Understanding how plants use solar energy could play a big role in the future energy supply, claim scientists.

Researchers who met at a public discussion in Glasgow earlier this week talked about how understanding the fundamental processes that plants use to turn light into energy is a key way of securing cheap, emission-free energy in the future.

Scientists who took part in the event - organised by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) - say that furthering our understanding of photosynthesis 'offers an innovative way of producing environmentally-friendly energy.'

Photosynthesis is the process that green plants and certain other organisms use sunlight as an energy source to synthesise food from carbon dioxide and water.

Sociology Professor Steve Yearley from the University of Edinburgh who took part in the public discussion said: "If carefully managed, biofuels could provide a partial solution to dwindling fossil-fuel supplies. However, the biofuels industry currently faces criticism for pushing up food prices and damaging sensitive ecosystems.

"Photosynthesis on the other hand, does not carry these risks. However, the development of any new technology can have far-reaching effects on society and it is important that we and the wider public assess what those might be at this early stage."

Scientists also discussed how a better understanding of photosynthesis could lead to better crops for biofuels.

Professor Jim Barber of Imperial College London said that if we can understand how plants capture and store solar energy, we could mimic the natural process to design solar panels with better energy conversion rates and also develop a clean, efficient means of producing hydrogen fuel.

Professor Barber said: "Plants use solar energy to split water into oxygen, released as 'waste', and hydrogen which they use to help build sugars that feed the plant.

"We do not fully understand how photosynthesis works, but recent key advances in plant research mean that the time is right to consider this science as a basis for future sustainable energy sourcing."

© Faversham House Group Ltd 2007.

Finance Will Support Development of US Geothermal Industry

REYKJAVIK, ICELAND--(Marketwire - July 26, 2007) -

Glitnir bank has agreed to provide ThermaSource, LLC (TSL) with up to USD 22.5 million to finance the acquisitions of drilling rigs (and related equipment) and working capital needs.

TSL will provide project management, engineering services and supervise effective drilling programs as well as provide the geothermal industry with a fleet of drilling rigs and experienced geothermal crews.

Louis Capuano Jr., CEO of ThermaSource, LLC: "With the completion of Glitnir's financing, ThermaSource will have the financial resources to fund our rapid growth. Glitnir's focus on the geothermal energy projects will provide a strong partner in ThermaSource's continuing growth."

ThermaSource's majority owners, US Renewables Group and Carlyle/Riverstone Group, are leading Private Equity Funds with focus on the energy sector.

Thomas King, CEO of US Renewables: "This financing is an important milestone in the growth of ThermaSource as the premier supplier of drilling and consulting services to the geothermal sector. We have been very impressed by Glitnir's knowledge of the geothermal market, its ability to anticipate structural requirements, and its approach to deal making in a spirit of partnership. We look forward to a long and profitable relationship with Glitnir through ThermaSource and in other renewable energy investments."

Larus Welding, CEO of Glitnir: "This agreement is an important milestone in establishing Glitnir as the leading geothermal bank in the world. The renewable energy team, led by Arni Magnusson, is both dedicated and focused and I am certain that the teamwork between Glitnir and ThermaSource will be very successful."

Arni Magnusson, Managing director of global sustainable energy at Glitnir: "Glitnir aims to be the leading bank in financial services to the geothermal sector. ThermaSource is a very professional, fast growing drilling company in the US, which specialises in servicing the geothermal industry. It is therefore a great pleasure to ensure ThermaSource with the financing of machines and equipment which will support the important development of the US geothermal industry."

About ThermaSource

ThermaSource, LLC provides the geothermal industry with engineering project management, consultation services and drilling rigs with crews. With over 420 years of geothermal experience on the ThermaSource, LLC management team, the educated and experienced drill crews and a consultation service that has been our business mainstay since 1980, ThermaSource, LLC is a well-respected contributor to the geothermal industry. For more information: www.thermasource.com

While most of them have been extensively discussed, the information available is usually fragmented, being either too scientific or simplistic in its presentation, and generally not comparable.

Now STOA, the European Parliament's Scientific Technology Options Assessment body, has published an inventory of 20 of the most promising options, which are clustered in five technologies: hydrogen and fuel cells, battery electric vehicles, hybrid technology, biofuels and natural gas. The inventory provides a comparative overview of the pros and cons of each of these technologies.

Focusing primarily on road transport, the study starts by looking at hydrogen which, when combined with fuel cells, seems to be a promising technology alternative. However, some serious technological problems remain unsolved, including for instance questions concerning the performance of fuel cells, and the production of large amounts of 'clean' hydrogen. Recently, the only affordable way of large-scale hydrogen production has been via steam-reformation from natural gas. From a mid-term perspective, this route might support the market penetration of hydrogen and of fuel cells, notes the study. The crucial point is that, in this case, hydrogen would be derived from a fossil fuel source.

Other routes are also being discussed, including the production of hydrogen from renewable sources (wind, photovoltaic, solar thermal, water) via electrolysis. This is often regarded as a kind of silver bullet since it enables close to zero emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG). 'But it is not clear if, at which time, and in which regions the production of hydrogen from renewable sources will be feasible at larger scales and at reasonable costs,' says the study.

A 'clean' production of hydrogen from nuclear power is feasible as well, but the drawbacks here are the finiteness of uranium sources and the acceptance of the use of nuclear power. In terms of climate security, the study predicts that the coal route will only be suitable if it is combined with CO2 sequestration and storage (CSS).

Assessing the use of hybrid technology, the study finds that this option offers the possibility to save energy and emissions by using established technologies and infrastructures. Whatever fuel and propulsion technology will be dominant in 20 to 30 years, the authors of the study predict that that hybrid technology will be part of the propulsion system. It is an important component of most fuel cell concepts and there seems to be a high potential to further improve the efficiency of conventional fuels.

