Articles in R & D Focus
(Reuters) A European Union target to promote the use of biofuels will accelerate global species loss because it encourages the conversion of pasture, savanna and forests into new cropland, EU scientists have warned.
…The scale of …
by Melody Bomgardne (Central Science/Cleantech Chemistry) DuPont has been digesting its acquisition of Danisco for a while now, and has sent out an update about what used to be called DuPont Danisco Cellulosic Ethanol – …
by Kris Bevill (Ethanol Producer Magazine) AE Biofuels Inc. has a new name and, with it, a plan to expand the product line at existing ethanol plants. The company announced Nov. 15 that its shareholders …
by David Biello (Scientific American) Microbes will be the (human) food- and fuel-makers of the future, if J. Craig Venter has his way. The man responsible for one of the original sequences of the human genome …
by Kris Bevill (Ethanol Producer Magazine) A recent USDA report echoes what ethanol producers have said for years: distillers grains are a valuable addition to the nation’s feed supply and can be used to reduce …
(Reuters) India-based biofuel producer Nandan Cleantec expects to grow sales by at least 25 percent every year till 2014-15, on the back of strong demand for its high yielding variety of oilseeds, a top executive …
(OriginOil) Algae Appliance set for commercial release in early 2012 will help producers meet rising demand
OriginOil, Inc. , the developer of a breakthrough technology to extract oil from algae and an emerging leader in the global …
(The Mainichi Daily News) Could Japan become a major oil-producing nation? That’s the dream of researchers at IHI NeoG Algae LLC, which is working on extracting oil not from new holes in the ground, but …
Louis Bergerson (Stanford University/Western Farm Press) When it comes to making biodiesel cheaply and efficiently enough to be commercially feasible, E. coli may prove to be “the little bacterial engine that could,” say Stanford researchers.
…The …
by Heather Lammers (National Renewable Energy Laboratory/Renewable Energy World) …In June, DOE announced an award of up to $13.4 million dollars to Virent and its partners to develop a process to cost effectively convert cellulosic …
(National Algae Association) Due to the lack of sufficient data on the performance of industrial-scale photobioreactors, fermentation, dewatering/harvesting and extraction equipment, the NAA is announcing a new collaborative testing center starting in The Woodlands, Texas …
(PR NewsWire/MarketWatch) Analytical Technology Fueling Institute’s Fundamental Energy Research
Waters Corporation today (November 15, 2011) welcomed the Future Fuels Institute at Florida State University, Tallahassee, Florida into its Centers of Innovation Program. The Future Fuels Institute …
(Soya Tech) Indonesia’s Confederation of Primary Cooperatives Association (Inkud) is teaming up with Taiwan in developing jatropha curcas-based fuel, its vice president director Yusri Suhud said.
“We are cooperating with Taiwan to develop jatropha curcas as …
by Larry Dreiling (High Plains MidWest Ag Journal) Construction has begun in Hugoton, Kan., on the nation’s first commercial scale biomass fuel refinery.
Abengoa Bioenergy’s new, 23 million-gallon annual throughput refinery will take biomass, mainly switchgrass, …
by Isaac Leung (PACEToday.com) Mission NewEnergy will construct a major waste material processing facility in Malaysia which will recover palm oil from waste material in the palm oil refining process.
The Spent Bleaching Earth Extraction Plant …
by Dan Voorhis (The Wichita Eagle) …The Kansas Alliance for BioRefining and BioEnergy was created in 2009 and was originally funded by the Kansas BioScience Authority to help commercialize research and technology that turns …
by Vidya Ramanathan (Advanced Biofuels USA) A clear view of coppery miniature treetops, brilliant skies and shimmering coastline. This is the sight that welcomed the attendees of the first ever conference on ElectroFuels, conducted by the …
by Philip Brasher (Argus Leader) … A top official with the Environmental Protection Agency, which regulates motor fuels, told lawmakers recently butanol is one of the nation’s “most promising biofuels.” However, the product faces potential government …
by John Hollenhorst (Deseret News) West High School students David Larkin and Andy Law have apparently invented a new way of making fuel, and they’ve applied for a patent.
It’s the kind of success story that …
(Ventura County Star/AP) … Joule Unlimited Inc. plans to convert sunlight and carbon dioxide waste into biofuel at the planned facility in Hobbs. The plant is expected to begin operations in 2012.
…State officials say Joule …
by Graham Warwick (Aviation Week) As airlines launch the first commercial biofuel flights in the U.S., the government is working with industry to scale up production of biomass-derived jet fuel to commercial quantities beginning in …
by Wayne Seames (American Oil Chemists Society/Inform Magazine) A new generation of technologies to generate renewable fuels is nearing commercialization. Some of these are focused on producing ethanol and other alcohols from cellulosic biomass using …
(University of Delaware) …Eleftherios (Terry) Papoutsakis, Eugene du Pont Chair of Chemical Engineering at the University of Delaware, is working to create hardy organisms for producing biofuels and chemicals from renewable sources – microorganisms that are more …
(Oak Ridge National Laboratory) A tree outside Oak Ridge National Laboratory researcher Pratul Agarwal’s office window provided the inspiration for a discovery that may ultimately lead to drugs with fewer side effects, less expensive biofuels …
(Boeing/PR NewsWire/Yahoo!) Collaborative efforts to focus on regionally produced, sustainable fuel options
Boeing today announced a collaborative agreement to work with Hawai’i BioEnergy on renewable energy sources for creating aviation fuel. Announced on the eve of …
by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest) As POET lands a record biomass harvest in prep for a 2013 cellulosic ethanol launch, the Digest looks at stover, jatropha, miscanthus, switchgrass, MSW, wood and animal residue. Are costs …
by Bryan Sims (Biorefining Magazine) …Co-founded in 2002 by Randy Cortright, Virent’s current chief technology officer, and James Dumesic, professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Virent deepened its relationship with Shell and refocused its business …
by Luke Geiver (Biorefining Magazine) …“I came to the U.S. four years ago to really make what we wanted to be on a piece of paper a reality,” she (Sue Ellerbusch, president of BP Biofuels …
by Erin Voegele (Biorefining Magazine) Single cell photosynthetic organisms, such as blue-green algae, could play an important role in the future of our nation’s space program. Not only could they be used to supply valuable …
by Cindy Zimmerman (DomesticFuel.com) A three-year initiative by Nebraska corn growers to fund research into feeding the ethanol co-product distillers grains to cattle has resulted in some new breakthroughs.
