News: Progress toward running cars on plants
Before leaving office, Gov. Pataki (NY) helps make it a good week for cellulosic ethanol.
Mascoma Corporation of Cambridge, MA received a $14.8M award from NYSERDA to build a 500,000-gallon-per-year cellulosic ethanol pilot plant in Rochester, NY. The company is teaming up with Genencor and will be getting support from International Paper Co., Cornell University, Clarkson University, and the NRDC. The plant will be able to test processing of multiple feed stocks such as wood, switch grass, paper sludge, and corn stover.
In addition, the state provided SUNY ESF and Catalyst Renewables Corporation of Dallas, TX with a $10M grant to build a 130,000-gallon-per-year cellulosic ethanol facility in Lyonsdale, NY near Syracuse. The feedstock for this facility will be wood.
The efforts of these companies, universities, and of NY state is bringing US commercial cellulosic ethanol closer to reality. Currently, the only other plant of this kind is Iogen's Canadian facility in Ottawa, Ontario. They use agricultural feedstocks such as wheat, oat, and barley and can make up to 3 million liters or almost 800,000 gallons of ethanol per year.
Labels: biofuels, cellulosic ethanol, NY
posted by ATE @ 10:17 PM
4 Comments
4 Comments:
This weekend I attended the IX Latin American Business Conference, organized by HBS. One of the panels was the Biofuels: Growing the future of fuels in Latino America with several speakers from Brazil, Colombia, Argentina and Spain. Why I found fascinating is the extent of progress that this countries have in Biodiesel and EtOH production (from sugar cane), especially in Brazil.
According to Luiz Lourenco, from COCAMAR (Brazil), the net energy balance for EtOH produced from sugar cane is positive, while the NEB for EtOH produced from corn is not. In view of the enormous support that Corn-EtOH is receiving right now, what is your take on the USA going in the wrong track for energy self-sufficient. If the NEB for the EtOH that will be produced in the USA is negative, and the only reason is to maintain the subsidies to big corn producer conglomerates by the tax payer, then it’s the wrong approach
This weekend I attended the IX Latin American Business Conference, organized by HBS. One of the panels was the Biofuels: Growing the future of fuels in Latino America with several speakers from Brazil, Colombia, Argentina and Spain. Why I found fascinating is the extent of progress that this countries have in Biodiesel and EtOH production (from sugar cane), especially in Brazil.
According to Luiz Lourenco, from COCAMAR (Brazil), the net energy balance for EtOH produced from sugar cane is positive, while the NEB for EtOH produced from corn is not. In view of the enormous support that Corn-EtOH is receiving right now, what is your take on the USA going in the wrong track for energy self-sufficient. If the NEB for the EtOH that will be produced in the USA is negative, and the only reason is to maintain the subsidies to big corn producer conglomerates by the tax payer, then it’s the wrong approach
Vito
Vito,
"True" NEB values for all kinds of fuels are often debated because it is dependent on the assumptions that go into the calculation. I've seen NEB values for corn ethanol close to one or even less than one, and when it's compared to other fuels (sugar ethanol, cellulosic ethanol, biodiesel), corn ethanol NEB values are usually lower. This has been my general understanding, but I haven't reviewed the NEB studies and could be wrong.
Ana
Give me $10 million and I'll build enough BioDiesel plants TODAY to recyle 300,000 gallons of waste oil from restaurants every year, then sell it for 100% profit and STILL be $2.50 less per gallon than regular diesel!
This 'paper' trail may offer long-term benefits (i.e. 20 or 30 years from now), but BioDiesel works fantastic RIGHT NOW.
See extremebiodiesel.com
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home