The development of pure electric cars is also explored. Here the study remarks that the commercialisation of such vehicles will strongly depend on the development of suitable batteries. In spite of decades of research and development activities, decisive technological breakthroughs regarding batteries are not in sight. 'Yet, a surprising breakthrough in battery technology is not completely impossible and would surely entail radical changes to both the transport and the energy sector,' say the authors of the study.

No inventory on alternative fuel sources would be complete without an assessment of biofuels. While recognising the ease at which so-called first generation fuels, mainly biodiesel and bioethanol, can be produced today, the study sees second generation fuels as the way forward. Unlike their ancestors, second generation biofuels can be made using the whole plant or from biomass other than rapeseed and sugar cane.

It is estimated that by 2030, roughly 20% to 30% of the EU's road transport fuels could be covered by biofuels derived from European biomass such as energy crops, agricultural and forestry residues or the organic fraction of municipal solid waste. But to meet the continent's fuel needs, it is likely that biomass will have to be imported from abroad. This should be critically discussed, argues the study, since importing biomass may be detrimental to ecologically sensitive areas worldwide.

Last on the list of possible fuel alternatives is compressed natural gas technology (CNG). 'This is a feasible technology for the transport sector and has the potential to bring at least mid-term improvements in terms of energy security and GHG emissions,' notes the study. But its possible contribution to energy security strongly depends on the overall demand for natural gas. It is likely that CNG vehicles will become at least established for niche applications, such as in larger fleets or in inner cities. Meanwhile the study predicts that liquid petroleum gas (LPG) will offer environmental benefits at relatively low costs. However, since both CNG and LPG are based on fossil feedstock, they must be considered as bridging technologies. They might help to pave the way for 'cleaner' gaseous fuels such as hydrogen, bio-methane or dimethyl ethyl (DME), suggests the study.

For more information, please visit:

http://www.europarl.europa.eu/stoa/publications/studies/stoa179_en.pdf

JAKARTA - More overseas firms are showing interest in developing the bioenergy sector in Indonesia, with a British oil giant and a Swedish energy firm being the latest to join the list, bringing investment commitments in the sector to Rp 160 trillion (US$17.7 billion).

Alhilal Hamdi, head of the government's biofuel development committee, said Monday that BP Plc., and its partner, D1 Oil Plc., had allocated $160 million for developing the industry in India, Africa and Indonesia -- most of which would be spent on the development of 1 million hectares of plantations here.

Speaking Monday, he added that last March, Sweden's Bioenergy had signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) for the development of 100,000 hectares of jatropha plantations in East Nusa Tenggara.

He estimated the value of this investment at around $200 million as the company was also planning to build a biofuel plant with a capacity of 350,000 tons per day.

Purnomo Yusgiantoro, Energy and Mineral Resources Minister, said on the same occasion that Indonesia needed a total investment of Rp 200 trillion until 2010 to be able to develop up to 5.25 million hectares of biofuel feedstock plantations.

Of the Rp 200 trillion, Rp 185 trillion was expected to come from the private sector, while the remaining Rp 15 trillion would come from the state, he explained.

Under the government's biofuel plans, Indonesia wants to develop 5.25 million hectares of biofuel plantations in the next three years in order to produce 5.29 million kiloliters of biofuel per year by 2010.

It hopes that by 2025, biofuel production will account for some 5 percent of the country's energy mix, which is currently dominated by fossil fuels.

With the arrival of two more foreign companies, Purnomo said he was upbeat about the government meeting that target.

Indonesia has been seeking sources of renewable energy, including biofuels, in a bid to reduce its dependence on oil.

It has laid the foundations to become one of the world's top biofuel producers in the coming years with the signing of 58 agreements worth $12.4 billion with 59 energy firms and institutions in January.

Among the big companies on the list are China's major energy firms, CNOOC and Sinopec, Malaysia-based Genting Biofuels Asia and a number of local companies, including the Sinar Mas Group.

CNOOC is now in the process of building three biodiesel plants in West Kalimantan.

CNOOC signed an investment commitment worth $5.5 billion in January.

In addition, three Austrian companies -- Energea, BioDiesel International and the Christof Group -- said recently that they were interested in constructing biodiesel refineries, and have been involved in discussions with potential Indonesian partners.

Copyright © The Jakarta Post

The EU’s consumption of biofuel went up dramatically in 2006, according to new figures. A report published by EurObserv’ER, a renewable industry consortium, says biofuel use in the EU went up 78 per cent from 2005 to 2006 – from 3m to 5.38m tonnes.

Germany is by far the EU’s biggest biofuel consumer: with a total consumption of 3,343,700 tonnes in 2006, it is far ahead of runners-up France (682,000 tonnes) and Austria (275,200 tonnes).

The report says this is due to “the explosion of vegetable oil consumption in Germany, which considers this product as a fully-fledged fuel”.

The majority of the biofuel boom is made up of biodiesels which are much more prevalent than bioethanol, according to the figures.

But in spite of the EU-wide increase, the report warns that “a significant number of countries shall not reach the threshold as set by the directive (5.75 per cent biofuel share of total consumption in 2010)”.

The EU’s biofuel directive calls EU member states to boost their use of biofuels in the next few years as a way to cut CO2 emissions and help decrease Europe’s dependence on fossil fuels.

But environmental organisations are warning that biofuels are not a silver bullet for the transport sector, and could trigger environmental damage if they are developed without safeguards.

NGOs including Friends of the Earth and WWF say there is a danger that production could be intensified at the expense of forests and wildlife.

