by Ron Kotrba (Biodiesel Magazine)  Small North Carolina producer continues to innovate
The founder of Pittsboro, N.C.-based Piedmont Biofuels, Rachel Burton, gave details at the 2012 National Biodiesel Conference & Expo in Orlando on the company’s …

by Kari Williamson (Renewable Energy Focus)  The Energy & Environmental Research Center (EERC) will develop alternative liquid fuels, including biofuel, for US military applications under a US$906,000 contract from the Connecticut Center for Advanced Technology …

by Bryan Sims (Biodiesel Magazine)  Minimizing catalyst use, particularly homogenous catalysts, while simultaneously maximizing product quality and process yield is a pervasive challenge that every biodiesel producer encounters daily because, after all, single digit differences …

by David Shaffer  (Star Tribune)  …Grants totaling $2.4 million announced Wednesday by the Minnesota Agriculture Department will help nine ventures trying to burn or gasify biomass or to make liquid fuel or ammonia. Biomass includes …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  Can companies like Mascoma and Sud-Chemie, by transforming the economics of cellulosic ethanol, compete at parity with gasoline – no subsidies, no five-years-to-commercial-scale, no kidding?
Part II – “Chain-Chain-Chain, Chain of …

(ClickGreen) Scotland’s Finance Secretary John Swinney has today announced funding to increase the energy and low carbon support available to Scottish companies.
The Scottish Government has awarded £3.4 million of European Regional Development Funding to six projects …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  Part I – I Want a New Bug   In Part I, today, “I Want a New Bug,” we look at the formation of Lygos, and the magic bugs, coming primarily …

(The Fish Site)  The Centre for Aquaculture and Seafood Development will establish a demonstration bio-refinery that will convert fish oils into biodiesel with support from the Provincial Government.
Darin King, Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture, announced …

(EurekAlert/Iowa State University)   Genetic mutations to cellulose in plants could improve the conversion of cellulosic biomass into biofuels, according to a research team that included two Iowa State University chemists.
The team recently published its …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  New ideas on growing hydrocarbons directly in the field tap ancient ideas of agriculture, and ancient capabilities trapped deep in the genome
…A good part of the work of modern genetics …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  While confusion reigneth on Shell’s plans for cellulosic ethanol, the company quietly builds a drop-in biofuels pilot plant in Texas, based on Virent’s bioforming technology.
…After a stunning move to establish …

by Paula Horton (Tri-City Herald/The Bellingham Herald)   The Tri-Cities is primed to be a leader in creating a new, cleaner alternative jet fuel, Sen. Maria Cantwell said Saturday at the Washington State University Tri-Cities …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  In an update to our story The Enzyme Wars, a group of researchers from Lawrence Berkeley National Lab and the Joint BioEnergy Institute write: “the results from a recently-published paper on …

by Holly Jessen (Ethanol Producer Magazine)  Two companies develop new technologies aimed at revolutionizing fermentation
Understood since man first made beer, fermentation is an age-old process that has been developed to the point where it’s nearly …

(OriginOil)  Analysis indicates potential $2.28/gallon cost for algae-blended feedstock using newest growth, harvesting and fuel conversion technologies
OriginOil, Inc., developer of a breakthrough technology to convert algae into renewable crude oil, today announced a new company …

(MarketWatch)  ZeaChem Commences USDA-Funded Initiative to Build a Bioenergy Industry in the Pacific Northwest
ZeaChem Inc., a developer of biorefineries for the conversion of renewable biomass into sustainable fuels and chemicals, today announced that it has …

by S. Heather Duncan (Macon Telegraph)  Wearing green hard hats with the LanzaTech logo pasted over the words “Range Fuels,” officials of the company that now owns a Soperton ethanol plant visited the site this …

(Science Daily)  A team of chemical engineers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst has discovered a small molecule that behaves the same as cellulose when it is converted to biofuel. Studying this ‘mini-cellulose’ molecule reveals …

by Clive Cookson (Financial Times)  Scottish scientists have found a more efficient way to make biofuels, using electricity rather than sunlight.
Their “electric leaf” is based on photosynthetic bacteria whose biochemistry has been changed through radical …

by David Shaffer   (Star Tribune)  A biofuels company opts for plants elsewhere after being helped by nearly $1 million in grant funding from Minnesota.
A biofuels company that benefited from nearly $1 million in grants …

by Erin Voegele (Biorefining Magazine)  Finland-based UPM recently announced plans to develop a biorefinery in Lappeenranta, Finland, to convert crude tall oil into renewable drop-in diesel biofuel. Construction on the 100,000 metric ton (30 million …

by Brian Wingfield (Bloomberg)  The United States lost $10.4 million on six clean-energy projects, including biofuel research at Iowa State University, that were suspended for missing performance milestones, according to the Energy Department.
…Iowa State spent about …

(Manchester Evening News)  A biotech business has developed and patented a process which it believes has the potential to fight the world’s energy and food crises. Protein Technologies, based at Manchester Science Parks, specialises in research …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)   …Some of the first American visitors to Yellowstone, who began to record their journeys into the wilds of northwestern Wyoming during the early 1870s, noted the horrible taste of …

