The European Association of Sugar Manufacturers (CEFS), the European Confederation of Maize Production (CEPM), the International Confederation of European Beet Growers (CIBE), and the European renewable ethanol producers association (ePURE) have issued a joint letter to the European Commission to voice their opposition to phasing out conventional biofuels in Europe.

The letter warns that phasing out conventional ethanol produced from crops would not be scientifically justified, will rob transport of a credible green alternative, and will cost European cereal and beet farmers at least €2.1 billion in revenue annually. In order to sustain Europe's biofuels policy post-2020, they should support the European biofuels sector. The authors also call for the EU to ensure that imported biofuels are regulated and managed to the same criteria that govern biofuels produced in Europe.

The Malaysian government will push back its implementation of its B10 mandate to a later date, according to the Minister of Plantation Industries and Commodities, Mah Siew Keong.

The government was set to introduce the B10 biodiesel mandate for the transportation and industrial sector starting 1 December, 2016. However, the move was made after a comprehensive study taking into account the difference between the prices of crude palm oil (CPO) and diesel on the market. It is now unclear when Malaysia will implement the initiative.

The B10 programme, a mixture of 10% palm biodiesel with 90% petroleum diesel, was to be rolled out gradually, beginning with the state of Johor. The B7 program for the nationwide industrial sector was also due to start on the same date.

Manas Agro Industries and Infrastructure Limited (MAIIL) of the city has developed a process that can produce bio-CNG (compressed natural gas) from molasses that can be used as fuel for vehicles. MAIIL is already planning to set up bio-CNG dispensing units in the Nagpur City in about 8-9 months.

In the procedure, molasses generated from sugar manufacture is mixed with rectified spirit and ethanol, forming sludge. This sludge is used to produce methane which is then purified and filled in cascades at high pressure. Some sludge residues can also be used as fertilizer.

However, the government still needs to make changes in rules and infrastructure to allow use of bio-CNG as fuel. The government should allow converting existing vehicles such as scooters or three wheelers into CNG-friendly vehicles by attaching a conversion kit in it. Old vehicles should also be permitted to be converted into bio-CNG vehicles.

Drought affects lignocellulosic crop biomass yields and composition, and thus, biofuel yield. However, the effect of drought on downstream fermentation processes has never been directly described. To investigate the impact of climate variability on biofuel production, Michigan State University's Rebecca Garlock Ong and her team, collected corn stover and switchgrass for a period of 3 years with significantly different precipitation profiles.

All feedstocks were pretreated and hydrolyzed, and the hydrolysates were separately fermented using Saccharomyces cerevisiae and Zymomonas mobilis. Most corn stover and switchgrass hydrolysates were readily fermented. However, the growth of S. cerevisiae was completely inhibited in hydrolysate from drought-stressed switchgrass. Analysis found that strains deficient in genes related to protein trafficking within the cell were more resistant to the drought-stressed switchgrass hydrolysate. Further analysis revealed that drought-stressed switchgrass accumulated greater concentrations of soluble sugars in response to drought, and these sugars were then degraded during ammonia-based pretreatment.

Variations in environmental conditions during the growth of bioenergy crops were found to be capable of significant detrimental effects on fermentation organisms that are involved in biofuel production.

Flowthrough pretreatment is capable of removing high quantities of hemicellulose and lignin from plant biomass than batch pretreatment. Hence, the team of Samarthya Bhagia from University of California Riverside compared these two pretreatments in terms of sugar yields and lignin removal in hopes of gaining insights into lignocellulosic biomass deconstruction.

The team applied flowthrough and batch pretreatments using either liquid hot water (LHW) or extremely diluted acid (EDA) to poplar at two temperatures (140°C and 180°C). The solid composition, sugar yields, and lignin removal from pretreatment and enzymatic hydrolysis were analyzed.

LWH flowthrough pretreatment of poplar removed between 63-69% lignin, while batch pretreatments removed about 20-33% lignin at similar conditions. EDA slightly enhanced lignin removal in flowthrough pretreatment. Close to 100% total sugar yields were also measured from LHW and EDA flowthrough pretreatments. The high lignin removal by flowthrough pretreatment enhanced cellulose digestibility compared to batch pretreatment, consistent with lignin being a key contributor to biomass recalcitrance.

Results show that flowthrough pretreatment removes about 65–70% of lignin before it can form lignin rich fragments that deposit on the biomass surface in batch operations and hinder enzyme action. However, the leftover 30–35% lignin in poplar is still a key player in biomass recalcitrance to enzymatic deconstruction and might be harder to remove from the biomass with low temperature pretreatment.