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News and Trendshttp://www.biofuels-news.com/news/world_demand_100mt.html The Biofuels International website reports on a study of world biofuel outlook and trends, conducted by the industry research firm, The Freedonia Group. Some of the highlights are: (1) the annual increase in global biofuel demand is predicted to be about 20% per year and will reach about 92 million tons in 2011, (2) The Asia/Pacific region and western Europe will experience faster advances in the biofuel market. There will be “above average increases in small African and eastern European markets, while Latin America will continue to grow modestly due to Brazil’s already sizeable bioethanol market”, (3) In the European Union, the increase in biofuel demand is buoyed up by heightened concerns about global warming/climate change. In many Asia/Pacific countries, economic development seems to be the main driver for the institution of increasing biofuel development programs, (4) Due to efforts at reducing dependence on imported oil, and for economic reasons, the development of cereal based (corn, wheat) bioethanol feedstocks will continue to be favored. In Latin America, sugarcane remains the bioethanol source. For biodiesel, the major feedstocks are soybean in the Americas, rapeseed in Europe and palm oil/jatropha in Asia/Paficic countries, (4) Technologies for the production of cellulosic-ethanol and algae-biodiesel will be “commercially significant in the long term”.. http://www.biofuels-news.com/news/petrosun_farm.html The first commercial algae farm for the production of biofuels in the United States is planned for development in South Padre Island Texas, by an American energy company, PetroSun. The oil extracted from the algae will be used for the production of biodiesel. The 1,831 acre site will provide 157 algae ponds for a potential oil production of about 9 to 15 million gallons per year. The biofuels international website reports that although US Defense Department estimates that production cost of algae oil to be over $20 per gallon, “algae-based research and development is increasing”..
http://www.biofuels-news.com/news/shell_virent.html A leading energy company (Shell) and a pioneering company on Aqueous Phase Reforming (APR) technology (Virent), have agreed on a collaborative research and development effort to develop "biopetrol" or "biogasoline" from biomass-derived sugars. According to the joint press release by Shell and Virent, the R and D effort could "herald the availability of new biofuels that can be used at high blend rates in standard gasoline engines". This would obviate the need for special engine modifications or blending equipment, usually required for the case of high-ethanol-blended (greater than 20% or 30% ) fuels. The biofuels international website also reports that biopetrol has a higher energy content and a better fuel efficiency. Related information on the Aqueous Phase Reforming Process at https://selectra.co.uk/energy/guides/market/energy-center-of-wisconsin
http://jeq.scijournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/37/2/318 In the March-April 2008 issue of the Journal of Environmental Quality, American scientists from the University of Maryland, University of Arkansas, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Cornell University and Kansas State University, assessed and reported the potential impacts of large scale corn ethanol and cellulose ethanol production on nutrient/animal management, as they relate to water quality. Increased plantations of corn could lead to increases in the nitrogen and phosphorus losses to water. These nutrient losses were estimated to be about 37% for nitrogen and 25% for phosphorous. Measures to mitigate these nutrient losses, such as the use of distiller’s dried grains (DDG) as animal feed to increase manure phosphorus and nitrogen content in soils, were recommended. The technology for the production of ethanol from cellulosic feedstocks (“cellulosic ethanol”) was also seen to have a potential to provide water quality benefits.. Energy Crops and Feedstocks for Biofuels Production
http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1523-1739.2007.00879.x?prevSearch=allfield%3A%28Martha+Groom%29 An essay written by Dr. Martha Groom and colleagues from the University of Washington, presents some guidelines related to assessing and certifying biodiversity-friendly feedstocks: (1) biofuel crop cultivation must use environmentally safe and biodiversity-friendly agricultural practices, (2) “the ecological footprint of a biofuel, in terms of the land area needed to grow sufficient quantities of the feedstock, should be minimized”, and (3) high priority should be given to biofuels which have net negative or zero carbon balance, when “viewed over the entire production life cycle”. Corn as feedstock for bioethanol is said to be one of the most “environmentally damaging” among current biofuel feedstocks. The use of algae and fast growing trees as biofuel sources are seen to have more fuel yield per acre, compared to other currently used feedstocks. The paper is published in the journal, “Conservation Biology” (URL above)..
http://newsroom.msu.edu/site/indexer/3363/content.htm In the manufacture of “corn ethanol”, only the starchy portion of the grains, are utilized for ethanol production. The corn leaves and stalks (which are cellulosic in nature) are not usually used for ethanol production, and often end up in the soil or as animal fodder. The production of “cellulose ethanol” from plant biomass (such as leaves/stalks of corn) is often limited by the high cost of cellulose-degrading enzymes (called, “cellulases”). Cellulases liberate ethanol-fermentable sugars from the cellulose fibers in plants. Recently, however, scientists from Michigan State University (MSU in the United States) may have found a way to produce “cellulose ethanol” from the leaves and stalks in corn, without the high cost of cellulases. They have successfully inserted genes for three types of cellulases in a corn plant, called, “Spartan III”. These three types of cellulases can work synergistically to liberate as much sugar as possible, from corn cellulose fibers. The inserted cellulase genes were obtained from three different sources: a hot spring bacterium, a fungus and a cow gut bacterium. In order to prevent the plant from “digesting itself” while growing, the production of the enzyme was targeted in the vacuole of the plant cell. According to the MSU press release, the “vacuole is a safe place to store the enzyme until the plant is harvested”, and since the enzyme is stored only in the vacuole of green tissues in plant cells, “the enzyme is only produced in the leaves and stalks of the plant, not in the seeds, roots or the pollen. It is only active when used for biofuels production since it is stored in the vacuole.”. Biofuels Processing
http://ethanol-news.newslib.com/story/8483-348/ The Gekkeikan General Research Institute has a novel production technology for ethanol which utilizes cellulosic, inedible plant materials such as chaff (protective seed casings of cereal grains) and paddy straw as raw material. The technology involves the use of subcritical water to pretreat the raw material, followed by a single step simultaneous saccharification/ethanol fermentation by a genetically modified yeast which can produce its own cellulase enzymes. The conventional method for ethanol production from cellulose usually involves: (1) pretreatment of the raw material by chemical agents (such as acids) to liberate the cellulose fibers from their “lignin wrappings”, (2) enzymatic saccharification (using cellulase) to break the liberated cellulose molecules into simple sugars, and (3) yeast fermentation of the sugars to produce the ethanol. In the Gekkeikan technology, the use of subcritical water temperature (150oC to 370oC) is said to be more “environment friendly”, since it does not use chemical agents, such as sulfuric acid. By using genetically modified yeast that is capable of producing its own cellulase enzymes, the saccharification and fermentation steps can be combined into a single process, thus reducing production costs.. |
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