Ethanol Plants Left Out of Greenhouse Gas Reporting

Cindy Zimmerman

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued final regulations for the nation’s first greenhouse gas reporting system to begin in 2010, but ethanol plants have been removed from the initial list of facilities required to report emissions.

EPAThe regulations require large emitters of heat-trapping emissions to begin collecting greenhouse gas (GHG) data under the new program which will cover approximately 85 percent of the nation’s GHG emissions and apply to roughly 10,000 facilities. Ethanol plants were on the list when it was first proposed in March.

According to EPA, the new reporting system will provide a better understanding of where GHGs are coming from and will guide development of the best possible policies and programs to reduce emissions. The data will also allow businesses to track their own emissions, compare them to similar facilities, and provide assistance in identifying cost effective ways to reduce emissions in the future. This comprehensive, nationwide emissions data will help in the fight against climate change.

Among the facilities that are included in the program are extractors of crude petroleum and natural gas, coal and oil refineries, industrial landfills, and wastewater treatment plants.

Environment, Ethanol, Ethanol News, Government

ACE Responds to Ethanol Attack Ad

Cindy Zimmerman

The American Coalition for Ethanol (ACE) is calling claims made by an advertising campaign against ethanol by a coalition food and oil company groups “half-baked.”

ACE“If the products sold to consumers by Big Food are as half-baked as their ethanol claims, we have a life-threatening food safety crisis in America,” stated Brian Jennings, Executive Vice President of ACE. “Never before has more corn been used to make more ethanol, and yet retail food prices have fallen sharply this year.”

Jennings issued the statement in response to an anti-ethanol ad last week in the Capitol Hill publication Roll Call, that was funded by the American Meat Institute, Grocery Manufacturers Association, National Petrochemical and Refiners Association, Environmental Working Group and others. The ad claimed that moving from 10 percent ethanol in gasoline up to E15 would be bad for consumers, the environment, and rural communities.

“This coalition of strange bedfellows is both desperate and naïve,” Jennings said. “Oil and food companies are desperate and will resort to anything to protect the status quo of cheap corn and expensive oil. Some environmental groups naively believe getting rid of corn ethanol today, in hopes that some other potentially promising but not yet commercialized technology will be available tomorrow, will somehow reduce air pollution.”

EPA is currently considering a petition that would increase the amount of ethanol allowed in regular gasoline to 15 percent from the current 10 percent.

ACE, Ethanol, Ethanol News, food and fuel, Food prices

Farmers Become Guardians of Ethanol Plant

Cindy Zimmerman

RFAA group of farmer-owned ethanol plants in Minnesota, Iowa and Nebraska have teamed up become the guardians of a former VeraSun facility in Janesville, Minn.

Guardian Energy is a joint venture between ethanol plants in Little Falls, Benson, Claremont, and Winthrop, Minnesota as well as Mason City, Iowa and Minden, Nebraska that last week closed on the purchase of the 100 million gallon per year ethanol plant in Janesville.

“Drawing on the experience of its member plants, Guardian Energy is rapidly working to bring the facility on line this fall,” said interim CEO and Board President Randall Doyal. “We are actively recruiting and interviewing candidates from across the region to fill more than 45 new jobs. We will work closely with local farmers to create a new, value-added market for their corn, as well as with other local suppliers who are already at work completing the plant, putting the finishing touches on the plant site, and bringing in supplies necessary to operate the facility.” Doyal also serves as CEO of Al-Corn Clean Fuel.

Guardian Energy LLC is the cooperative effort six midwestern farmer owned ethanol plants which have a philosophy that the economic benefits of producing ethanol should stay in the local communities and that has been key to the success of each of the member plants involved in Guardian Energy. Guardian Energy negotiated with the banks holding the Janesville facility, and their negotiations led to the successful close and transfer of ownership to Guardian Energy on September 23.

The six facilities comprising Guardian Energy are Al-Corn Clean Fuel, Central Minnesota Ethanol, Chippewa Valley Ethanol Company, Golden Grain Energy, Heartland Corn Products, and KAPPA Ethanol.

Ethanol, Ethanol News, Facilities

Grant Helps Iowa State Establish Wind Energy Lab

John Davis

Researchers at Iowa State University will be able to learn more about wind turbine technology… a good idea when you consider how big wind energy has become in the state.

