The Standing Committee on Rural Development, in its report on the demands for grants of the land resources department, noted that the bio-fuels programme was started in 2003 and “in-principle” approval had been given for “demonstration phase” involving plantation over 300,000 hectares of bio-diesel producing non-edible oilseeds (jatropha and pongamia) on degraded forest and waste land.

…It noted that funds have not been allocated for bio-fuels programme in the current fiscal (2012-13) as the decision on its future “has been pending for long.”

…A senior official of the department told the panel that a study by TERI had found the programme to be financially unviable.  READ MORE and MORE (Biofuels Digest Asia)

…BRISK (Biofuels Research Infrastructure for Sharing Knowledge) is rooted in the recognition that engineering new production processes for fossil fuel alternatives is among the most promising technological fixes for reducing carbon emissions. A European network of 26 leading universities, hosted by KTH, the BRISK programme is designed to cross-fertilise experimentation in thermochemical biomass conversion by funding the movement of researchers among at least 60 test facilities and pilot plants stretching from Turkey and Greece in the south to Scandinavia and the UK in the north.

Established last autumn, BRISK began accepting proposals for trans-European research projects in April.

…BRISK aims to give researchers the tools to answer fundamental questions about every step in conversion of biomass to fuels: preparing the feedstock, reaction processes such as pyrolysis or gasification, treatment of the resulting products, and catalytic processing.  READ MORE

“We think the model will help policy makers and forest managers make informed decisions to maintain forest productivity while minimizing the environmental impact of managed forest plantations,” says Dr. Shiying Tian, a Postdoctoral Researcher at NC State, and lead author of a paper on the model, just released in the Journal Of Environmental Quality. “It also will help us understand how these forest systems will respond if we see changes in temperature or precipitation related to climate change,” says Dr. Mohamed Youssef, Assistant Professor of Biological and Agricultural Engineering at NC State, and co-author.

…The new model is timely, due to a number of emerging uses for forest land. One example, the national interest in identifying new means of growing biofuels crops, like switchgrass, by planting it in the space between trees in commercial forests. DRAINMOD-FOREST will help determine whether such an “inter-crop” method is viable and sustainable. Would it hinder tree growth? What would the environmental consequences be? “We could also use the model to determine the viability and environmental impact of introducing new commercial tree species,” Tian says.  READ MORE  Abstract

The agreement provides for the construction and operation of a micro-crop scientific research program in Hainan Province, China. After the success of the research program, build-out of ten commercial-scale units of approximately 5,000 hectares will be implemented step by step at locations to be determined around the world.

…Parabel’s product platform will enhance global food and energy security, and directly address deficiencies in critical feed, food and fuel industries. The company’s protein product could qualify as the first major new plant protein source for humans since soy entered the human diet in the 1950s, while third-party tests have confirmed the value of Parabel’s animal feed applications as a local feedstock for renewable “drop-in” fuels.

“This is an exciting and unique opportunity,” said Anthony Tiarks, CEO of Parabel. “Not only does this agreement simultaneously accelerate our commercialization process and deepen our relationship with CECEP, but it also envisions the construction of commercial-scale production units outside of mainland China. We look forward to working closely with CECEP to serve critical market needs in China and beyond.”  READ MORE

…What is it with Louisiana? It seems like at-scale renewable diesel projects have never found a a better home. There’s the Dynamic Fuels project – 75 million gallons in Geismar; the 137 million gallon Diamond Green Diesel project under construction in Norco, as a JV between Valero and Darling, and now this one, clocking in at 85 million gallons.

If and when all three are completed, that’s 297 million gallons of capacity in the one state.  …All three plants find themselves in the heavy shipping corridor between Baton Rouge and New Orleans.  READ MORE and MORE (Emerald Biofuels) and MORE (Advanced Biofuels USA)

…(T)he biofuels industry contributed $277.3 billion to the global economy in 2010. This amounts to 0.4 percent of the globe’s GDP.

