Nova CEO: Cheaper Biodiesel Feedstocks Key

John Davis

In a time when many biodiesel makers are having a tough time because of the high costs of their feedstocks, one is looking to expand its operations.

The CEO of Houston, Texas-based Nova Biosource Fuels, which has biodiesel refineries in Iowa, Mississippi and Illinois, Kenneth Hern say the key to his company’s success has been expanding its range of feedstocks to cheaper sources. In this article with the Houston Chronicle, Hern does some Q & A with reporter Brett Clanton, Hern says Nova is even looking to open another biodiesel refinery in the heart of petroleum country… right in Houston:

Q: We’re hearing a lot about how high crop and vegetable oil prices are pinching biofuels producers, even forcing some to close. What’s different about your business model?

A: Nova has a patented, proprietary process that lets us use any material that’s got a triglyceride or a fairly high amount of free fatty acids in it. If you take soy, it has almost no free fatty acid in it. It’s a pure triglyceride. Anyone can make biodiesel from it. It’s a very simple reaction. But when you want to use the feedstocks that are cheaper, almost every time those cheap feedstocks have some amount of free fatty acids.Read More

Biodiesel

Suzuki to Develop FFVs Running on 100% Ethanol

According to the Nikkei Business Daily, Japan’s Suzuki Motor Company will begin selling flexible fuel vehicles running on 100 percent ethanol by the year 2010. The FFVs will be offered for sale in both the U.S. and Brazil.

Suzuki will first begin offering vehicles that can run on 25 percent ethanol in Brazil in March. Currently in the U.S., the highest ethanol blend of fuel which can be sold is 85 percent. Chrysler, Ford, General Motors and Nissan currently sell these vehicles and there are about seven million on America’s roads. Suzuki’s move would mark a huge development in ethanol-powered vehicles, and a huge shift for Suzuki, which hasn’t had any alternative fuel-specific offerings in its lineup to this point.

The Brazilian ethanol industry is experiencing amazing growth right now. The industry is based on the conversion of sugarcane to ethanol and, according to reports, it is a completely self-sustaining industry. The United States main source of ethanol is corn.

Car Makers, corn, E85, Ethanol, News

Georgia Ethanol Plant Progress

Cindy Zimmerman

Bill SchaferConstruction on what is expected to be the nation’s first commercial cellulosic ethanol plant in southeast Georgia is making good progress, according to plant officials.

Range Fuels senior vice president of business development Bill Schafer gave an update on the project at last week’s Ethanol Conference and Trade Show in Omaha.

“We expect to be producing ethanol next year,” Schafer said of the plant that will use woody biomass as a primary feedstock.

Schafer says they have been experiencing many of the usual construction-related delays with the project. “Everything costs more and takes longer than you thought it would,” he said. “It’s nothing exceptional, it’s the things you would expect. But anything that constitutes a delay is a real disappointment for us because we really want to get this up and going as quickly as we can.” Range Fuels received a grant from the Department of Energy for the project, as well as private financing.

Range FuelsIn addition to using woody biomass as a feedstock, they are experimenting with energy crops that can be grown in the region. “We have test plots we have established with Ceres on our Soperton site,” he said. “We intend for the site to be a showcase for some of the technologies we see in the future feeding this industry.”

Schafer noted that the restrictions on woody biomass that can be harvested from federal lands that are included in the energy bill passed by Congress last year concern them when it comes to the development of cellulosic ethanol. They support legislation proposed by Rep. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin (D-SD) that would broaden the definition of cellulosic ethanol within the Renewable Fuels Standard (RFS) to include more biomass gathered from federal lands.

Listen to an interview with Schafer from the ACE conference here:
[audio:http://www.zimmcomm.biz/ace/ace-schafer.mp3]

Audio, Cellulosic, Ethanol, News

Citizens for Energy Freedom Conference

Cindy Zimmerman

A group dedicated to energy independence and fuel choice is holding a conference to bring other like-minded Americans together to “organize and win the battle against the oil cartel.”

citizens for energy freedomThe Founding Conference of the Citizens for Energy Freedom in Des Moines, Iowa on September 13-14.