There are also concerns that the monoculture of biofuels in Europe could lead to a rise in food prices as biofuels replace food crops.
©2007 theparliament.com

The technology could potentially be used to produce renewable fuels from carbon dioxide, Sunflower said. The emissions from two of its existing plants and its two proposed coal-fired plants would be used to make the biofuel at Holcomb Station.

The first phase of Sunflower's Holcomb Expansion project is being co-funded by Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association Inc., based in Westminster, Colo. The total project is expected to cost about $417 million.

"This is an important first step in our efforts to demonstrate that coal-based flue gas can be utilized for beneficial purposes," Earl Watkins, Sunflower's president and chief executive officer, said in a release. "I look forward to the day when this project is completed, and we are facilitating the production of renewable energy that benefits our agricultural producers in central and western Kansas."

The algae farm part of the process is being developed by GreenFuel Technologies. Its laboratory will use the flue gas from Sunflower's power plant to grow micro-algae in an enclosed environment. Testing is being conducted to determine the specific strain of algae that will grow best.

"GreenFuel recently learned valuable production lessons at their Arizona algae project that will benefit the Holcomb Expansion partners, so we are pleased they have decided to focus their efforts on five projects globally and provide us with their newest technology," said Clare Gustin, Sunflower's vice president of member services and external affairs.

Following the algae farm, the rest of the project will consist of an anaerobic digester, a biodiesel plant and dairy subsystems to complete the ethanol plant.

© Copyright 2007 United Press International, Inc.

LANSING — Michigan will soon be producing a new type of ethanol - not from corn but from trees.

Gov. Jennifer Granholm announced Thursday that Michigan will soon be home to the world's first commercial scale cellulosic ethanol plant, to be built by Mascoma Corp., a Massachusetts-based energy biotech company.

Cellulosic ethanol, unlike the more common corn ethanol, is a biofuel that would derive its energy primarily from wood chips and other nonfood crops, or "biomass."

The process that would be used to break down the biomass would use enzymes to break down the tree's cellulose, convert it to sugars, then ferment those sugars into alcohol - the basis for ethanol.

The conversion has a corollary in nature, Mascoma Corp. CEO Bruce Jamerson said.

"It's very similar to what goes on in a ruminant animal's stomach, converting grasses into energy," he said. "It's a very similar process, but much more sophisticated and about three times more effective in generating energy."

One of the factors that attracted Mascoma to Michigan was the recent $50 million federal grant MSU received to study biofuels in June. MSU will help in areas such as pretreatment technology for cellulosic ethanol production and energy crops that can be utilized by the plant.

"It tells us there's going to be continuous support for professors, students and research that we can tap into," Jamerson said. "It was absolutely a factor in our coming here."

Jamerson estimated the plan could produce 150 gallons of ethanol out of a cord of wood, or 128 cubic feet, and the total investment for the plant will be $100 million.

Despite the fact the fuel primarily would be derived from wood, it would actually be good for Michigan forests, said Becky Humphries, director of the Department of Natural Resources.

"That may sound counterintuitive but we manage our forests sustainable now, meaning we grow a lot more (trees) than we cut (down) in the forest right now," Humphries said.

Michigan has been losing its marketplace to sell wood, she said.

"As we cut down trees that mature or have become diseased, we don't have places to sell some of that fiber," Humphries said. "This gives us a place to do that."

While Michigan is known for its high-quality hardwood supplies, the state also has a lot of other tree species that are of a lower quality that can be turned into biomass for fuel purposes, she said.

Some, however, are not so sure the new plant is the best idea for Michigan.

"As the world's first anything, I have some reservations about the state using taxpayer funds to underwrite a somewhat experimental venture," said Diane Katz, director of science, environment and technology policy for the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, a conservative think tank.

"My concern would not be the ethanol but the funds," Katz said. "The Mackinac Center has tracked state subsidized programs for years and they are overwhelmingly failures. The market does a better job of making sense of what to invest in than the state does."

There are significant ecological advantages to cellulosic ethanol, such as leaving a small carbon footprint.

Traditional gasoline produces 24.6 pounds in greenhouse gasses per gallon, whereas cellulosic ethanol only puts out 1.2 pounds per gallon, Jamerson said.

It also would be more economy-friendly, he said.

"Compared to oil refineries, which have many dangerous materials, we're very clean," he said. "We don't use acids or harsh chemicals."

Even still, Katz said, cellulosic ethanol remains experimental.

"No one should think it's a perfect substitute," she said. "We should not get our hopes up too much about an ethanol future."
©2007 The State News

The technology could potentially be used to produce renewable fuels from carbon dioxide, Sunflower said. The emissions from two of its existing plants and its two proposed coal-fired plants would be used to make the biofuel at Holcomb Station.

The first phase of Sunflower's Holcomb Expansion project is being co-funded by Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association Inc., based in Westminster, Colo. The total project is expected to cost about $417 million.

"This is an important first step in our efforts to demonstrate that coal-based flue gas can be utilized for beneficial purposes," Earl Watkins, Sunflower's president and chief executive officer, said in a release. "I look forward to the day when this project is completed, and we are facilitating the production of renewable energy that benefits our agricultural producers in central and western Kansas."

The algae farm part of the process is being developed by GreenFuel Technologies. Its laboratory will use the flue gas from Sunflower's power plant to grow micro-algae in an enclosed environment. Testing is being conducted to determine the specific strain of algae that will grow best.

"GreenFuel recently learned valuable production lessons at their Arizona algae project that will benefit the Holcomb Expansion partners, so we are pleased they have decided to focus their efforts on five projects globally and provide us with their newest technology," said Clare Gustin, Sunflower's vice president of member services and external affairs.

Following the algae farm, the rest of the project will consist of an anaerobic digester, a biodiesel plant and dairy subsystems to complete the ethanol plant.

© Copyright 2007 United Press International, Inc.

