Cellulosic Ethanol Feedstock- Will Switchgrass be the Best Choice?

posted by Sumukee @ 5:02 AM | Tuesday, September 29, 2009 0 Comments

As discussed in my previous posts, the cellulosic biomass constitutes to be the most abundant biological matter in the planet. Almost anything and everything can be used as a cellulosic biomass. Plants such as switch grass have been recognized as the best bionergy crops for producing cellulosic ethanol.

Benefits of using Switch grass:

1. They are perennial bionergy crops.
2. They have high energy efficiency.
3. Comparatively, they are economically feasible.
4. It does not require as much nitrogen as a corn crop and is harvested once per year
5. Switchgrass produce 13 times more energy from the crop than is put in, which exceed soybeans at 3:1 or sugarcane at 8:1.
6. The advantage of switchgrass is that it is drought resistant, making it less of a burden on irrigation supply, and produces more energy than corn.
7. Switchgrass and corn ethanol reduces greenhouse gas emissions up to 90%. Such ethanol produces 80% more energy as compared to the amount of energy used for processing.
8. Estimated average greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from switchgrass were 94% lower than estimated average greenhouse gas GHG from gasoline .

Commercialization of Switchgrass :

Switchgrass can be a prospering renewable fuel in the future. Many companies have started building refineries that convert biomass to ethanol. Some companies are producing improved strains of yeast and enzymes that can produce better switchgrass and corn ethanol in the future.

These developments will open new doors of opportunities for farmers, investors, biotechnology firms, and project developers in near future. Some companies are trying to produce switchgrass from the wastes generated during the production of cellulosic ethanol.

Improvements and developments in the field of genetics, biotechnology and agronomics may further enhance the sustainability and biofuel yield of switchgrass. Research is underway in finding the best bioenergy crop for cellulosic ethanol.

For those of the scientific bent - Full article

Labels: bioenergy, cellulosic ethanol, energy, Ethanol, switchgrass

Cellulosic Sugar to Cellulosic Ethanol has been made much easier by the London Company...

posted by Sumukee @ 4:37 AM | Monday, September 28, 2009 0 Comments

Comet Biorefining, a London company, is a leader in the field of biomass conversion and biomass pretreatment. Comet's knowledge and experience in the pretreatment of biomass spans numerous raw materials and many end use applications. This sustainability company has announced a new sugar technology to digest a wide range of cellulosic biomass and convert it into ethanol fuels.

This cellulosic ethanol technology employs cellulosic ethanol feedstock such as wood chips, switch grass and corn cobs to produce cellulosic sugars and then convert it into fuels. For the production of these cheap pre-treatment methods were used and these sugars were shipped to the biorefineries wherein they are converted into ethanol.

The greatest advantage with this cellulosic sugar is the fact that if remains stable for a long-time even after pre-treatment due to its high –density. Hence, this advantage makes it possible to be shipped or transported to biorefineries in farther places as well.

This breakthrough will definitely reduce the capital and operating costs of the biofuel companies , whooonly processes the cellulosic sugar for bioethanol . This will further help them to focus more on developing better enzyme technology to carry out the steps to make biofuel from the broken down sugar.
Comet Biorefining has demonstrated this unique technology at pilot scale and estimates that cellulosic sugar can be produced for as low as 7 cents per pound based on laboratory testing. Comet Biorefining plans to build a demonstration facility in 2010 and partner with biofuels technology developers to provide them with cellulosic sugar for their processes. Comet Biorefining's goal is to license its Cellulosic Sugar Technology worldwide.

Pilot and demonstration plants have shown promising results, and the London company believes that even small pretreatment plants can provide cellulosic sugars for large biofuel industries thereby making their biofuel production economically viable.

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Labels: bioenergy, biofuel, cellulosic ethanol, wood-chips, woody biomass

2G biofuels from non- food crops will replace fossil fuels

posted by Sumukee @ 12:19 AM | Saturday, September 26, 2009 0 Comments

2G biofuel sources includes almost all the non- food crops available on earth. Yup! I am talking about the cellulosic biomass, which is considered to be the most abundant biological material present in the planet. Cellulosic biomass is anything and everything such as waste, woody biomass, weeds such as Miscanthus. Many people believe the idea of cellulose based ethanol due to the fact that it used inedible waste products to produce Ethanol and this will even the solve the problems of waste disposal.

Producing cellulosic ethanol is still in its nascency, due to the fact that pretreatment procedures have still not been made economically viable. With the help of Synthetic Biology, 15 new fungal enzyme catalysts have been identified. These enzymes are considered to be stable and can easily digest the cellulosic biomass into sugars at high temperatures. Efforts are on the way to identify more organisms to easily break-down the cellulosic biomass, mostly derived from the waste.


