ACE Conference 2026

Minnesota Bio-Fuels Association Working for You

Joanna Schroeder

The Minnesota Bio-Fuels Association is working on behalf of the biofuels industry and consumers throughout Minnesota. With several successes under their belt, the Association has identified several more goals they would like to achieve on behalf of the biofuels industry over the next few years.

“We are hopeful the next two years will lead us into opportunities to develop higher usage of ethanol blends, in particular we will work hard on promoting usage of E15 in 2001 and newer vehicles,” said Brian Kletscher, CEO of Highwater Ethanol and President of the Highwater Ethanol Aerial PhotosBoard of the Minnesota Bio-Fuels Association. “To help accomplish this we have hired a Biofuels Marketing Manager, this will allow us to directly communicate with the many gas station owners in the State of Minnesota and give them guidance on how to bring in E15 to their gas station while providing and economic benefit to them as owners while also passing on a savings to their customers in lower cost for E15.”

Tim Rudnicki, executive director of the Minnesota Bio-Fuels Association echoes Kletscher’s goal. In addition, Rudnicki said they are continuing to increase the use of E85. “Sales of E85 in Minnesota have been on the rise but there is still plenty of room to grow. There are many flex-fuel vehicle owners who don’t know the benefits of using E85 or even the fact that it’s 80 cents cheaper per gallon on average in Minnesota.”

When asked if the biofuels industry would have seen as many successes without the Minnesota Bio-Fuels Association, Kletscher said while the industry was growing prior to the formation of the Association, by working with Minnesota Corn Growers Association, Soybean Growers Association and other ethanol related organization, the formation of the Association has allowed the ethanol industry and biofuels industry the opportunity to branch out and grow in supporting and promoting the usage of their products.

“While doing this we have maintained a strong relationship with the associations and related organizations that walked with and grew the biofuels industry to the point that it is today,” said Kletscher.

However, as Rudnicki identifies, the political landscape will have an effect on their work but for the most part, the view of biofuels is positive. “We are fortunate that many of our federal and state-level senators and representatives are supportive of biofuels and support measures to increase its usage,” he said. “We work closely with many of them and they understand how important biofuels are to the economy in Minnesota and its role in reducing prices at the pump, greenhouse gases and our dependence on foreign oil. Biofuels are the only viable solution to removing our dependence on harmful fossil fuels and many of them understand that.”Read More

advanced biofuels, Biodiesel, Education, Environment, Ethanol, RFS

Food Prices Still Up Despite Lower Corn Prices

Cindy Zimmerman

With record corn production forecast this year comes lower corn prices, which makes the food versus fuel argument harder than ever to make, according to Growth Energy.

Total corn production is now projected at 14.475 billion bushels, 550 million bushels more than last year’s record, while the average price received by farmers is expected to be $3.40 per bushel, the lowest price in eight years.

Meanwhile, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) reports the international food price index is down 6.0 percent over the last year, grain prices are down nearly 9 percent since 2013, but meat prices are nearly 22 percent higher than a year ago.

Domestic food prices are up 2.5 percent compared to December 2013, nearly the same as the overall Consumer Price Index, which is up 2.1 percent for the same period. But while corn and other grain prices are rapidly declining, consumer meat prices are up 11.6 percent since last December.

growth-energy-logo“The current WASDE projections and recent reports from the FAO and Bureau of Labor Statistics further confirm that there is virtually no correlation between U.S. ethanol production and consumer food prices,” said Tom Buis, CEO of Growth Energy. “Corn prices are below the cost of production for most farmers, and ethanol is selling approximately $1.00 per gallon less than the gasoline on the wholesale marketplace.”

“As integrated livestock and poultry companies brag about their record profits and margins to their stockholders and investment bankers, the Turkey Federation, National Chicken Council and The National Council of Chain Restaurants, all allies of Big Oil, continue their campaign to intentionally mislead Americans about the cause of rising food prices in the U.S,” Buis added.

corn, Ethanol, food and fuel, Food prices, Growth Energy

USDA Increases Crop Forecast Again

Cindy Zimmerman

il-harvest-14The harvest may be running a little slow right now, but the latest report from USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service is calling for a bit more corn than expected a month ago, adding to the already record forecasts.

