The Renewable Fuels Association (RFA) submitted comments to the California Air Resources Board (CARB) last week stressing that the state’s path toward achieving its carbon reduction targets should be technology-neutral and include a broad array of technologies. RFA also recommended that CARB rely on “more realistic assumptions and feasible scenarios” as it develops its plan to achieve statewide carbon neutrality …
Meet the New GREET
The U.S. Department of Energy Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) has just released its latest update to the Greenhouse gas and Regulated Emissions and Energy use in Transportation (GREET) model, the standard tool used to audit the energy and environmental effects of transportation fuels such as ethanol and gasoline. The 2021 GREET model includes a number of significant updates, especially for …
USDA Announces Climate Smart Efforts
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced a new initiative Wednesday to “finance the deployment of climate-smart farming and forestry practices to aid in the marketing of climate-smart agricultural commodities.” USDA will support a set of pilot projects that provide incentives to implement climate smart conservation practices on working lands and to quantify and monitor the carbon and greenhouse gas benefits associated …
White Energy Teams with Occidental for CO2 Study
Occidental Petroleum Corporation and White Energy are teaming up to evaluate the economic feasibility of a carbon capture, utilization and storage project. The project would capture carbon dioxide (CO2) at White Energy’s ethanol facilities in Hereford and Plainview, Texas, and transport it to the Permian Basin, where Occidental would use it in its enhanced oil recovery (EOR) operations. Occidental injects …
GRFA Calls on Increased Action for Climate Change
Bliss Baker, the President of the Global Renewable Fuels Alliance (GRFA), has asked G20 leaders take last year’s Paris Accord even further. The first binding climate agreement needs to be scaled up in it’s ambitiousness to reduce emissions in the transport sector, Baker said, especially in light of a newly released report “Perspectives for the Energy Transition” from the International …
Breakthrough Energy Ventures Launches $1B Green Fund
A new green venture fund has been created by Breakthrough Energy Coalition (BEC) called Breakthrough Energy Ventures (BEV). The $1 billion investor-led fund will finance emerging energy technologies with the goal of reducing global greenhouse gas emissions to near-zero. The announcement was made earlier this month during the climate talks. “It is extremely exciting for us to launch this fund …
Carbon Intensity Surpasses #Biofuel Volumes as Key Metric
Lux Research is reporting that new policies are being put forward based on technology-agnostic carbon intensity metrics rather than focusing on mandating volumes of specific biofuels. The move to low carbon fuels is being led, says Lux Research, by the California Air Resources Board (CARB) and the near-term winners will be renewable diesel and conventional electricity followed by renewable electricity. …
WEO-2016 Finds Renewables, Natural Gas Future Winners
According to the 2016 World Energy Outlook (WEO-2016), the winners to reach energy demand growth through 2040 will be renewables and natural gas. The annual report is published by the International Energy Agency (IEA) and finds that the era of fossil fuels is long from over. Natural gas will continue to expand and coal and oil usage will decrease. This …
UNIST Discovers Waste Gas to Biofuel Catalyst
A research team led by Professor Jae Sung Lee of Energy and Chemical Engineering at UNIST has discovered a new way to make biofuels directly from carbon dioxide. The team has produced road ready diesel through a direct CO2 conversion to liquid transportation fuels by reacting with renewable hydrogen generated through solar water splitting. The research was published in the …
MSU Awarded $6M Biofuel, Carbon Grant
Montana State University (MSU) has received a $6 million, four-year grant from the National Science Foundation to develop new innovations at the intersection of food, energy and water systems. MSU will be working alongside the University of Wyoming and the University of South Dakota to address the sustainability profiles of biofuels and carbon capture technologies that would be introduced in …