World’s Biofuels Markets 2010 has now passed into history, amidst memories of lessons learned, contacts made, and friendships renewed. The standing-room only crowds in many of the sessions showed that, after a trying 2009, the biofuels industry is very much on the move in 2010. Several trends were much in evidence during the three days of the conference.
WBM 2010
March 25th, 2010Qteros receives patent for Q Microbe and consolidated bioprocessing system
March 25th, 2010Qteros announced today that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has issued U.S. Patent for the fermentation of biomass by the unique, naturally-occurring anaerobic Q Microbe (Clostridium phytofermentans). Qteros, the exclusive licensee of the patent, demonstrated that their Q Microbe technology offers ethanol producers significant cost reductions by streamlining the biomass-conversion process, commonly referred to as “consolidated bio-processing” (CBP).
Virent, Shell announcing startup of biogasoline plant
March 25th, 2010Virent and Shell announced the successful startup of the Virent “Eagle” demonstration plant, producing 10,000 gallons per year of biogasoline, a drop-in renewable fuel.
67 advanced biofuels projects aim for 2.32 billion gallons in capacity by 2014: Biofuels Digest Advanced Biofuels database
March 25th, 2010Biofuels Digest released its updated, version 1.3 of the Advanced Biofuels Tracking Database, now featuring 67 announced projects with 2.322 billion gallons in announced capacity by 2014, and 107 million gallons of installed advanced biofuels capacity by the end of 2010.
1 billion gallons of camelina biofuels, $5.5 billion in new revenue, 25,000 jobs by 2025: new report
March 25th, 2010Biomass Advisors, the research division of Biofuels Digest, projected that one billion gallons of Camelina biofuel would be produced for the aviation and biodiesel sectors by 2025, creating 25,000 new jobs; producing over $5.5 billion in new revenues and $3.5 billion in new agricultural income for U.S. and Canadian farmers.
The Shell Game: What’s up with Biofuels’ “Quiet Company?”
March 25th, 2010In the old and famous “shell game”, a small, round ball, known as a “pea” is located under one of three shells, and shuffled around by an operator. The player can double his bet by guessing under which shell the pea is located. Of course, the skilled operator is using sleight-of-hand to move the pea so that no player can ever successfully guess where the pea is located.
Global ethanol production expected to increase 16.2 percent in 2010 to 22.7 billion gallons
March 25th, 2010In Canada, the Global Renewable Fuels Alliance predicted that global ethanol production will reach 22.72 billion gallons (85.9 billion liters) in 2010, up 16.2 percent from 2009.
Rumors aplenty at “standing-room only” WBM
March 16th, 2010Sapphire, DARPA, Joule, Akuo, SunFuel in the news as World Biofuels Markets convenes.
In the Netherlands, World Biofuels Markets, which officially opened yesterday with 10 keynote speakers including former Norwegian PM Dr. Gro Harlem Brundtland, BP Biofuels CEO Philip New, former Netherlands PM Ruud Lubbers and current Netherlands Environment Minister Bernard ter Haar, got off to a roaring start Monday with delegates crowding standing room-only workshops on algal fuels, energy crops, sustainability, and congresses on biopower and bio-based products. Overall attendance figures of up to 1500 have been reported for WBM, a sharp increase over 2009’s 900 attendees.
Interview – StrategicFit
March 16th, 2010In the UK, StrategicFit will debut the GreenTrackers Algae Biofuels Company Database, which gathers information on 50+ algae bio-fuels companies around the world, from New Zealand and Hawaii to China, California and Europe. The database provides quantitative and qualitative information and is updated on a monthly basis, and uses a motion chart visualization tool to enable easy comparison of companies on multiple dimensions simultaneously. The database is partially based on data from the Biofuels Digest “50 Hottest Companies in Bioenergy” Selectors Data Book as well as the Digest archive. The Digest caught up with the database’s designers, Strategic Fit in an email interview this week.
Think Big? Think Small.
March 16th, 2010Though the stakes could not be bigger, the pop stars that will be gliding across the biofuels’ Red Carpet this week are so incredibly tiny it can take an electron microcrope to see them, as the latest designer e.coli, yeast and enzyme strains take a turn down the runway. The key to thinking big in biofuels, 2010 style, is thinking very, very small.