Corn production is now forecast at 14.5 billion bushels, up almost one percent from the previous forecast and four percent more than last year. Corn yields are expected to average 174.2 bushels per acre, up 2.5 bushels from the September forecast and 15.4 bushels above the 2013 average.

The bigger crop mean lower prices and USDA’s latest World Agricultural Supply Demand Estimate also released today. Corn supplies for 2014/15 are now projected at 15,736 million bushels, up 129 million from last month, while season average prices were lowered 10 cents to $3.10 to $3.70 per bushel. Corn used to produce ethanol, distiller’s grains and other co-products is projected at 5.125 billion bushels, while corn consumption for feed is estimated at 5.375 billion bushels.

corn, Ethanol, Ethanol News, USDA

“PUMP” Movie Getting Good Reviews

Cindy Zimmerman

pump-movieA new documentary film that explores the history of the American fueling infrastructure and how it has led to today’s oil-dominated market, which features some ethanol industry figures, is being well received by critics and viewers alike.

“PUMP” the movie, opened last month and has a rating of 71% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, with an 82% audience approval rating. Big name reviewers like the New York Times and Variety have had very good things to says about the movie.

The film is the latest from Josh and Rebecca Tickell, who have done other documentaries on alternative fuels beginning with FUEL, released in 2009, that focused on biodiesel.

PUMP features several familiar faces of folks known in the renewable fuels industry, including “Energy Victory” author Dr. Robert Zubrin, Biofuels Digest Editor Jim Lane, and Renewable Fuels Association Vice President for Industry Relations Robert White.

“Not often do small town farm kids from Kansas make it to Hollywood’s big screen, but I am fortunate enough to be one of those, if even for just a few seconds,” writes White in a column today for the E-xchange Blog. “The opportunity to be a part of an educational effort of this scale is not only rewarding, it is exciting.”

To find out more about the movie and when it might be playing in your area – check out PumpTheMovie.com and like it on Facebook.

advanced biofuels, Ethanol, Ethanol News, Oil, RFA

California Biodiesel Maker Gets $4 Mil State Grant

John Davis

communityfuelsA California biodiesel maker is the beneficiary of a $4 million state grant to help the refinery become more efficient and expand its range of feedstocks. This news release from Encinitas-based Community Fuels says the California Energy Commission grant will help put in the new equipment at the company’s Port of Stockton advanced biorefinery and help the state meet its goals of reducing emissions and increasing production and use of renewable fuels within California.

“Community Fuels is currently completing two projects: expanding production capacity and building an advanced biofuel terminal. This new award is for a third, distinct project that is complementary to our current projects. We planned our business to be built in an incremental manner while we validated various technologies and market conditions. This new project will position Community Fuels to serve the future needs of California’s transportation fuel market.” says Lisa Mortenson, Co-Founder and CEO of Community Fuels.

“Grant funding accelerates the pace at which we expand our capabilities. Our team has a strong track record of completing grant-funded projects; each project that we successfully complete helps to build confidence in our business and our long-term growth opportunities.” says William Crooks, Corporate Controller of Community Fuels.

Community Fuels officials added they will use their on-site, BQ9000 laboratory to help in design and commissioning efforts.

Biodiesel, Government

Cavitation Tech Inks Deal for Biodiesel, Food Oil Reactor

John Davis

cti-logoMaker of devices and systems for refining edible oils and biofuels, including biodiesel and ethanol, Cavitation Technologies, Inc. (CTi) will have one of its reactors installed at a soybean processing plant. The company’s agreement with Desmet Ballestra Group will see CTi’s vegetable oil refining system process approximately 500 tons of soybean oil with full installation and operations coming in 2015.

President Igor Gorodnitsky comments, “We are excited to have our first system sale in fiscal 2015. We believe that fiscal 2015 will encompass a combination of the benefits our technology brings in vegetable oil refining, production of ethanol and biodiesel, water and petroleum treatment. Our invaluable relationships with our licensees, the Desmet Ballestra Group and GEA Westfalia provide our company with very strong business partnership with global technology leaders.”

CTi anticipates approximately $350,000 in revenue from this sale. This is CTi’s 12th system put in North America.