The school’s work with Arizona-based TPI Composites and the U.S. Department of Energy’s Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, N.M., to improve the process currently used to manufacture turbine blades has led to a three-year, $6.3 million project called the “Advanced Manufacturing Innovation Initiative.” This ISU press release says a third of the money comes from the Iowa Power Fund, a state program to advance energy innovation and independence, and equal shares from TPI Composites and the U.S. Department of Energy:

ISUwindbladesThe grant will allow Iowa State to establish a Wind Energy Manufacturing Laboratory on campus. The lab will feature the work of four faculty researchers: Matt Frank, Frank Peters and John Jackman, all associate professors of industrial and manufacturing systems engineering, and Vinay Dayal, an associate professor of aerospace engineering. The grant will also support the research of five graduate students and several undergraduates.

The researchers’ goal is to develop new, low-cost manufacturing systems that could improve the productivity of turbine blade factories by as much as 35 percent.

“The current manufacturing methods are very labor intensive,” Jackman said. “We need to improve throughput – we need to get more blades produced every week in order for it to be economical to continue to produce wind energy components in the United States.”

Peters said possible manufacturing improvements include developments in automation and quality control.

The researchers will be working with smaller models of the turbine blades to see what are the best ways to boost efficiency and strength. Later work will focus on the towers, the nacelles, gearboxes and other components.

With installed wind capacity at 3,043 megawatts, Iowa ranks second in the nation in wind power production.

Wind

NBB, RFA Submit Biodiesel, Ethanol Comments to EPA

John Davis

The comment period for the EPA’s proposed Renewable Fuels Standard (RFS2) has come and gone, and the leaders in the biodiesel and ethanol industries have turned in the comments they’ve collected from their members and interested parties.

The National Biodiesel Board’s main contention is that the proposal contains several significant flaws:

NBB-logo• EPA’s GHG [Greenhouse Gas] methodology relies on outdated data that artificially penalizes U.S. biodiesel. GHG emission reductions associated with biodiesel produced from vegetable oils compared to petroleum will significantly exceed the 22 percent assumed by EPA in its proposed rule if the agency relies on scientifically valid analysis and practices. Even with EPA’s assumptions and methodology, correcting the outdated data pertaining to nitrogen fixation, energy balance and co-product allocations would give biodiesel produced from vegetable oil a 62 percent GHG reduction compared to baseline petroleum. When just some of the major flawed assumptions from EPA’s indirect analysis are corrected, the GHG emissions lifecycle reduction for biodiesel from vegetable oils is 99% percent lower than diesel fuel. This number includes penalties to biodiesel for international indirect land use change.

NBB also took issue with the international Indirect Land Use provisions of the RFS2… a stance echoed by Bob Dinneen, RFA president and CEO:
rfa-logo
“International indirect land use change simply should not be included,” Dinneen said. “Congress did not intend to penalize America’s ethanol producers for decisions made by farmers and governments in other countries.”

Now, we’ll have to wait to see if anyone at EPA is paying attention.

Biodiesel, Ethanol, Ethanol News, Indirect Land Use, NBB, News, RFA

Subsidies Should Help Nearly Double Canadian Biofuels

John Davis

Canadianflag1Biodiesel and ethanol production in Canada is expected to rise more than 75 percent over the next two years, thanks to subsidies from that country.

Reuters reports that total biofuel output north of the border will reach 660 million gallons each year by 2011, including about 500 million gallons of ethanol and about 160 million gallons of biodiesel:

“We’re certainly on track to build that production capacity, no question,” [Gordon Quaiattini, president of the Canadian Renewable Fuels Association] said.

Canada currently produces 1.3 billion litres of ethanol annually and 120 million litres of biodiesel, he said.

On Friday, the federal government gave operating subsidies of C$70 million ($64.2 million) annually to Husky Energy’s Lloydminster, Saskatchewan, ethanol plant and C$5.4 million to Methes Energies Inc’s biodiesel plant in Mississauga, Ontario.

The funding is for seven years, with the exact amount calculated on a per-litre basis, and designed to pay more in a weak market than when conditions are favorable.

The Canadian government has given out funding to 23 biodiesel and ethanol plants, distributing about $1.38 billion over nine years since 2008.

Biodiesel, Ethanol, Ethanol News, News

RINWorld Summit Fast Approaching

Joanna Schroeder

EPA regulations as part of the Renewable Fuels Standard has impacted thousands of businesses working in the biofuels industry. As part of this regulation, the EPA now requires that each gallon of ethanol or biodiesel must have a Renewable Identification Number, known as RINS. While some perceive RINS to be a burden, others have learned how to improve their bottom line profits.

rinlogosmThe 2nd Annual RINWorld Summit is being held in Dallas, TX on November 4-6, 2009 and last year, several hundred people learned about how the RFS is changing their business and more importantly, how to profit from these changes. This year speakers include John Wienouch, EPA, Office of Transportation and Air Quality (OTAC) as well as Erv Pickell, EPA, Office of Enforcement Compliance Insurance.