The initiative created a beef cattle advisory …
by Ben Sills (Bloomberg) Fossil-fuel consumers worldwide received about six times more government subsidies than were given to the renewable-energy industry, according to the chief adviser to oil-importing nations.
State spending to cut retail prices of …
by Anna Austin (Biomass Power and Themal) Energy crop developer New Energy Farms says it has developed a new system for establishing miscanthus that takes one-third the time of previous planting methods.
…The first is a …
by Erin Voegele (Biodiesel Magazine) Florida-based Green Oil Solutions Inc. has announced the successful production of camelina biodiesel, from field trials to harvesting, pressing and processing. According to Steve Edmonds, the company’s director of industry …
(National Science Foundation) A sustainable world is one in which human needs are met equitably without harm to the environment, and without sacrificing the ability of future generations to meet their needs. Growing evidence for …
by Jennifer Stewart (Purdue Newsroom) Dairy producers looking for a high-quality heifer feed that often costs less than traditional corn and soybean feed grains should consider distillers grains, says a Purdue Extension dairy nutrition specialist.
Distillers …
(GreenTechMedia/PR NewsWire) Today, at the Advanced Biofuels Markets Conference in San Francisco, Arnold Klann, Chief Executive Officer and President of BlueFire Renewables (OTC BB: BFRE.OB), a company focused on shifting the paradigm for energy sources by converting …
by Derek Mead (GreenTechMedia) Three newly public biofuel and green chemical firms reveal their financials.
A trio of young biofuel firms recently reported their third-quarter 2011 earnings, offering a good glimpse into what’s up and coming …
(Arch1Design.com) …Tel Aviv University researchers are doing their part to reduce humanity’s carbon footprint by successfully growing forests in the most unlikely place — deep in Israel’s Aravah Desert.
With environmental “extras” such as a local …
by Kevin Welch (Amarillo Globe-News) The U.S. Department of Agriculture is giving White Energy, with ethanol plants in Hereford and Plainview, a $3-million grant to promote using materials other than corn to make biofuels.
Those materials …
By Paul M. Ingram (Wick Communications Science/Green Valley News and Sun) …Under ideal conditions, half the weight of the plants will be converted into liquid, turning 2 tons of vegetation into 1,000 gallons of …
by Tara Bozick (GoDanRiver.com) …Chemtex International and its parent Gruppo Mossi and Ghisolfi, or the M&G Group, have been developing a lingo-cellulosic bio-ethanol technology called Proesa in a move away from petroleum and toward …
by Kristy Moore (Renewable Fuels Association) Recent claims from some marine engine manufacturers that E15 ethanol blends will ruin marine engines are meant solely to incite fear and not meaningful discussion. A meaningful discussion would …
by Geoff Liesik (Deseret News) Researchers at Utah State University are making progress on a project that could soon have drivers filling up their gas tanks with fuel harvested from pond scum.
The project has moved from …
by Jason Palmer (BBC News) Scientists have succeeded in forming a “feedback loop” between a computer and a common yeast to precisely control the switching on and off of specific genes.
The computer controlled flashes of …
(Ricardo/PR NewsWire) Ricardo today announced the results of a landmark multi-client research study conducted by Ricardo Strategic Consulting in association with Kevin J. Lindemer LLC, and involved participation of some of the world’s leading energy …
by Terry Hillig (STLToday.com) The National Corn-to-Ethanol Research Center has added $3.5 million in advanced corn fractionation technology, provided by Cereal Process Technologies LLC of Overland Park, Kan., with support from the Illinois Department of …
by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest) United and Solazyme, Alaska and Dynamic Fuels hook up, as producers scramble to make fuel, raise cash, ratchet down costs. Will producers scale, or fail?
…United Airlines will operate the first …
by Bryan Sims (Biorefining Magazine) Could algae and biowaste be the next black gold? Yuanhui Zhang believes it very well could be. Since 1996, the professor in agricultural and biological engineering at the University of …
(Science Daily) …A team led by Carnegie’s Steven Davis, and including Ken Caldeira, tracked and quantified this supply chain of global carbon dioxide emissions. …Traditionally, the carbon dioxide emitted by burning fossil fuels is …
(Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory) Joint BioEnergy Institute Researchers Create RiceNet for Predicting Genetic Functions in Rice
The first genome-scale model for predicting the functions of genes and gene networks in a grass species has been developed …