Approvals have been granted from DRIRE and DIREM, the regulatory bodies responsible for French environment and fuel specifications and applications.

O2Diesel's French connection began in late 2005 when Abengoa Bioenergy R&D became the company's largest shareholder, and entered into a five-year agreement to jointly develop the European market for O2Diesel's ethanol diesel fuel blend technology.

The company expects Europe will be a substantial opportunity, especially as the 2003 EU directive to replace 5.75% of fossil energy with renewable fuels is implemented in member countries

"Ethanol is not an established fuel component in Europe, so there have been a substantial number of regulatory hurdles to overcome," said Alan Rae, CEO of O2Diesel.

"We believe these approvals in France will be the first of several over the coming months as our efforts start to deliver results. We look forward to being able to announce our first fleet shortly."

France is the third largest consumer of petroleum in Europe, behind Germany and Russia, and tenth in the world. Diesel represents more than 70% of France's transportation fuel market at 29 billion litres per year.

Independent of the EU directive for 5.75% fossil fuel displacement, France has its own imposed target to replace 10% of diesel fuel with renewable alternatives by 2015.

O2Diesel says its fuel provides exceptional performance and environmental qualities for centrally fueled fleets and off-road equipment, reducing harmful emissions without sacrificing power and performance.

O2Diesel claims its fuel is or can been made available in any fuel market using existing diesel fuel storage, supply, and distribution networks.

World Banlk - “A surge in the production of biofuels derived from corn, wheat and soyabeans is helping to push up food prices so sharply that the World Food Programme, the United Nation’s agency in charge of fighting famine, is finding it difficult to feed as many hungry people as it has in the past.

Josette Sheeran, WFP’s executive director, said in an interview with the Financial Times that rising food prices were ‘already having an impact on WFP operations’ and added: ‘There is a realisation we are facing a new level of challenge.’ Food commodity prices are surging because of a number of factors including rising demand from China and bad weather, but the potential consequences of the rising demand for biofuels has caught the attention of those in the business of feeding the world….” [The Financial Times/Factiva].

AFP reports that “The World Food Programme feeds people in countries including Chad, Uganda and Ethiopia, but reaches a fraction of the 850m people it estimates suffers from hunger. It spent about $600m buying food in 2006.” [Agence France Presse/Factiva].

The Financial Times mentions that “some 77 per cent of the WFP’s food purchases are made in developing countries. Last year it spent $460m (€334m, £226m) in such countries, making the largest cash purchases in Uganda, Ethiopia and Pakistan. The United Nations organisation feeds some 90m people annually.Ms Sheeran also said that her organisation and others were trying to make it easier for poorer farmers to benefit from rising demand for food, either by helping African farmers become more efficient and tapping new markets or by helping small farmers in Latin America benefit from the rising demand for biofuels.‘In a world of growing population, the African farmer will be needed,’ she said.

The rise in food prices has also underlined the difficulties the WFP and other food aid programmes face when determining which type of donations they receive are more effective – cash or commodities.About half of the donations the WFP receives are now made in cash, the rest in commodities. When the organisation started, it benefited mainly from surplus food donated by wealthy nations including the US. It now receives cash from many countries, and often, as is the case with the US, must spend that money on products grown in the donor country.”[ The Financial Times/Factiva]

Last month, Republican senators from the South provided about half the votes that defeated federal legislation to require power companies to get 15 percent of their electricity from renewable sources by 2020. Nationally, almost half the states have adopted their own renewable mandates, but only one, Texas, is in the South.

Southern lawmakers — responding to heavy lobbying from local utilities — argue their region is not conducive to solar or wind power like the sun-baked Southwest or the open plains of the West.

But many leading scientists and environmental advocates say Southern states have plenty of alternative-energy potential. Utilities have simply grown comfortable with cheap, dirty coal and have not been forced to change, they say.

"If you look at other regions of the country where renewables have taken off, it's been because of mandates, and that's why you haven't seen it take off in the South," said Nicholas Rigas, director of the South Carolina Institute for Energy Studies at Clemson University. "Once the development starts it will be just as successful as it is in other states."

The South has long relied on coal for electricity. Its two largest utilities — Atlanta-based Southern Co. and Charlotte, North Carolina,-based Duke Energy Corp. — produce about two-thirds of their power from coal, mostly burned in aging plants not yet upgraded with clean-air technologies.

Southern Co. puts more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than any other U.S. utility.

Its Scherer plant near Macon, Georgia, for several years has been the nation's single largest source of the greenhouse gas, which most scientists believe contributes to global warming. Duke Energy is not far behind, ranking third in carbon dioxide emissions, while the Tennessee Valley Authority ranks fourth, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

Many of the companies' plants also rank among the worst in emissions of mercury, a neurotoxin, and other pollutants that cause smog, respiratory problems and acid rain.

The utilities — among the largest political donors in Washington — vehemently oppose federal mandates. They argue that "one size fits all" standards would drive up Southern utility bills and urge that new technologies be phased in gradually.

Southern Co., which reported profits of $1.6 billion in 2006, questions the existence of global warming even as other utilities acknowledge it must be addressed.

"If we are irrational about it and we cripple our economy or cripple our industry and we realize carbon dioxide wasn't the source of the problem, then we'll be real regretful," said Chris Hobson, senior vice president for research and environmental affairs at Southern Co., which owns Alabama Power Co., Georgia Power Co. and other subsidiaries.

But the demand for renewable energy is growing.

"Coal is the dominant source of global warming pollution," said Michael Shore, who directs Southeastern air quality programs at Environmental Defense, a private lobbying group. "It is critical that states in the Southeast embrace energy efficiency and renewables if we are to take responsibility for global warming."

