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    The 4th Annual Brussels Climate Change Conference is announced for 26 - 27 February 2008. This joint CEPS/Epsilon conference will explore the key issues for a post-Kyoto agreement on climate change. The conference focuses on EU and global issues relating to global warming, and in particular looks at the following issues: - Post-2012 after Bali and before the Hokkaido G8 summit; Progress of EU integrated energy and climate package, burden-sharing renewables and technology; EU Emissions Trading Review with a focus on investment; Transport Climatepolicy.eu - January 28, 2007.

    Japan's Marubeni Corp. plans to begin importing a bioethanol compound from Brazil for use in biogasoline sold by petroleum wholesalers in Japan. The trading firm will import ETBE, which is synthesized from petroleum products and ethanol derived from sugar cane. The compound will be purchased from Brazilian petrochemical company Companhia Petroquimica do Sul and in February, Marubeni will supply 6,500 kilolitres of the ETBE, worth around US$7 million, to a biogasoline group made up of petroleum wholesalers. Wholesalers have been introducing biofuels since last April by mixing 7 per cent ETBE into gasoline. Plans call for 840 million liters of ETBE to be procured annually from domestic and foreign suppliers by 2010. Trading Markets - January 24, 2007.

    Toyota Tsusho Corp., Ohta Oil Mill Co. and Toyota Chemical Engineering Co., say it and two other firms have jointly developed a technology to produce biodiesel fuel at lower cost. Biodiesel is made by blending methanol into plant-derived oil. The new technology requires smaller amounts of methanol and alkali catalysts than conventional technologies. In addition, the new technology makes water removal facilities unnecessary. JCN Network - January 22, 2007.

    Finland's Metso Paper and SWISS COMBI - W. Kunz dryTec A.G. have entered a licence agreement for the SWISS COMBI belt dryer KUVO, which allows biomass to be dried in a low temperature environment and at high capacity, both for pulp & paper and bioenergy applications. Kauppalehti - January 22, 2007.

    Record warm summers cause extreme ice melt in Greenland: an international team of scientists, led by Dr Edward Hanna at the University of Sheffield, has found that recent warm summers have caused the most extreme Greenland ice melting in 50 years. The new research provides further evidence of a key impact of global warming and helps scientists place recent satellite observations of Greenland´s shrinking ice mass in a longer-term climatic context. Findings are published in the 15 January 2008 issue of Journal of Climate. University of Sheffield - January 15, 2007.

    Japan's Tsukishima Kikai Co. and Marubeni Corp. have together clinched an order from Oenon Holdings Inc. for a plant that will make bioethanol from rice. The Oenon group will invest around 4.4 billion yen (US$40.17 million) in the project, half of which will be covered by a subsidy from the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries. The plant will initially produce bioethanol from imported rice, with plans to use Hokkaido-grown rice in the future. It will produce 5 million liters per year starting in 2009, increasing output to 15m liters in 2011. The facility will be able to produce as much as 50,000 liters of bioethanol from 125 tons of rice each day. Trading Markets - January 11, 2007.

    PetroSun, Inc. announced today that its subsidiary, PetroSun BioFuels Refining, has entered into a JV to construct and operate a biodiesel refinery near Coolidge, Arizona. The feedstock for the refinery will be algal oil produced by PetroSun BioFuels at algae farms to be located in Arizona. The refinery will have a capacity of thirty million gallons and will produce 100% renewable biodiesel. PetroSun BioFuels will process the residual algae biomass into ethanol. MarketWire - January 10, 2007.

    BlueFire Ethanol Fuels Inc, which develops and operates carbohydrate-based transportation fuel production facilities, has secured capital liquidity for corporate overhead and continued project development in the value of US$15 million with Quercus, an environmentally focused trust. BlueFire Ethanol Fuels - January 09, 2007.

    Some $170 billion in new technology development projects, infrastructure equipment and construction, and biofuel refineries will result from the ethanol production standards contained the new U.S. Energy Bill, says BIO, the global Biotechnology Industry Organization. According to Brent Erickson, BIO's executive vice president "Such a new energy infrastructure has not occurred in more than 100 years. We are at the point where we were in the 1850s when kerosene was first distilled and began to replace whale oil. This technology will be coming so fast that what we say today won't be true in two years." Chemical & Engineering News - January 07, 2007.

    Scottish and Southern Energy plc, the UK's second largest power company, has completed the acquisition of Slough Heat and Power Ltd from SEGRO plc for a total cash consideration of £49.25m. The 101MW CHP plant is the UK’s largest dedicated biomass energy facility fueled by wood chips, biomass and waste paper. Part of the plant is contracted under the Non Fossil Fuel Obligation and part of it produces over 200GWH of output qualifying for Renewable Obligation Certificates (ROCs), which is equivalent to around 90MW of wind generation. Scottish & Southern Energy - January 2, 2007.