Reference to this link will give you additional details about the recent discovery of a new fungus which which produces myco-diesel from waste. Improvements in Biotechnology, plant genetics and recombinant engineering technology are sure to exploit the biofuel potential from cellulosic biomass in the near future.

Labels: bioenergy, biofuel, cellulosic ethanol, energy, Ethanol

The Cellulosic Ethanol Story...

posted by Sumukee @ 7:04 AM | Friday, September 25, 2009 0 Comments

Fuel ethanol produced from substances like Cellulose can contribute significantly to reducing the use of petroleum and will help a great deal in solving the energy crisis. Developments in science and technology in a number of disciplines are required to make cellulosic ethanol dream come true.

Cellulose is the most abundant biological molecule in the world. Cellulose is a polymer of sugar. Polymers are large molecules made up of simpler molecules bound together much like links in a chain. Cellulose is a polymer of glucose, a simple sugar that is easily consumed by yeast to produce ethanol. Cellulose is produced by every living plant on the earth, from single-celled algae in the oceans to giant redwood trees. This means that cellulose is the most abundant biological molecule in the world.

The way it works is as follows:

The cellulose chains are broken down into individual links thereby releasing which can be further used to produce ethanol to be used as a fuel. Many companies like Iogen, NREL, Mascoma are employing their own enzymes to make this industry reach great heights. You can refer to my previous post, if you wish to know more details about the technology employed by the top leaders in the Cellulosic Ethanol Industry.

Conventional Ethanol Vs Cellulosic Ethanol:

Cellulosic Ethanol has a number of advantages when compared to the conventional ethanol. Differences between conventional ethanol and cellulosic ethanol have also been highlighted in my previous post. They share a lot of similarities as well . The technology for fermentation,distillation and recovery of the ethanol are the same.

Challenges faced by the Cellulosic Ethanol Indusry :

The major challenges are linked to reducing the costs associated with production, harvest, transportation, and up-front processing in order to make cellulosic ethanol competitive with grain-based fuel ethanol and gasoline.

The major processing challenges are linked to the biology and chemistry of the processing steps. Plant genetics research and biotechnology are giving researchers the tools to increase agricultural yield of cellulosic plant material that is tailor-made for conversion to biofuels.Advances in biotechnology and engineering will help a great deal in achieving the goal of making CE a reality

Issues with the Pre-treatment technology:

This is done to soften the cellulosic material to make the cellulose more susceptible to being broken down. There are some issues in pretreatment of cellulosic ethanol.. Better understanding of the chemistry of plant cell walls and the chemical reactions that occur during pretreatment is leading to improvements in these technologies which lower the cost for producing ethanol. The leading pretreatment technologies under development use a combination of chemicals (water, acid, caustics, and/or ammonia) and heat to partially break down the cellulose or convert it into a more reactive form.

I, along with companies like Iogen, TMO renewables ,Mascoma and many other sustainable minds believe that Cellulosic Ethanol will soon definetely solve the enrgy- crisis.

Full report

Labels: bioenergy, Bioenergy Enzymes, cellulosic ethanol, energy, Ethanol

Cellulosic Ethanol Commercialization will be a Dream Come True!

posted by Sumukee @ 3:43 AM | 0 Comments

Many companies like DuPont Danisco Cellulosic Ethanol, Iogen Corporation , Lignol, POET and Pure Vision Technology, have already produced cellulosic ethanol from demonstration plants or will do so within the year. Most are processing about 1 ton of material into ethanol daily. From that ton of biomass, they are producing between 70 gallons and 85 gallons of biofuels. Commercial production is expected to follow by 2010 or 2011.

Although financing obstacles might derail the below mentioned efforts by some top companies, experts believe that around 300 million gallons of cellulosic ethanol will be available for use.

For example, Coskata’s process is far more robust than originally estimated because the company can process cellulosic feedstock from agricultural sources, urban land waste, forests and a variety of manufacturing waste materials. Company officials also said once the process is perfected, ethanol from cellulosic sources would become price competitive with gasoline without any federal tax credit.

Another company which requires a special mention is POET. POET, the world’s largest ethanol producer, is currently working with agricultural equipment manufacturers and farmers to find the best way to harvest cellulosic feedstock. They are already producing cellulosic ethanol from corn cobs at a pilot-scale plant in Scotland apart and is also planning to produce a 25 million gallon producing cellulosic ethanol plant.

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Labels: bioenergy, cellulosic ethanol, energybioenergy

Will Cellulosic Ethanol be a reality?

posted by Sumukee @ 2:44 AM | 0 Comments

Things are working out well for corn- based ethanol industries in the US with the aid of top British companies such as TMO renewable. But will this somehow help the cellulosic ethanol industry to rise?