The Energy Department said the proposal that failed in the Senate would have increased utility bills nationally by less than 1 percent through 2030. Renewable energy advocates acknowledge the South could see slightly higher increases, in part because the region's electricity rates are among the nation's lowest. But they say the South should be ready to meet modest new mandates.

Many Southern states already produce a small amount of power from hydroelectric dams. Although the region has relatively low wind speeds, a recent study by Georgia Tech and Southern Co. found promise for offshore wind energy production in coastal states.

The most potential could lie in the South's emergence as a national leader in producing energy from timber residue, grasses and agricultural waste. Biomass now accounts for 1.5 percent of the nation's power — more than solar or wind.

Steven Taylor, chairman of the bioenergy program at Auburn University in Alabama, said Southern states have a record of producing biomass from their vast forests and farmlands.

Although utilities still struggle to collect and transport the materials efficiently, much of the infrastructure has been put in place by the agriculture and timber industries. And most legislative proposals would allow utilities to "co-fire" biomass at modified conventional plants, eliminating the need for expensive new facilities.

"We've got the ability to generate a pretty good proportion of our power or liquid fuel from biomass," Taylor said.

Copyright © 2007 the International Herald Tribune

PANA - A community- based organisation in the eastern region of Ghana has announced that it has started the production of bio- diesel in Ghana from palm kernel oil. The Dumpong Pineapple Growers Cooperatives said it was doing this in collaboration with its US partners, Dumpong Biofuels.

According to the producers, the product has a better performance quality compared to petroleum diesel. They have started using the bio-diesel to power a generator and to fuel their official vehicles and it worked efficiently just like the petroleum diesel, officials told PANA Tuesday.

Jerry Robock, Head of the US Dumpong Biofuels team, said that a simple processor to convert locally produced palm kernel oil into bio-diesel was assembled and a process known as "transesterification", which removes glycerine molecule from the oil, was used to extract the fuel.

He said the processor comprising two 55-gallon steel drums were welded together with an electric heating element screwed through one opening.

A piping and a small electric pump were added to pump palm kernel oil and a solution of methanol with potassium hydroxide into the processor. The circulating mixture finally pumped the bio-diesel into a washing tank.

Robock said bio-diesel was more environmentally friendly than petroleum diesel and significantly reduced exhaust emissions and could be a major substitute for imported petroleum diesel fuel.

He explained that the project, which cost about US$1,000 and was currently on a pilot basis, could be adopted in other communities to help cut down cost of fuel.

He added that Dumpong Biofuel had come up with a strategy to take advantage of locally available oilseed crops to include atrophy and sunflower seed as well, to be converted into environmentally renewable and sustainable fuel to be used locally to replace imported diesel fuel.

Copyright Africa Interactive

The European Union plans to give money to help developing countries grow energy crops rich nations want to use for transport fuel, the EU aid chief said Friday.

Europe and the United States plan to use more low-carbon emission biofuels to reduce their dependence on imported oil and cut their contribution to global warming.

EU Development Commissioner Louis Michel said the EU would allocate part of a 220 million euro ($300 million) foreign aid budget to offer countries investment and technical skills so they can jump on the biofuel bandwagon. Officials were unable to give a precise figure.

He said the EU was currently studying how sugar producers from former European colonies in Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific, or ACP, could turn to ethanol production while other regions could grow oilseed crops.

The biofuel boom offers an answer to fears that ACP countries will lose out as the EU slashes sugar prices it kept artificially high for decades.

For more than 30 years, these countries had preferential access to rich European markets and grew crops that Europe wanted. The EU is now pushing them to turn to other crops by cutting trade tariffs for other products - and may reduce high ethanol tariffs in the future although this is likely to benefit Brazil more than other sugar exporting countries.

Michel acknowledged concerns that turning land over to energy crops might reduce food production but said this should not hold back a "historic" opportunity to introduce new crops where there is high demand.

But nonprofit groups warn that the benefits of biofuel production - access to energy and new income - could be outweighed by rising food prices and more competition for the same land.

Even small increases in food prices could harm populations living on less than a dollar per day, said International Food Policy Research Institute director Joachim von Braun.

A report this week from Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization warned that high prices for wheat and maize - blamed on increasing demand for biofuels - could last through the decade.

Simon Trace from development campaigner Practical Action said there still isn't enough proof that using more biofuels will slow down climate change since refining some of them drains a considerable amount of energy, canceling out environmental benefits.

"If we get this wrong, if we waste time and resources in chasing something that does not reduce climate change, we are potentially pushing millions of people into poverty," Trace said, painting a scenario where food prices go up as land is turned over to energy crops.

Officials from Senegal and the Dominican Republic cautioned that rich nations need to be involved to make sure multinational companies and farmers negotiate fair land agreements.

Copyright 2007 Associated Press.

U.S. farmers planted 92.9 million acres of corn in 2007, exceeding last year’s planted area by 19 percent and surpassing the March projection by 3 percent, according to the Acreage report released today by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS). The actual planted acreage is the highest since 1944, when farmers planted 95.5 million corn acres.

Driven by favorable prices, growing ethanol demand and strong export sales, farmers in nearly all states increased their corn acreage. They set state records in Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota and North Dakota, while Iowa continued to lead all states in total corn acres.

The increase in corn is offset mainly by fewer acres of soybeans in the Corn Belt and Great Plains, and fewer acres of cotton in the Delta and Southeast. Nationwide, NASS estimates planted soybean area at 64.1 million acres, down 15 percent from last year’s record high and down 5 percent from the March forecast. Area planted to cotton totals 11.1 million acres, marking a 28 percent drop from 2006 and the lowest level since 1989.