    PetroChina Co Ltd, the country's largest oil and gas producer, plans to invest 800 million yuan to build an ethanol plant in Nanchong, in the southwestern province of Sichuan, its parent China National Petroleum Corp said. The ethanol plant has a designed annual capacity of 100,000 tons. ABCMoneyNews - December 21, 2007.

    Mexico passed legislation to promote biofuels last week, offering unspecified support to farmers that grow crops for the production of any renewable fuel. Agriculture Minister Alberto Cardenas said Mexico could expand biodiesel faster than ethanol. More soon. Reuters - December 20, 2007.

    Oxford Catalysts has placed an order worth approximately €700,000 (US$1 million) with the German company Amtec for the purchase of two Spider16 high throughput screening reactors. The first will be used to speed up the development of catalysts for hydrodesulphurisation (HDS). The second will be used to further the development of catalysts for use in gas to liquid (GTL) and Fischer-Tropsch processes which can be applied to next generation biofuels. AlphaGalileo - December 18, 2007.

    According to the Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística (IBGE), Brazil's production of sugarcane will increase from 514,1 million tonnes this season, to a record 561,8 million tonnes in the 2008/09 cyclus - an increase of 9.3%. New numbers are also out for the 2007 harvest in Brazil's main sugarcane growing region, the Central-South: a record 425 million tonnes compared to 372,7 million tonnes in 2006, or a 14% increase. The estimate was provided by Unica – the União da Indústria de Cana-de-Açúcar. Jornal Cana - December 16, 2007.

    The University of East Anglia and the UK Met Office's Hadley Centre have today released preliminary global temperature figures for 2007, which show the top 11 warmest years all occurring in the last 13 years. The provisional global figure for 2007 using data from January to November, currently places the year as the seventh warmest on records dating back to 1850. The announcement comes as the Secretary-General of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), Michel Jarraud, speaks at the Conference of the Parties (COP) in Bali. Eurekalert - December 13, 2007.

    The Royal Society of Chemistry has announced it will launch a new journal in summer 2008, Energy & Environmental Science, which will distinctly address both energy and environmental issues. In recognition of the importance of research in this subject, and the need for knowledge transfer between scientists throughout the world, from launch the RSC will make issues of Energy & Environmental Science available free of charge to readers via its website, for the first 18 months of publication. This journal will highlight the important role that the chemical sciences have in solving the energy problems we are facing today. It will link all aspects of energy and the environment by publishing research relating to energy conversion and storage, alternative fuel technologies, and environmental science. AlphaGalileo - December 10, 2007.

    Dutch researcher Bas Bougie has developed a laser system to investigate soot development in diesel engines. Small soot particles are not retained by a soot filter but are, however, more harmful than larger soot particles. Therefore, soot development needs to be tackled at the source. Laser Induced Incandescence is a technique that reveals exactly where soot is generated and can be used by project partners to develop cleaner diesel engines. Terry Meyer, an Iowa State University assistant professor of mechanical engineering, is using similar laser technology to develop advanced sensors capable of screening the combustion behavior and soot characteristics specifically of biofuels. Eurekalert - December 7, 2007.

    Lithuania's first dedicated biofuel terminal has started operating in Klaipeda port. At the end of November 2007, the stevedoring company Vakaru krova (VK) started activities to manage transshipments. The infrastructure of the biodiesel complex allows for storage of up to 4000 cubic meters of products. During the first year, the terminal plans to transship about 70.000 tonnes of methyl ether, after that the capacities of the terminal would be increased. Investments to the project totaled €2.3 million. Agrimarket - December 5, 2007.

    New Holland supports the use of B100 biodiesel in all equipment with New Holland-manufactured diesel engines, including electronic injection engines with common rail technology. Overall, nearly 80 percent of the tractor and equipment manufacturer's New Holland-branded products with diesel engines are now available to operate on B100 biodiesel. Tractor and equipment maker John Deere meanwhile clarified its position for customers that want to use biodiesel blends up to B20. Grainnet - December 5, 2007.

    According to Wetlands International, an NGO, the Kyoto Protocol as it currently stands does not take into account possible emissions from palm oil grown on a particular type of land found in Indonesia and Malaysia, namely peatlands. Mongabay - December 5, 2007.

    Malaysia's oil & gas giant Petronas considers entering the biofuels sector. Zamri Jusoh, senior manager of Petronas' petroleum development management unit told reporters "of course our focus is on oil and gas, but I think as we move into the future we cannot ignore the importance of biofuels." AFP - December 5, 2007.