Topics include:

  • ~Implementing RFS2 into your business
  • ~The New “Burden of Proof” Facing Producers
  • ~RFS1.75 and the more immediate standard
  • ~California Raises the Mark in 2010 with the LCFS
  • ~How EMTS will impact your business and what you can do to be Prepared
  • ~Trading the RIN as an Asset and How to Maximize Profits
  • ~The 38 Steps to RIN Validation and How to Implement them
  • ~The Blend Pump Initiative and its Impact on Ethanol Demand

Current RINSTAR members receive one free registration. Not a member? Attend as the guest of a RINSTAR member and receive a 50 percent discount off the current registration rate. Click here for more information and to register.

Biodiesel, conferences, Ethanol

Dine with General Wesley Clark

Joanna Schroeder

wesclarkKen Field, Chairman of Greenfield Ethanol, Canada’s largest ethanol company, is inviting people to attend a private reception and fire side chat with General Wesley Clark on September 29, 2009. Clark is most notably known in the biofuels industry as the Co-Chairman of Growth Energy. In addition he owns his own strategic consulting firm, Wesley K. Clark & Associates.

The reception will be held at the National Club beginning at 5:30 p.m. followed by a dinner. The fire side chat will be moderated by Diane Francis, Editor at Large, Financial Post.

For more information, or to RSVP contact Debra Conlon, d.conlon@greenfieldethanol.com or via phone at 416-304-1700 x8447.

Ethanol

Ford Debuts B20 Biodiesel, E85 Compatible Trucks

John Davis

FordSuperDutyBack at the end of August, I told you about how Ford was getting ready to debut a new engine that would be compatible with more blends of fuels, including B20 biodiesel. Today, at the State Fair of Texas, the automaker unveiled its new line of F Series trucks that will not only take the higher blend of biodiesel but also a line of engines that will take E85 ethanol.

This company press release says the new engine, which was code-named “Scorpion,” should make a pretty big, green splash:

* The 2011 F-Series Super Duty boasts all-new powertrains, led by the Ford-designed, Ford-engineered and Ford-built 6.7-liter Power Stroke® V-8 turbocharged diesel engine, which delivers significantly improved torque and horsepower as well as class-leading fuel economy while maintaining best-in-class towing and payload capability; new engine also has biodiesel compatibility up to B20

* A new 6.2-liter V-8 gasoline engine also is added to the lineup; it also delivers significantly improved torque and horsepower as well as class-leading fuel economy; new gas engine can run on regular-grade gasoline, E85 or any blend in between

Ford says the new trucks, due to the market in 2011, will have a six-speed transmission that gets the new diesel engine’s low-end torque to the ground faster and will come in an automatic or manual option.

Biodiesel, Car Makers, E85, Ethanol, Ethanol News

Biodiesel Boosts Renderer’s Bottom Line

John Davis

darlingA Texas-based company that has made its living rendering grease and animal carcasses has seen a recent boost to its bottom line… thanks to biodiesel.

CNNMoney reports that Darling International, a company that picks up the waste at 116,000 restaurants and slaughterhouses and is the largest independent renderer in the nation, has also turned profits of $55 million. That makes it CNNMoney’s 13th fastest growing company of 2009, in part, because of its investment in the green fuel:

Now Darling is eyeing a potentially lucrative new market: renewable fuels. The industrial giant Honeywell approached Darling 2½ years ago offering to license technology to make “green diesel” fuel using animal fats.

For 30 years biodiesel has been produced by combining vegetable oil and diesel. But as analyst Jin-Ming Liu of Ardour Capital explains, the fuel gums up engines and performs poorly in cold weather. Researchers have been studying a more efficient formula using animal fats for the 60-billion-gallon-a-year diesel market.

Since a green diesel refinery costs twice as much to build as a standard biodiesel plant, Darling sought a Big Oil partner for capital and refining know-how. It had little luck courting one…

Now things are different. As part of the latest government energy act, the U.S. Department of Energy is offering loans for up to 80% of the cost to build a renewable-fuel factory. Darling just announced that Valero Energy has agreed to be a partner in its proposed $270 million green diesel plant in Louisiana. The government’s final loan decision may come early next year.

Analysts say while animal fats and greases equal just 5 percent of the diesel the country needs, it’s enough to keep this specialty company going and growing.

Biodiesel, Miscellaneous