The Acreage report shows that the nation’s farmers continued to embrace biotechnology. Corn growers planted 73 percent of their acres with biotech seed varieties, an increase of 12 percent from 2006. Cotton farmers planted 87 percent of their acres with biotech varieties, up 4 percent from 2006, and soybean producers planted 91 percent of their acres with biotech seed, up 2 percent from 2006.

NASS’s acreage estimates are based on surveys conducted during the first two weeks of June on approximately 11,000 segments of land and from a sample of approximately 88,000 farm operators across the United States.

© 2007 Biofuel Review

BERLIN - Germany's biofuel companies hope for government support to keep their industry thriving. While critics say the environmental and social damages caused by the biofuel boom are severe, industry members say biofuels can be an important factor in the battle to stop global warming.

Both the United States and the European Union are heavily supporting the increased use of biofuels to drive down greenhouse gas emissions in the transportation sector.

At a summit earlier this year, the 27 EU member states agreed to increase the share of biofuels in transportation to at least 10 percent by 2020 -- a very ambitious goal, observers say.

"If we want to reach that goal, we need government support," Moritz Gaede, member of the executive board at Campa AG, a German biofuels firm, recently told a group of reporters in Berlin.

His call was supported by a German environmentalist, who said that much like the solar energy sector, which got a significant boost from a renewable energy feed-in tariff, the biofuel industry needed incentives.

"The market doesn't automatically care for climate protection; the state has to create those incentives," Gernot Klepper, environment and natural resources expert at the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, a Germany-based think tank for research in global economic affairs, said at the same news conference.

Klepper, in a presentation to reporters, said some 7.5 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions were saved in 2005 because of biofuels.

But biofuels are becoming increasingly controversial. For one, they have driven up food prices: Farmers are switching in droves from producing food crops to plants used for biofuel production, which is often subsidized. Palm, soybean and rapeseed oils are increasingly used for biofuels, and less wheat is produced, putting a strain on the poorest countries, which can hardly afford higher prices.

Moreover, biofuels lead to more land being used for agricultural purposes; in countries like Indonesia and Brazil, where palm oil is produced, this leads to rainforests being cut down, critics say.

Biofuel critics also argue that biofuels produce much more CO2 than is being said, if you count in the agricultural production cycle that includes heavy fertilizing and harvesting machinery.

On Thursday, a charity supporting farmers in developing countries sounded the loudest alarm yet. The charity, Grain, said their research shows that the biofuel boom is causing severe environmental and social damage.

"The wide-scale cultivation of agrofuels will actually make things worse in many parts of the world, notably southeast Asia and the Amazon basin, where the drying of peat lands and the felling of tropical forest will release far more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than will be saved by using agrofuels," the group said in a statement based on its research. "Farming is responsible for 14 percent of greenhouse gas emissions. Within farming, the largest single cause is the use of chemical fertilizers, which introduce a huge amount of nitrogen into the soil, and nitrous oxide into the air.

"Changing land use (mainly deforestation and thus linked to the expansion of crop monoculture) is responsible for another 18 percent. And a large part of global transport, which is responsible for a further 14 percent of emissions, stems from the way in which the agro-industrial complex moves large quantities of food from one continent to another."

Klepper did not agree with Grain's findings: He said biofuels' ecologic record is already better than most people say.

"In the past decade, the environmental balance of biofuels has dramatically improved," Klepper said. "Today, biofuels produced in Germany can replace roughly 70 percent of the fossil fuel."

The industry also hopes for so-called second-generation biofuels, which are based on biological waste digested by bacteria. They are, however, at least a decade away, according to current estimates.

Until then, Gaede said biofuels should be certified for their sustainability, to avoid social (child work) and environmental (deforestation) shortcomings in connection with their production.

Norbert Schmitz, of the environmental consulting agency Meo Consulting, has helped develop such a certification system for the German Agriculture Ministry, which will be tested within the coming years, he said. Companies in the 27 EU member states and key firms in Malaysia, India, Brazil and Argentina will take part in the test system, he added.

© Copyright 2007 United Press International, Inc.

Pubs could face rising prices and shortages of core food and drink products as an unforeseen consequence of increased investment in biofuels.

Suppliers are warning that farmers producing grain to make staples such as bread and beer are being incentivised by subsidies to sell to fuel producers instead. Grain used as feed for cattle and poultry is also in short supply.

The Bavarian Brewers Association, which represents German beer producers, said this week that beer prices are likely to rise because European farmers are abandoning barley to plant subsidised crops for sale to biofuel producers.

The UK government has set a target of 2010 for 5 per cent of all the fuel sold on forecourts to come from biofuels. This is forecast to save 1m tonnes of carbon a year, said to be the equivalent of taking 1m cars off the road.

However, charity Grain warned last week of the dangers of diverting grain from food to fuel production. The cautionary note came after BP announced plans to invest £200m in a biofuels plant in Hull, which will make ethanol from wheat.

The UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation has also said basic food prices in poor countries are being pushed up by competition for land from biofuels.

Copyright The Publican Publishing Ltd.

Catilin has come up with a way to let biodiesel manufacturers consume both of their major food groups: animal fat and vegetable oil.

The company, which was developed from research at Iowa State University, has devised a catalyst that allows fuel refiners to mix different types of oils together in the same manufacturing process. Currently, it's not easy for biodiesel manufacturers to process animal and vegetable oils together. The catalyst also eliminates a step in the oil-to-biodiesel process.

In all, the catalyst could cut processing prices by 30 cents a gallon, CEO Larry Lenhart said in an interview.

"Think of this nanocatalyst as an omnivore," said Erik Straser, a partner at Mohr Davidow Ventures, which was the lead investor in a $3 million initial round of funding for the company.