The group is pushing for congress to pass a law requiring that all new cars sold in the United States be flex-fuel vehicles. The Open Fuel Standard Act, has already been introduced in the Senate (S3303) and the House of Representatives (H6559).

By making flex fuel the American standard, we can open the fuel market worldwide, as all foreign car makers would be impelled to convert their lines over as well. Around the globe, gasoline would be forced to compete at the pump against alcohol fuels made from any number of sources, including not only corn and sugar, but cellulosic ethanol made from crop residues and weeds, as well as methanol, which can be made from any kind of biomass, as well as coal, natural gas, and recycled urban trash.

Conference information and registration are available on-line at energyfreedomconference.com.

conferences, Ethanol, Flex Fuel Vehicles, News

Continuation of RFS Good for Consumers

Cindy Zimmerman

The decision by the Environmental Protection Agency earlier this month to deny a request that would have cut the Renewable Fuels Standard in half was obviously good news for corn growers and ethanol producers. But it was also good news for consumers, according to the Ethanol Promotion and Information Council.

e-podcastIn this edition of “Fill Up, Feel Good,” EPIC executive director Toni Nuernberg talks about how the RFS is helping to keep gasoline prices lower than they would be otherwise and ethanol production continues to help America become more energy independent. The EPA’s decision also allows EPIC to continue with its mission of consumer education about ethanol.

The podcast is available to download by subscription (see our sidebar link) or you can listen to it by clicking here (4:30 MP3 File):
[audio:http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3?http://www.zimmcomm.biz/epic/epic-podcast-08-08.mp3]

The Fill Up, Feel Good theme music is “Tribute to Joe Satriani” by Alan Renkl, thanks to the Podsafe Music Network.

“Fill up, Feel Good” is sponsored by the Ethanol Promotion and Information Council.

Audio, EPIC, Ethanol, Fill Up Feel Good, News

Florida Researcher Wins Award for Work Including Biodiesel

John Davis

A University of Florida professor has been recognized with the highest honor the Florida State Horticultural Society bestows for his work that includes research to get more oil from plants to produce biodiesel.

This article from the school’s newspaper, InsideUF, says Wagner Vendrame, an associate professor of environmental horticulture at the University of Florida’s Tropical Research and Education Center, Homestead, picked up the society’s Presidential Gold Medal Award:

Presented to Vendrame at the society’s annual meeting this summer, the award is the most prestigious honor from the FSHS, given to the individual whose work published in the previous five years of the Proceedings of the Florida State Horticultural Society has contributed the most to the Sunshine State’s horticulture sciences.

Vendrame joined UF in 2001 and has more than 16 years of experience in plant micropropagation and biotechnology. His research program involves production and conservation of plants using tissue culture, molecular biology and cryopreservation techniques.

Vendrame is well known for his work propagating selected hybrids of the jatropha nut, which has some great potential in the biodiesel business.

Biodiesel

Clark Headlining Wind Energy Forum

John Davis

General Wesley Clark, the former Supreme Allied Commander of military forces in Europe and former presidential candidate, will be leading the opening day’s session at the HUSUM WindEnergy trade show and congress in Husum, Germany Sept. 9-13, 2008.

Clark will be speaking at the “Wind Power Forum: The New Energy Economy,” at the conference.

HUSUM is the world’s largest, longest-running and best-attended wind energy industry trade show, congress and job fair taking place in Husum, a small North Frisian coastal town.

More details about HUSUM are available at the event’s web site.