Biodiesel, Soybeans

Get to Know the Minnesota Bio-Fuels Association

Joanna Schroeder

In April 2011 the Minnesota Bio-Fuels Association was founded to represent and promote the renewable fuels industry in Minnesota. According to Tim RudnickiTim Rudnicki Executive Director MN Bio-Fuels Association, executive director, as a state and a union, the country faces many challenges on the energy and environmental front and the Minnesota Bio-Fuels Association is providing solutions to these challenges.

When asked about the Association, Rudnicki explained, “We are a non-profit organization and our members include ethanol producers in Minnesota as well as industry vendors. Our aim is to work with our stakeholders in a collaborative manner to achieve our collective goal of a greener future, a stronger economy in Minnesota, consumer savings at the pump and a more energy independent America.”

The Association has three key areas of focus:

  1. Advocacy: Their active engagement takes place at the state capitol in St Paul with a variety of state agencies and departments as well as through the governor’s office. They work with policymakers and agency officials to give voice to the biofuels industry in matters that impact day-to-day production operations and to further grow the industry.
  2. Fuel Supply Chain Development: They work closely with fuel retailers in the state to increase the availability of fuels such as E15 and E85. They are also able to connect them with wholesale suppliers of E15 and E85 and infrastructure and equipment providers and also educate them on the business case to sell E15 and E85.
  3. Communications: As the representative of the biofuels industry in Minnesota, they organization is constantly communicating and educating consumers on the various benefits of ethanol in transportation fuel as well as changing negative perceptions. Their communication channels include a website with extensive resources on biofuels, social media, advertising and email marketing and they also liaise with the media throughout the state.

One of the founding members of the Minnesota Bio-Fuels Association is Highwater Ethanol, a 59.5 million gallon per year denatured ethanol facility located in Lamberton. They also produce nearly 150,000 tons of dried distillers grains (DDGs) and in April of this year began producing corn oil.

In May of 2006, Brian Kletscher began working with Hightower Ethanol as the president of the Board of Directors and then in November of 2008 was hired as the CEO. He has served as the president of Minnesota Bio-Fuels Association since 2011.

When asked why Highwater Ethanol became involved with the Association, Kletscher noted that being a part of Minnesota biofuel producers, they needed another strong voice to deal directly with potential challenges for the industry and the Association is set up to address many biofuel opportunities. For example, the Association has been participating in bringing additional biofuel usage to Minnesota, by supporting usage of higher blends of ethanol and other biofuels.Read More

advanced biofuels, Biodiesel, E15, E85, Education, Ethanol

MIT Boosts Yeast Tolerance

Joanna Schroeder

Gregory Stephanopoulos, with the Willard Henry Dow Professor of Chemical Engineering at MIT has discovered a way to boost yeast tolerance to ethanol by altering the composition of the medium in which yeast are grown. “Toxicity is probably the single most important problem in cost-effective biofuels production,” said Stephanopoulos. The research was published in the journal, Science.

Ethanol and other alcohols can disrupt yeast cell membranes, eventually killing the cells. The MIT team found that adding potassium and hydroxide ions to the medium in which yeast grow can help cells compensate for that membrane damage. By making these changes, the researchers were able to boost yeast’s ethanol production by about 80 percent. They found the approach works with commercial yeast strains and other types of alcohols, including propanol and butanol, which are even more toxic to yeast.

MIT yeast and ethanol research.jpg“The more we understand about why a molecule is toxic, and methods that will make these organisms more tolerant, the more people will get ideas about how to attack other, more severe problems of toxicity,” explained Stephanopoulos.

The research team began its quest searching for a gene or group of genes that could be manipulated to make yeast more tolerant to ethanol, but this approach did not yield much success. Yet when the researchers began to experiment with altering the medium in which yeast grow, they found some dramatic results. By augmenting the yeast’s environment with potassium chloride, and increasing the pH with potassium hydroxide, the researchers were able to dramatically boost ethanol production. They also found that these changes did not affect the biochemical pathway used by the yeast to produce ethanol: Yeast continued to produce ethanol at the same per-cell rate as long as they remained viable. Instead, the changes influenced their electrochemical membrane gradients — differences in ion concentrations inside and outside the membrane, which produce energy that the cell can harness to control the flow of various molecules into and out of the cell.

Ethanol increases the porosity of the cell membrane, making it very difficult for cells to maintain their electrochemical gradients. Increasing the potassium concentration and pH outside the cells helps them to strengthen the gradients and survive longer; the longer they survive, the more ethanol they make.