Mohr Davidow also announced it is participating in funding for ZeaChem, which says it has come up with a process that can extract far more ethanol out of rotting vegetable matter than competitors' processes. Using ZeaChem's method, nearly all of the carbon out of a pile of vegetable matter gets turned into fuel. Right now about one-third of the carbon in the corn ethanol process winds up as worthless carbon dioxide, which then adds to the levels of greenhouse gases.

ZeaChem hopes to have a million-gallon-a-year facility up and running in 12 to 18 months.

"There is no 'Frankenbug'," Straser said, referring to how some companies hope to create synthetic microbes to process cellulosic ethanol. "The enzyme cocktail is much simpler here. It works on a wider variety of feedstocks too."

Both biodiesel and ethanol are dependent upon feedstocks such as palm oil, sugarcane, and corn, which can fluctuate wildly in price and erode margins. Corn has doubled in price, from $2 a bushel to $4 a bushel, in the U.S. in the past year and whacked the profits of ethanol producers. Increased biodiesel demand is expected to make cooking oil prices spike in the coming years.

To ameliorate these problems, researchers are trying to come up with feedstocks with almost no value (like wood chips) instead of food crops (like corn), to reduce the amount of energy required to produce fuel, or figure out better ways of using the byproducts that result from the manufacturing process.

Ideally, the Catilin catalyst will let biodiesel refiners select from a wider variety of feedstocks, particularly the lower value ones such as old chicken fat. It also lowers the capital expenditure because one processing line can be used for a wider variety of oils.

Although the U.S. consumes a lot of meat, the store of leftover animal fat isn't large enough to get the country off of imported oil. Even if all the animal fat and tallow from slaughterhouses were converted to biodiesel, it would produce only a billion or so gallons of fuel a year, or about a percent of the amount of diesel consumed, according to statistics from University of Minnesota professor Vernon Eidman. Still, a billion gallons of fuel a year could sell for about $3 billion. To capitalize on the opportunity, pork and poultry giant Tyson Foods and ConocoPhilips announced plans to build a refinery.

The catalyst also isn't absorbed by the oil, so it can be reused. Straser further asserted that the catalyst will cut the costs of biodiesel refiners that mix meat and vegetable oils as well as those that want to stay vegetarian.

How does it work? The catalyst is a hollow, porous sphere. The outside of the sphere reacts with one type of oil to strip away glycerol while the inside sphere reacts with a different oil.

ZeaChem, meanwhile, has created an enzyme that converts plant matter made of sugar into acetic acid, which is then used in the ethanol conversion process. The techniques used by the company result in less carbon being burned off. ZeaChem's system also takes advantage of lignin, a high-energy material in plants that is extracted during the initial stages of making cellulosic ethanol and reused in a later part of the process.

What's more attractive: biodiesel or ethanol? Straser says his firm is investing in both, but indicated that biodiesel may have a lead. Ethanol, after all, is mostly being emphasized in the U.S. and Brazil and is not as popular globally.

"Net, net, it's a better fuel," he said. "Overall, the world is turning toward diesel."

Others, such as Michele Rubino of Navigant Consulting, side with ethanol, noting that the subsidies are higher on some types of biodiesel.

Copyright ©2007 CNET Networks, Inc

BEIJING - China is likely to face raw material shortages for an increasing number of ethanol plants until the technology matures to enable conversion of agricultural waste into biofuel.

Industry officials, gathered for a biofuel conference in Beijing, said China might also be short of sweet potatoes and sweet sorghum for ethanol projects, prompted by Beijing's limits on the use of corn for fuel ethanol out of concern that it could cause a shortage of food.

PetroChina, listed arm of the China National Petroleum Corp. (CNPC), was conducting a feasibility study for a 100,000-tonne-per-year sweet potato-based ethanol plant in the southwest province of Sichuan, a company official said.

The plant will be located in Sichuan's Nanchong, Li Jianxin, a senior engineer with PetroChina Planning and Engineering Institute, told Reuters on the sidelines of the biofuel conference organised by IBC Asia Pte Ltd.

His remark followed an announcement this month by China Agri-Industries Holdings Ltd. , a listed arm of state-owned grains group COFCO, that it was to build a similar plant in the eastern province of Jiangsu province.

Industry officials said other developers were also working on similar sweet potatobased ethanol projects in the central province of Hubei and Hebei.

With oil prices hovering around $70 a barrel and Beijing promoting biofuels to wean the country from imported oil, many ethanol projects have sprouted in China, especially as local officials are keen to boost rural economies.

This has already helped push up domestic corn prices towards record highs ahead of the 2007 harvest and after a bumper crop last year. "China cannot follow the path of the United States and Brazil in developing ethanol. China's raw material supplies are insufficient," said Li Guiying, a researcher with the Research Centre for Biomass at the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences.

Worried that high corn prices might fuel inflation and undermine the country's food security, Beijing has recently introduced a series of measures to curb the use of corn by processors, including fuel ethanol.

Beijing has said that production of the crops used in making power should not take land away from its grains production. China feeds 21 percent of the world's population with its 7 percent of the world's cultivated land. "Supplies of feedstocks like sweet potatoes and sorghum grown on marginal land are very limited," Feng Han, manager at new business development for Du Pont (China) Research and Development and Management Co. Ltd, told Reuters.

"That does not support scale production of ethanol," said Han.

"Cellulose ethanol will be the future. China has a large amount of stalks from wheat, rice and corn."

Han said Du Pont Co. was looking for a Chinese partner for cellulose ethanol, and that it hoped to start commercial production by 2010 or 2011.

The industry officials estimated about 200 million tonnes of stalks would be available for ethanol production in China.

With a boom in ethanol made from corn or sugar threatening food supplies even in countries such as the United States, many firms, including Du Pont, are racing to develop a commercially viable technology for cellulose-based ethanol.