TMO renewable, a world leader in Ethanol industry in the UK has brought in the use of compost bacterium found in compost heaps which would help the U. S ethanol industry to a very great extent; it is retro-fitted to the US corn ethanol plant. This microorganism helps a great deal in greening the cellulosic ethanol industry as well as make America’ s ethanol industry profitable.

The preceding paragraph will tell you how!

This British company provides a plug-in which can be attached to a biofuel plant. This will increase output by recycling a by-product of the initial fuel run. This plug–in further reduces the carbon- dioxide emissions and saves about 50 percent green house gas emissions.

Interestingly, the TMO technology uses the by-product from the US ethanol industry and further converts it into ethanol by further increasing its yield by about 15 percent. This saves energy to a considerable extent, thereby increasing profits by about 50- 60%.

The problem faced here is that many firms want to develop so-called second generation fuels which use non-edible products such as corn stover, the stalks and leaves of the corn plant, or even municipal waste and the issue here is, it is challenging to find ways to transport sufficient volumes of these products to make commercial quantities of fuel.

Moving millions of tons of cellulosic biomass from the filed to the factory remains as a big obstacle. If this problem is overcome then Cellulosic Ethanol will be a reality. It is quite a lengthy process and experts believe that it will take about 12 and 18 months to make CE a reality.

TMO is trying to collaborate with countries like China and they have planned to convert waste products such as rice straw or wood waste to biofuel.

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Labels: bioenergy, cellulosic ethanol, energy, Ethanol

Why not Poplar Pulp to produce Ethanol?

posted by Sumukee @ 12:52 AM | 0 Comments

As discussed in my earlier post, poplar pulp is an excellent source of cellulosic biomass. The poplar trees grow to a height of about 10 feet a year. When they grow they completely change a desert into a forest.

Earlier, this was used to produce paper, but energy entrepreneurs now believe that the poplar pulp can be used to produce ethanol and they are ready to begin investments to ascend the biofuel industry.

To date there are not many commercial-scale cellulose-to-ethanol plants operating in North America. Most of the plants are in a pilot or demonstration stage, and, like the ZeaChem project near Boardman mentioned below which are still under development.
Mentioned below are some efforts by some cellulosic biomass to ethanol companies.

1. ZeaChem, formed in 2002 near Boardman, is using a technology that harnesses the same bacteria used by termites as they feast on wood. They plan to invest about $34 million to build a biomass plant. This was planned even earlier, however, the regions farms and economies but the first three biofuel industries which was started few years back crashed.

They employ a technology wherein, the bacteria break down the cellulose into acetic acid and then eventually into ethanol and ethyl acetate. This ethyl acetate is used as a solvent in varnishes and lacquers.

ZeaChem researchers say that this process allows a more complete conversion of cellulose to ethanol, offering a fuel yield more than fivefold greater than an acre of corn and considerably more than other cellulosic technologies.

Zeachem has planned to develop two of its biomass plants

- One of the first investments in this region will be near Boardman, where construction is scheduled to begin later this year on a demonstration plant that will produce about 1.2 million gallons a year of ethanol from poplar.
- A second corn-ethanol plant near Boardman still operates. But the plant is in Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization as its parent company, Pacific Ethanol, struggles to pay off debts.

2. Imperium, a company which has its biomass plant in Scotland is idle. It was actually constructed to use Canadian Canola.

Efforts ar underway to bring in the involvement of federal government’s involvement as it will help a great deal in the expansion of the biofuels industry . Federal governments support is expected to make poplar ethanol conversion to ethanol a dream come true. A federal mandate requires the production of 36 billion gallons of ethanol and other biofuels by 2022. The law calls for some 15 billion gallons of that fuel to come from wood, wheat straw, corncobs or other cellulosic materials rather than foods such as corn or sugar cane.

However, producing cellulosic ethanol are still facing a lot of hurdles and is still a costly undertaking when compared to converting starch or sugar to ethanol.

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Labels: bioenergy, Biomass, cellulosic ethanol, Ethanol, poplar pulp

Companies Investing in Cellulosic Ethanol

posted by Sumukee @ 2:04 PM | Thursday, September 24, 2009 0 Comments

Here is a list of companies who have invested in Cellulosic Ethanol.

1. Iogen

Iogen requires a special mention as they are the world leaders in the field of cellulosic ethanol. Operates a demonstration scale facility to convert biomass to cellulose ethanol using enzymatic hydrolysis technology. Full scale commercial facilities are being planned.

2. Mascoma

Mascoma is developing bio and process technology for cost-effective conversion of cellulosic biomass.

