is represented by 835,000 barrels per day. The group also states that inventories have increased by 8.3% over the past three weeks to 19.3 million barrels. This comes after the country suffered the lowest corn harvests since…
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Japanese energy company Idemitsu Kosan has signed a new Memorandum of Understanding to promote biofuel production in southeast Asia. The agreement was with the Cambodian government and it will aim to produce bioethanol from cassava in the country for sale throughout the region. It is believed an Idemitsu Kosan office will open in Phnom Penh with ambitions of producing 200,000 litres of bioethanol…
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A venture deal has been completed between the Mars Cleantech Fund and Woodland Biofuels as the producer closes in on being North America’s lowest-cost ethanol provider. Woodland Biofuels makes cellulosic ethanol from woodchips and other agricultural biomass into fuel at its newly opened demonstration plant in Ontario. ‘This fund seeks technologies with the potential to revolutionise…
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Following a fire that occurred almost a year ago to the day, Australia-based biodiesel producer Australian Renewable Fuels (ARF) has recommissioned its Largs North processing and storage facility.  It has cost AU$6.5 million (€5.2 million) to rebuild, but now also includes a fuel-blending facility on-site. The first truck shipped fuel out at the start of December, with ARF officials…
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A new $7 million (€5.3 million), five year biofuels collaboration has been signed this month. International chemical company Johnson Matthey will work with the US Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) at producing economical drop-in gasoline, diesel and jet fuel from non-food based biomass. ‘It’s a way of leveraging the expertise of two…
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Renewable oil and bioproducts company Solazyme has completed multiple initial fermentations at Archer Daniels Midland’s (ADM) Iowa, US-based facility. Solazyme claims to have achieved commercial-scale production metrics, linear scalability of its process from laboratory scale and demonstrated the ability to run large scales without contamination. The fermentations were conducted in veseels…
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Renewable energy watchdog for Europe EurObserv’er has calculated the final gross energy consumption for the 27 European member states. There has been an estimated rise of nearly 1% over 2011, which finished on 13.4%, compared to 2010 on 12.5%. The report believes the increase in renewable energy share across the 27 states can be explained by the combination of a slightly higher gross…
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A joint research project between Finland-based Turku University and Manchester University in the UK believe it has found a way to unlock clean fuel from some obscure feedstocks. A fatty acid compound found in ice cream, which also resides in other items like shampoo and soap, could be a long-term solution to replace fossil fuels through hydrocarbon chemical manipulation. ‘The key is to…
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A consortium is to use a multi-million euro grant to construct a large-scale biomass refinery in the Netherlands. The companies involved are BioMCN, Siemens, Linde, and Visser and Smit Hanab, which received a €199 million NER300 grant to fund the project also known as Woodspirit. NER300 is a financing instrument, jointly managed by the European Commission (EC), European Investment Bank and…
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