China Agri-Industries, China's top fuel ethanol producer, is also working with Danish enzyme supplier Novozymes A/S on such technology and it is investing 50 million yuan to build a pilot plant to covert cellulose-based biomass into fuel ethanol in the northeastern province of Heilongjiang.

© Reuters 2007.

WASHINGTON - The Energy Department is creating three bioenergy research centers to find new ways to turn plants into fuel.

The three centers, which the department described as three start-up companies with $125 million each in capital, will be in Oak Ridge, Tenn.; Madison, Wis.; and near Berkeley, Calif. They will involve numerous universities, national laboratories and private companies. The goal of the centers, which are to be announced on Tuesday, is to bring new technologies to market within five years.

The new approach supports President Bush’s goal of reducing gasoline consumption by 20 percent in 10 years.

The bioenergy centers will focus on finding naturally occurring microbes that can break down lignin, a component of plants and trees, to give access to the material inside, called cellulose. The cellulose can be converted into ethanol or other liquid fuels, like butanol and biodiesel, said Raymond L. Orbach, the under secretary for science at the Energy Department.

Today, companies trying to commercialize cellulosic ethanol use heat and acids, an expensive process.

They have focused on the cellulose itself, which is made up of six-carbon sugars, the kind that is found in grains that have been turned into fermented products like beer for thousands of years, and of five-carbon sugars, which cannot be fermented by ordinary means. These are bound together tightly, and must be loosened by biological processes.

“There has been tremendous progress,” Dr. Orbach said. “But if you don’t fix the front end, the back end isn’t going be very efficient.”

The centers will also work on creating new crops that produce lignin that is easier to deal with, he said.

Ethanol is increasingly used as a gasoline substitute, but that has driven up the price of corn. “There’s a lot of biomass in our country that has nothing to do with corn or any other food,” Dr. Orbach said in an interview. One such plentiful plant often mentioned is switch grass.

In another area, the department announced Monday that it would help establish laboratories in Texas and Massachusetts to test designs for wind turbine blades up to 300 feet long, about twice the length of blades now in common use. The size of wind turbines in use has tripled in the last five years and could triple again, but this would require blades of lighter materials that are three times the length of the longest blade that can be reliably tested now in this country, said Andrew Karsner, assistant secretary for energy efficiency and renewable energy.

The two announcements are part of a highly public campaign by the Bush administration to stress its commitment to renewable energy.

One of the new bioenergy centers will be led by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, an Energy Department lab in Tennessee. Participants include another lab, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Golden, Colo.; the Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta; the University of Georgia, Athens, and the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.

A Great Lakes center, in Madison, Wis., will be led by the University of Wisconsin, and will include Michigan State University, East Lansing; the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Richland, Wash.; the Lucigen Corporation, Middleton, Wis.; the University of Florida, Gainesville; Oak Ridge National Laboratory; Illinois State University, Normal; and Iowa State University, Ames.

The third, the Joint Bioenergy Institute, will be led by the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California, and will include Sandia National Laboratories; Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory; the University of California, Berkeley; the University of California, Davis; and Stanford. Dr. Orbach said that the centers’ geographic diversity would help researchers examine a wide range of plants.

The centers, each to be financed by $25 million a year, are supposed to be fully operational by the fiscal year beginning Sept. 1, 2009.

Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Researchers have made a new type of biofuel with more energy than ethanol, and which can be produced more quickly and efficiently than other biofuels.

At present biofuel - most commonly in the form of ethanol - is produced biologically, using microorganisms to break down raw biomass into simple sugars, which are then fermented to produce ethanol.

Ethanol is a far from perfect fuel - its production can be slow and the amount of energy it produces is vastly less than conventional fuels such as petroleum.

James Dumesic, from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the United States, and colleagues have created a new biofuel, dimethylfuran (DMF), using a combination of conventional biological and new chemical methods.

Their approach is quicker than the biological method and uses far less energy than existing chemical procedures.

They first use microorganism-derived enzymes to break down raw carbohydrate chains into fructose (a simple sugar). Then an acid and a metal are used to catalyse reactions that remove oxygen molecules from the mix - minimal oxygen being more desirable in transportation fuel.

Although DMF has not yet been tested as a fuel, Dumesic says it is superior to ethanol in several ways.

It boils at 20 degrees Celsius higher than ethanol, meaning it remains as a liquid in the fuel tank and becomes a vapour in the engine - necessary for a fuel.

DMF also has a 40 per cent higher energy density than ethanol, requiring a smaller fuel tank, and repels water, so the fuel won't absorb moisture from the air like ethanol.

Dumesic says DMF, like ethanol, could be used as a fuel additive to increase fuel efficiency and ensure cleaner emissions.

He adds that part of the production process is similar to methods now used by the petroleum industry, making it easier to scale up production.

But he warns that safety and environmental testing are needed before widespread use of DMF as a possible blending agent for transport fuels can be considered.

Copyright SciDevNet

Washington, D.C., June 22, 2007—The Senate last night passed anti-energy legislation that will, if enacted, increase prices for consumers on an array of goods, including gasoline, automobiles and food, while doing nothing to increase supplies of affordable energy.

“The current legislation mandates the production of billions of gallons in subsidized ethanol while simultaneously criminalizing ‘excessive’ gas prices at the pump,” said Myron Ebell, Director of Energy Policy at the Competitive Enterprise Institute. “The real price gouging is not being perpetrated by oil companies, but by the Senate, by forcing drivers to buy higher-priced ethanol.”

The bill also contains provisions which sharply increase corporate average fuel economy (CAFE) standards for new vehicles and higher efficiency standards for a wide range of electrical appliances. Both provisions were adopted despite research showing that appliance efficiency rules have led to downgraded performance and that fuel economy regulations make