Researchers are also working on using this approach to boost the ethanol yield from various industrial feedstocks that, because of starting compounds inherently toxic to yeast, now have low yields.

biofuels, Ethanol, Research

BioEnergy Bytes

Joanna Schroeder

  • BioEnergyBytesDFThe SRI Conference on Sustainable, Responsible, Impact Investing will be held November 9-11, 2014 at The Broadmoor in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Conference organizers have announced that Amory B. Lovins of Rocky Mountain Institute and Bloomberg New Energy Finance Founder Michael Liebreich have both signed on to be keynote speakers.
  • The proliferation of distributed generation (DG) is beginning to take a toll on utilities, in high penetration markets such as Hawaii, California and Germany. To cope with the intermittent nature of these assets and optimize their performance, companies have developed a new class of software called distributed energy resource management systems, or DERMS. In a new report, “Distributed Energy Resource Management Systems 2014: Technologies, Deployments and Opportunities,” GTM Research forecasts the annual North American DERMS software market to more than double by 2018 to $110 million.
  • Discovery Green, an urban park in downtown Houston, Texas has committed to power the park and facilities through 2016 with 100% wind power from Green Mountain Energy. Discovery Green first teamed with Green Mountain Energy in 2008 and has been powered with 100% wind energy since 2012. The purchase is estimated to avoid an additional 6.2 million pounds of carbon dioxide.
  • NTC announced that it has been recognized by this year’s Fierce Innovation Awards: Energy Edition, a unique industry awards program powered by the publishers of FierceEnergy and FierceSmartGrid. NTC received top honors in the “Customer Engagement” category.
Bioenergy Bytes

RSI-CTC Calls for Rail Rulemaking Harmonization

Joanna Schroeder

The Railway Supply Institute Committee on Tank Cars (RSI-CTC) has submitted comments to the U.S. Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) in response to efforts to create new regulations for the shipment of crude oil and ethanol. While RSI-CTC is glad of the government’s work, they are warning of significant disruption to safety and major sectors of the North American economy is mismatched rules are implemented by the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) and Transport Canada. These disruptions, said RSI-CTC, include the loss of a significant portion of the rail tank car fleet during the modification period, and unintended consequences such as a potential increase in truck shipments of flammable liquids on highways.

To address these potential disruptions and safety hazards, the RSI-CTC called for greater harmonization between the two rulemaking bodies in the U.S. and Canada, and provided insight and specific recommendations across a range of issues that will help reduce the risk of transporting flammable liquids by rail in North America. The comments also urged DOT to focus more on the root causes of most derailments which continue to be track failure and human error, not tank car design.

railway supply institute logo“For years we have been advocating for a holistic approach to safety that will prevent train derailments and address tank car standards, among other issues,” said Tom Simpson, President of RSI. “In our comments today, we reiterated our positions and offered a comprehensive set of practical recommendations that will bring the greatest safety benefit in the quickest ways possible. For instance, we believe the timelines for modifications in the U.S. and Canada should be synchronized and feasible to avoid major disruptions of service. Moreover, the specifications for new tank cars and the rules for packaging of flammable liquids need to match up across North America. Without making these important changes to align the rules, the effect will be to deplete the fleet of tank cars available for service, and those effects to safety and the economy cannot be underestimated.”

RSI-CTC and independent third-party research show that the proposed U.S. rules—in their current form—would effectively force approximately 90,000 tank cars to be withdrawn from service at various times during the modification program and parked until the shop capacity required to carry out the necessary modifications becomes available. Between 2018 and 2020, 30-50 fifty percent of the total crude oil and ethanol tank car fleet would be idled at any given time. To replace the loss in 2017, the year the first compliance deadline hits, theoretically it would require 20,000 trucks carrying more than 370,000 truckloads on North American highways, a practical impossibility and potentially more hazardous outcome given the safety risk associated with transport by truck.

In its comments to PHMSA, the RSI-CTC supports a “commodity-based approach” for selecting the proper tank car that requires shippers to ensure materials are appropriately and safely packaged. The RSI-CTC also asked PHMSA to differentiate the requirements for new and existing cars, which will allow more new or modified cars with enhanced safety features to be put into service more quickly, rather than a one-size-fits-all approach.

biofuels, Ethanol, safety, transportation