• …Biofuels displace petroleum and reduce the world’s dependence on foreign oil, especially for major importers such as the U.S and EU and rapidly growing emerging markets such as China, India and Brazil. The production and use of ethanol and biodiesel displaces the crude oil needed to manufacture gasoline and distillate. The production of 110.8 billion liters of ethanol and biodiesel in 2010 is the equivalent of 1.2 billion barrels of crude oil valued $135.4 billion at 2011 prices. The displacement of crude oil with biofuels is projected to increase to nearly 2.3 billion barrels by 2020 valued at $253.6 billion.
• The impact of biofuels on displacing crude oil has a positive effect on the balance of payments and international financial health of net oil importers. As shown in Table 7, among the 21 major biofuels producers discussed in this study only seven (Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Malaysia, Mexico, and Vietnam) were net crude oil exporters in 2010 and of these only two (Argentina and Malaysia) had positive current account balances.    The aggregate current account deficit of the net oil importers was $639 billion (including the U.S. which had the highest deficit of $471 billion). These countries produced the equivalent of 821 million barrels of crude oil in the form of biofuels valued at $91.3billion. In other words, but for biofuels, the current account deficits of these countries would have been 14 percent higher.

…The importance of biofuels to agriculture is particularly notable since feedstocks produced by the world’s farmers provide significant revenue and stimulate future agricultural production that will enhance food security on a global basis. The fastest growth in biofuels production is expected to take place in emerging and developing countries particularly in Asia and Africa. For these countries biofuels will supply rapidly growing domestic markets and provide an important base for expanding export earnings needed to fuel economic growth.  READ MORE

Food and beverage wastewaters have high biological oxygen demand (BOD) from dissolved sugars, fiber, and carbohydrates and cannot be discharged into a sanitary sewer without significant surcharges. ThermoEnergy can help eliminate the expense of BOD treatment and disposal by making concentrated sugars suitable for resale in a wide variety of applications, including feedstocks for bio-ethanol production. In addition to concentrating the sugars, the remaining water is purified to levels suitable for normal discharge.

“Instead of incurring profit-draining treatment and disposal costs, companies are studying converting those wastewater streams into revenue streams, and ThermoEnergy is ready to help,” said ThermoEnergy CEO Cary N. Bullock.

“One particularly exciting use for the recovered sugar is for feedstock for bioethanol production,” Bullock noted. “Bioethanol is garnering significant international attention and support. Cleaning up a water discharge stream and converting it to a usable bio-feedstock has a tremendous, positive impact on sustainability.”

ThermoEnergy’s system is compact in size, uses less energy than competing technology, produces higher-quality concentrations, and is very low maintenance.

In 2011, Congress eliminated corn subsidies for ethanol production. The Obama Administration, however, continues to support renewable fuel standards that call for the production of more than 15 billion gallons of renewable fuels in 2012. In addition, the U.S. Department of Defense has a goal of meeting 25% of its energy requirements from renewables by 2025. Waste sugar is expected by ThermoEnergy to become a high-value feedstock replacement for corn in conventional ethanol production.

ThermoEnergy Sugar Recovery Systems integrate best available technologies to achieve the lowest OPEX/CAPEX, and the highest concentration levels of recovered sugar. These include reverse osmosis, ThermoEnergy TurboCAST®, and ThermoEnergy CAST® systems. ThermoEnergy’s Controlled Atmospheric Separation Technology (CAST®) concentrates sugar-bearing wastewater to create up to a 65-brix sugar product for use in a variety of agricultural and renewable fuel market applications. At the same time, the system recovers 100% of the wastewater for reuse in plant operations. ThermoEnergy’s TurboCAST® systems combine controlled atmospheric separation with state-of-the-art blowers to provide maximum efficiency, flow rates in excess of 60,000 GPD, and integration with commercial water technologies for zero liquid discharge applications in the food and beverage industry.

ThermoEnergy offers several financing options for system deployment, including sale of capital equipment, leasing, and “design/build/own operate” with fixed monthly payments. Service and extended warranties are also available.  READ MORE

All biodiesel processes, whether traditional or nontraditional, involve a settling process as the penultimate step. During the settling process, the biodiesel and glycerin mixture is settled using a decanter or a centrifuge to separate the biodiesel from the glycerin. The separated biodiesel is then taken through the final steps, which, in some cases, involve two stages: washing/polishing and distillation. Washing/polishing is mandatory and biodiesel distillation is optional. This article discusses both the washing/polishing and distillation stages.