3. TMO renewables

Yet another leader in the field of cellulosic ethanol is TMO renewables. They celebrated milestone in their UK facility a few days back.

For those interested - List of the top companies investing in Cellulosic Ethanol.

Labels: bioenergy, biofuel, Biomass, cellulosic ethanol

Cellulosic Ethanol - Biofuel of the near future !

posted by Sumukee @ 6:20 AM | 0 Comments

This post showcases facts about why cellulosic ethanol is believed to be the biofuel of choice in the near future.

Experts in this field claim that fuel derived from waste products like cellulosic ethanol is the best long term solution as it is made from non food crops. The main advantage of using ethanol is that the existing car can just run with 10 percent ethanol blended with gasoline. We believe chances are good that (conventional) ethanol and cellulosic ethanol will become a more widely accepted fuel, especially in light of global energy issues.

The toughest hurdle to hoe for this fuel alternative, what scientists in this field believe, is that the capacity of a given cellulosic ethanol production facility must be sized and located correctly to minimize transportation costs related to both the feedstock and the finished product.

Companies such as Iogen have been producing cellulosic ethanol and many Canadians vehicles were filled by the 10 percent ethanol produced by the Iogen facility. As E10 is an alcohol based fuel it might damage the engine if excess blend of ethanol is fed into it. Hence, the Canadian Renewable Fuels Association include a stainless steel fuel tank and Teflon fuel hoses which will prevent the parts of the engine being damaged.

Another advantage of cellulosic ethanol is its non-grain content could fuel a wider field of acceptance than conventional ethanol because it lessens the likelihood of food riots such as those that broke out last year in Africa, Mexico and Haiti over surging corn prices.

Additionally, the cellulosic ethanol has a kernel-free makeup and is, hence, beleived to overcome the maze of issues surrounding maize and other world's crop allotments.

As discussed in my previous posts, Cellulosic ethanol can also be from discarded corn stalks, barley straw, wood chips and sawdust, switch grass, algae and municipal solid wastes such as newsprint, table scraps and landscaping debris among other renewable organic materials which makes it the best feedstock to derive energy to run vehicles.

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Labels: bioenergy, biofuel, cellulosic ethanol, energy

Cellulosic Ethanol Vs Corn

posted by Sumukee @ 3:16 AM | 0 Comments

Ethanol production is different when cellulosic biomass is used as the raw material. For ethanol production, fossil energy inputs into the production cycle represent about 2/3 of the energy content of the ethanol produced, and greenhouse gas emissions on a per mile basis are about 2/3 of a gasoline base case, representing an approximately 33% reduction. Ethanol from Cellulosic biomass shows a better energy balance and is sustainable as well.

The reasons why I think cellulosic ethanol can be used against corn

1. Corn is easier, and currently less expensive, to process into ethanol than is cellulosic biomass. However, cellulosic biomass is less expensive to produce than corn by a factor of roughly 2 on a per ton basis, and the amount of ethanol that can be produced per acre of land.

2. For ethanol produced from cellulosic biomass, the energy balance and greenhouse gas emissions are more favorable when compared to corn

3. Relative to corn, production of a perennial cellulosic biomass crop such as switch grass requires lower inputs of energy, fertilizer, pesticide, and herbicide, and is accompanied by less erosion and improved soil fertility.

4. Finally, cellulosic biomass differs from corn kernels in that it contains substantial amounts of non-fermentable, energy-rich components that can be used to provide energy for the conversion process as well as to produce electricity.

Labels: bioenergy, biofuel, cellulosic ethanol, energy

D1 Oils, Abundant Biofuels Report Progress in Jatropha Development

posted by Mak @ 4:10 AM | Friday, August 28, 2009 1 Comments

Labels: bioenergy, biofuel, energy, Jatropha

Miscanthus in a Nutshell

posted by Sumukee @ 6:21 AM | Wednesday, July 15, 2009 0 Comments

As discussed earlier, Miscanthus is a promising non-food crop yielding high quality lignocellulosic material which can be used in a number of ways, including energy and fibre production, thatching, and industrial use.

A recent report published by Earthscan publications explains in detail 'Miscanthus -- For Energy and Fibre', encompasses the results and recommendations arising from extensive trials and experiments carried out by the leading European research organizations and institutions in the field.

Much of the research was performed under the auspices of the Miscanthus Productivity Network, established under European Union's Directorate General for Agriculture (DG VI)

.This book is believed to present expert guidance to growth conditions and breeding of Miscanthus, potential productivity and economics, environmental aspects, and harvesting, storage and utilization.

For all the sustainable minds - Miscanthus bioenergy

Labels: bioenergy, biofuel, Miscanthus