Wind

Galva Holstein Opens Iowa’s First Blender Pump

Galva Holstein Ag., LLC opened the first ethanol blender pump within the state of Iowa on August 14. The fuel dispensing unit will sell the products of E10, E30, E85 and unleaded fuel at 1583 Market Avenue in Galva, Iowa. The site has been selling the alternative fuels of E85 and biodiesel since the spring of 2005, but just recently added the new blender pump. Over 175,000 gallons of E85 have been sold to date at this site which was noted remarkable because Galva’s population is only 350.

“With the assistance of IDED (Iowa Department of Economic Development) grants,” said Anne M. Johnson of Galva Holstein Ag., “which we are truly grateful for, we were able to add blender pumps this summer to this location and are now dispensing E10, E30, and clean-burning E85. All of us at Galva Holstein Ag are delighted to be a part of the energy ‘solution’ and feel that we are helping corn/grain farmers from the Mid’West’ instead of big oil guys in the Mid’East’. Renewable fuels are popular here and we continue our efforts to keep them in the good press.”

A re-grand opening is scheduled for September 17th to kick-start the blender pump and continue educating FFV drivers about the many benefits of using E85 and E30. The ENCORE blender dispenser includes eight nozzles dispensing fuel, has security lighting and overhead canopy for driver’s convenience. It is a 24-hour cardtrol facility that accepts all major credit cards.

Any level of ethanol above 10 percent is only approved for use in flexible fuel vehicles.

Biodiesel, E85, Ethanol, Facilities, News

Ethanol Branding at the Pump

Cindy Zimmerman

Flex stationA new fuel station in Colwich, Kansas could be the poster child for ethanol branding.

TJ Convenience store, which is supported by local ethanol plant designer ICM, offers four different ethanol blends – E10, E20, E30 and E85. The higher blends can only be used in flex-fuel vehicles (FFVs).

Flex stationSenator Sam Brownback (R-KS) helped ICM president Dave Vander Griend cut the ribbon during a pump promotion held Monday to celebrate the opening of the new station and to kick off a new initiative in Kansas that will help fuel station retailers obtain funding and the equipment needed to sell higher blends of ethanol.

The station is literally branded from top to bottom with the “e” logo, developed as a brand for ethanol by the Ethanol Promotion and Information Council. One of the primary goals of the new Kansas initiative is to increase the state’s blender pump infrastructure by installing a minimum of 100 blender pumps over the next year. Currently there are three.

According to Kansas Corn Commission chairman Bob Timmons, the program “will help strengthen our economy by encouraging blender pump infrastructure development, and take us one step closer to weakening our dependence on foreign oil.”

corn, E85, EPIC, Ethanol, Flex Fuel Vehicles, News

Wisconsin Promotes E85 with New Vehicle

According to the Wisconsin Corn Promotion Board, the state’s new “Alice in Dairyland” will be driving a fully loaded 2008 GM Tahoe. The vehicle is being offered to the state’s agricultural ambassador, Ashley Huibregtse, by the Wisconsin Corn Promotion Board and General Motors.

“It’s very appropriate that our state agricultural ambassador starts her year-long, statewide drive at an ethanol plant and that she does so driving our ethanol-fueled car,” says Ken Rosenow, Wisconsin Corn Promotion Board President and corn grower from Oconomowoc. “Having Alice in Dairyland drive the Wisconsin Corn Promotion Board’s E85 Chevy Tahoe while she promotes agriculture across the state is the perfect symbol of how corn-based ethanol drives our state’s economy in an economical, fuel-efficient and renewable manner.”

As a public relations specialist with the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Alice in Dairyland annually travels the equivalent of a trip around the world during her 12-month tour, driving an ethanol capable E85 Chevrolet Tahoe donated by the Wisconsin Corn Promotion Board.

This vehicle is one of the many that GM will be offering as a cost-free lease to states that belong to the Governor’s Ethanol Coalition. This is the third year of General Motor’s promotion.

Currently, Wisconsin boasts 114 E85 fueling stations throughout their state.

corn, E85, Ethanol, Flex Fuel Vehicles, News