(Montana State University)  Researchers at Montana State University-Northern have developed a process to convert camelina oil to jet fuel and other high-value chemicals. MSU has applied for a U.S. patent and research is ongoing.
Using a …

by Martin LaMonica (CNET)  For a new crop of biofuel companies, ethanol is out and “biogasoline” is in.
One of them is Primus Green Energy, which plans to open a demonstration plant by the end of the …

by Snehlata Shrivastav (Times of India)  Moving one step ahead in the development of a technology to produce biodiesel from algae, the National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (Neeri) is now planning to scale up the …

(Solve for X/CoolPlanet Energy Systems)  Solve for X is a forum to encourage and amplify technology-based moonshot thinking and teamwork.
The fact is that plants have a carbon-negative phase – a time during which they remove …

by Erin Voegele (Biorefining Magazine)  RNA devices could lead to cheaper advance biofuels
Computer aided design (CAD) tools have long been used by architects, engineers and others to design buildings, circuits and a wide range of …

by Bryan Sims (Biorefining Magazine)  A unique noncatalytic thermal-cracking technology developed under the Sustainable Energy Research Initiative and Supporting Education supercluster program at the University of North Dakota is poised for commercialization. UND has received …

by Katherine Yung (Detroit Free Press)  After a lengthy delay, construction of what could be the nation’s first large-scale wood-to-ethanol plant in the country is to start this year in Michigan’s eastern Upper Peninsula.
If successful, …

by Kevin Bullis (MIT Technology Review)  Humbled by production challenges, the company plans to scale back production goals, it told investors Thursday.
Its originally planned to make an anti-malaria drug, as well as renewable diesel and …

(US Department of Energy)  The purpose of this Request for Information (RFI) is solely to solicit input for ARPA-E consideration to inform the possible development of future chemo/electro-autotrophic fuel production programs.  Information obtained may be used …

(Piedmont Biofuels)  Breakthrough Expedites Transformation of Biodiesel Production
Piedmont Biofuels announced today(February 7, 2012)  that the company has commenced the first commercial scale zero-waste production of biodiesel in the United States using its proprietary approach of …

by S. Heather Duncan (Macon Telegraph)  Although the company that purchased a defunct ethanol refinery in Soperton has some of the same financial backers as previous owners who lost the plant to foreclosure, leaders of …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  …In Canada, Enerkem has filed an F-1 registration statement for a proposed $125 million initial public offering. The number of shares to be offered in the proposed offering and the …

(AgWeek/NDSU Agriculture Communication)  A project that will develop an advanced biofuel from energy beets and provide growers across North Dakota with a new industrial crop is taking another important step forward, fueled by a significant …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  … When it comes down to it, a living organism such as a plant is an incredibly sophisticated next-gen solar panel, harvesting light as well as CO2, water and nutrients …

by S. Heather Duncan (Macon.com)  The new owner of a shuttered ethanol plant in Soperton plans to eventually add hundreds of jobs there to produce ethanol and other chemicals, a company official said this week.
That …

by Bryan Sims (Biorefinery Magazine)  The newest of three bioenergy research facilities in the U.S. is slated to come online this fall on the University of Wisconsin campus in Madison, as construction is progressing on …

by Bryan Sims (Biorefining Magazine)  Toronto-based CORE BioFuel Inc. has signed an exclusive agreement with Osprey Capital Partners Inc., Canada’s leading mid-market investment banking firm, to secure equity investment capital for financing the completion of …

(RSC Chemistry World News)  The development of a couple of new and improved catalysts for upgrading bio-oil is bringing this novel approach to producing biofuels a step closer to the big time.
Although there are several …

(YLE.FI)  Forest industry giant UPM is building a biorefinery in the eastern city of Lappeenranta which is to produce biofuel from crude tall oil. The plant’s output is expected to reach some 100,000 tons of …

(Sermatec Zanini and GeoSynFuels, LLC)  Sermatec Zanini and GeoSynFuels, LLC (GSF) have announced the formation of a strategic alliance for the development and commercialization of GSF’s proprietary cellulosic ethanol technology. The strategic alliance allows Sermatec Zanini …

by Silva, J. P. A., Mussatto, Solange I., Roberto, I.C., Teixeira, J. A.   (Universidade do Minho/Repositorium)  The ethanol production by Pichia stipitis was evaluated in a stirred tank bioreactor using semidefined medium containing xylose (90.0 g/l) as the …

(National Science Foundation)  The National Renewable Energy Laboratory uses supercomputer simulations to explore designer enzymes for renewable fuels
…
“Cellulose in the biosphere can last for years,” said Gregg Beckham, a scientist in the National Bioenergy Center at …

by Christopher Demorro (Gas2) …But new research shows that our existing oil refineries could process crude algae oil, meaning most of the infrastructure is already in place.
OriginOil, a leader in algae fuel research, has announced …

(Edinburgh Napier University)  A NEW company has been launched to commercialise a process for producing biofuel made from whisky by-products.

Celtic Renewables Ltd, a spin-out from Edinburgh Napier University’s Biofuel Research Centre, will initially focus on Scotland’s …

(US Department of Agriculture)  Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack today announced that USDA has approved a conditional commitment in the amount of $232.5 million to ZeaChem Boardman Biorefinery, LLC (ZBB) through the Biorefinery Assistance Program. ZBB …

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest)  …You just can’t turn your back for very long, around the Pyromaniax – the researchers around the world working on pyrolysis. Now, pyro comes in several flavors – fast pyrolysis, …