Washing and polishing mean the same thing. The term washing is used if water is used to do the washing step, and the term polishing/filtration is used if powder, ion exchange resins or some other media is used instead. This step is necessary to wash or polish off the excess glycerin or soap in the freshly separated biodiesel to meet the ASTM specification.

Biodiesel distillation is an optional step. As the name indicates, the distillation process distills the fuel to a colorless methyl ester. Both of these steps are individually addressed below in detail.  READ MORE and MORE (Biodiesel Magazine) and MORE (Biodiesel Magazine) and MORE (Biodiesel Magazine/Pacific Biodiesel Technologies)

Is there a new path to biofuels hiding in a handful of dirt? Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) biologist Steve Singer leads a group that wants to find out. They’re exploring whether a common soil bacterium can be engineered to produce liquid transportation fuels much more efficiently than the ways in which advanced biofuels are made today.

The scientists are working with a bacterium called Ralstonia eutropha. It naturally uses hydrogen as an energy source to convert CO₂ into various organic compounds.

The group hopes to capitalize on the bacteria’s capabilities and tweak it to produce advanced biofuels that are drop-in replacements for diesel and jet fuel. The process would be powered only by hydrogen and electricity from renewable sources such as solar or wind.

The goal is a biofuel—or electrofuel, as this new approach is called—that doesn’t require photosynthesis.

…The scientists chose to work with R. eutropha because the bacterium is well understood and it’s already used industrially to make bioplastics.

…In the first approach, Logos Technologies is developing a two-liter bioelectrochemical reactor, which is a conventional fermentation vessel fitted with electrodes. The vessel starts with a mixture of bacteria, CO₂, and water. Electricity splits the water into oxygen and hydrogen. The bacteria then use energy from the hydrogen to wrest carbon from CO₂ and convert it to hydrocarbons, which migrate to the water’s surface. The scientists hope to skim the first batch of biofuel from the bioreactor in about one year.    READ MORE includes animation

It is widely accepted that one of the causes of detrimental climate change is the emission of greenhouse gasses such as carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide and methane in to the atmosphere from the burning of fossil fuels.

Consequently, in recent years, scientific studies into the development of low-carbon technologies to meet our energy needs have become increasingly popular. Chris R. Somerville, F1000 Faculty Member and Philomathia Professor of Alternative Energy at the University of California, Berkeley, and Heather Youngs, a senior analysis fellow in the Energy Biosciences Institute at UC Berkeley and Adjunct Professor of Biochemistry at Michigan Technological University, describe recent research into ways that the body of plants, rather than the seeds, can be improved for use in making next-generation biofuels, in an article published today in F1000 Biology Reports: Development of feedstocks for cellulosic biofuels.

In their article, Somerville and Youngs argue that advances in the technology used to produce and extract plant biomass to be burned directly or converted to liquid fuels may allow the expansion of productivity to a scale large enough to meet the demand for an estimated 30% of all liquid transportation fuels.

The article also addresses some of the concerns associated with the development of biofuels, in particular, that land used to grow plants for biofuels, means less land for other purposes. However, Somerville and Youngs point out that recent scientific advances raise the possibility that non-edible plants can be engineered or bred to grow on the approximately 600 million hectares of land worldwide on which agricultural production has been abandoned, and used to produce biofuels, without significant effects on food production or the ecosystem.

“Many of the concerns about the use of food crops for biofuels do not apply to the use of the inedible parts of plants that are the focus of our review”, said Chris R. Somerville said. He continued: “New dedicated energy crops are a particularly promising area of research.”

The expansion of biofuel production is a topic with complex economic, ecological, environmental and political concerns. Many advances in our understanding of how to produce biofuels sustainably are arising from interdisciplinary research. Many more will be needed to reach the scale required to reduce the environmental impacts of transportation in an acceptable manner.  READ MORE and MORE (USA Today) Abstract   PDF Report