Other News

Biofuel Africa, a Ghanaian corporation wholly owned by the Norway-based Solar Harvest, claims to have increased the acreage of land available for food production in Northern Ghana by 880%. In 2008, 55 acres of the company’s land was planted with food crops grown by 25 local farmers. Tests showed that repeated growing of food crops had depleted this soil of much of its nutritional…
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The US state of Oregon has relaxed its E10 mandate to allow petrol stations to sell unblended fuel to the owners of non-road vehicles such as fishermen, snowmobilers and loggers. The E10 mandate was introduced in 2007, but it was relaxed shortly afterwards when the owners of specialist vehicles and power tools reported engine problems with the compulsory blend. Initially, the range of outlets…
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Dan Bulzan from the NASA Glenn Research Centre is the latest speaker to confirm his attendance at the upcoming Biofuels International Canada expo & conference, organised by leading publication Biofuels International magazine. Bulzan will be talking about 'Green Aeronautics': the work NASA is doing to make aircraft more environmentally friendly through R&D on the modifications…
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US-based second-generation biofuel company PetroAlgae is investigating the use of microcrops other than algae as feedstocks. PetroAlgae claims its technology, which uses the miniature flowering plant lemna, is ready for commercialisation. PetroAlgae currently operates two labs and one customer demonstration facility, all in the US state of Florida. The customer demonstration facility includes…
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Stockholders in Nevada's Panda Ethanol have voted to approve a voluntary dissolution and plan of liquidation. After payment of all outstanding claims to the company’s creditors, preference shareholders will receive up to $2.5 million (€1.4 million) in funds and assets, together with any unpaid dividends. Panda does not believe any funds or assets will remain for distribution to…
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In the credit squeeze and with plants idling around them, biodiesel producers are keen to ensure what they bring into the plant and what they produce out of it will survive the winter. Having a flexible source of raw materials is one way to weather the volatile ride the industry is taking. Biodiesel producer Innovation Fuels has been processing waste vegetable oil to produce biodiesel, but is…
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Texan bioethanol producer Gulf Alternative Energy (GAE) is to use its new cellulosic feedstock preprocessing technology to convert a first-generation bioethanol plant to cellulosic ethanol production. The company has signed a letter of intent with Xethanol Biofuels to purchase a plant in Blairstown, Iowa. The plant is currently producing six million gallons of ethanol a year from…
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Plankton Power and Regional Technology Development (RTDC) are to form a consortium with various research organisations and the Massachusetts National Guard to establish the Cape Cod Algae Biorefinery in the US state of Massachusetts. The new facility will focus on pilot- and commercial-scale development of algae biodiesel. Pending legal and regulatory reviews, the plant will be built on five…
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The US state of Oregon is to adopt a mandate requiring diesel sold in the state to contain at least 2% biodiesel by 1 October. Nine counties in northwest Oregon will introduce the requirement from next week. Oregon passed renewable energy legislation in 2007 stating that a B2 mandate would take effect when the state’s biodiesel production capacity reached 5 million gallons a year. This…
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Illinois-based Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) is set to become the US’ biggest producer of bioethanol despite an 83% drop in profits in the fiscal fourth quarter. The company is due to open new 275 Mgy bioethanol plants: one in the fourth (calendar) quarter of 2009 and one in Q3 2010. It anticipates that demand for ethanol will be driven by an expected increase in the permitted percentage of…
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A parliamentary motion has been tabled urging the British Government to review its proposal to remove the tax incentive on biofuels. At present, biodiesel is taxed at £0.20 (€0.23) per litre less than fossil diesel. The government proposes to remove this incentive in 2010, instead fining oil companies whose fuel contains less than 5% biodiesel, generating revenue for the exchequer on two…
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Two New Zealand-based research companies have joined forces in an effort to improve the economics of algal biofuel production. Many industries, including dairy, meat and paper, produce nutrient-rich wastewater that must be cleaned before it can legally be discharged into the watercourse. As part of this cleaning process, ‘settling ponds’ are used to remove organic sludge from the…
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Biodiesel could be economically produced from processed chicken innards, say scientists in Nevada. ‘Chicken feather meal’ is a gruesome by-product of the poultry industry, consisting of chicken feathers, blood, and innards processed at high temperatures with steam. 11 billion pounds of this is produced every year in the US alone. Because of its high protein and nitrogen content it is often…
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Colorado-based cellulosic ethanol specialist ZeaChem is on track to achieve yields of over 2,000 gallons per acre per year at a demonstration plant under construction in Boardman, Oregon, US. This yield is comparable with algae, but with fewer technical challenges to surmount. By contrast, the highest attained yields of ethanol from corn are about 450 gallons per acre per year. The…
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