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Friday, February 01, 2008

Study: biofuels industry added 10% to Iowa's GDP in 2007

A study prepared for the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association (IRFA) details the dramatic impact the growing renewable fuels industry has on Iowa’s economy. Biodiesel and ethanol production and the construction of new biorefineries proves to be a major force in driving Iowa’s economy forward, especially in rural communities. The sector added as much as 10% to Iowa's GDP in 2007. The report titled "Contribution of the Biofuels Industry to the Economy of Iowa" [*.pdf], was prepared by economist John Urbanchuk, a director with LECG, LLC.

Its main findings are that the sector has added substantial value to agricultural commodities produced in Iowa, has brough a large number of jobs, and has made a significant contribution to the state's economy. Based on the size of the biofuels industry at year-end 2007, ethanol and biodiesel:
  • Added $12.7 billion, or about 10 percent, to Iowa GDP
  • Generate $2.9 billion of household income for Iowa households
  • Supported the creation or retention of more than 96,000 jobs through the entire Iowa economy
  • Generated nearly $790 million in state tax revenue
Details are outlined in table 1 (click to enlarge).

Critics will say that these dramatic benefits are only possible because the sector is heavily subsidised (previous post). Moreover, it is unclear how heavy the indirect social and environmental costs of the mainly corn-based ethanol industry in Iowa are: the international effect of increased food prices, especially on the urban poor in maize importing countries, must be taken into account.

What is more, the potential local environmental costs - such as water depletion, nitrogen runoff, etc - as well as the effects of the complex "displacement effect" should not be underestimated. This displacement effect, which consists of indirect land-use changes, seems to be playing out in Brazil, where deforestation recently shot up in a rush to produce more soybeans as the U.S. shifts land from soy to corn (previous post). However, these effects are difficult to measure or to establish with certainty.

Nonetheless, the IRFA sees the numbers as proof of the fact that the biofuels industry is capable of bringing major local social and economic benefits:
Corn and soybean prices are up. Land values are up. Household income is up. State tax revenue is up. The common denominator is renewable fuels. John Urbanchuk’s report paints a dramatic picture of the far-reaching positive impacts of producing biodiesel and ethanol in Iowa. But the best news is that we’re just getting started. The new 36-billon gallon federal renewable fuels standard will drive the industry forward and Iowa will remain front and center. - Monte Shaw, IRFA Executive Director
Nationally, total ethanol capacity expanded 37 percent to 7.5 billion gallons. Iowa is the largest biofuels producer accounting for 31 percent of U.S. ethanol and 20 percent of biodiesel production capacity. At the end of 2007 Iowa’s 28 operating ethanol plants had operating capacity of more than 2 billion gallons and its 14 biodiesel plants had 318 million gallons of capacity. In addition, three ethanol plants are expanding production and 14 new ethanol plants and two new biodiesel plants are under construction. When completed, these new plants will increase Iowa’s biofuel production capacity by nearly 70 percent:
:: :: :: :: :: :: :: :: :: :: :: :: ::

With its new Energy Bill, the United States has set itself on a track to become a major biofuels producer that will ensure 20% of all transport fuel consumption comes from renewable, bio-based fuels by 2022.

Under the bill, the Renewable Fuels Standard increases to 36 billion gallons (136 billion liters) by 2022, roughly the equivalent of between 1.8 and 2 million barrels of oil per day. Of that amount, corn ethanol production is capped at 15 billion gallons per year starting in 2015 (56.8 billion liters), a three-fold increase of current production levels; the remainder is expected to be provided by 'advanced biofuels', the majority of which are cellulosic biofuels. In the final year of the standard (2022), cellulosic biofuels should contribute more (16 billion gallons) than does corn ethanol (15 billion gallons) (previous post).

In an earlier report, the Department of Agriculture (USDA) showed that the biofuels industry in the U.S. has brought farm income to all-time record highs. The USDA's Economic Research Service (ERS) showed in its annual Agricultural Income and Finance Outlook, that net farm income reached $87.5 billion in 2007, up $28.5 billion from 2006 and exceeding the 2004 record (more here).

References:
John M. Urbanchuk, Contribution of the Biofuels Industry to the Economy of Iowa [*.pdf], report prepared for the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association, LECG LLC, January 2008.

IRFA: Renewable Fuels Power Iowa Economy ) New Study Outlines Dramatic Increases in Job Creation and Household Income as Renewable Fuels Industry Grows - January 31, 2008.

Biopact: US becomes biofuel nation as Congress approves Energy Bill - December 19, 2007

Biopact: Scientist: U.S. corn subsidies drive deforestation in the Amazon - January 04, 2008

Biopact: Subsidies for uncompetitive U.S. biofuels cost taxpayers billions - report -
October 26, 2006

Biopact: USDA: Biofuels lead to all-time record farm income in the United States - December 17, 2007




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