News You Can Use: 5 biofuels reports worth getting now

Holiday reading that can set you up in the New Year? Here’s how to get five reports that will put a surprise in your stocking, and why.

Here in Digestville, we see an especially big flow, at year’s end, of new reports from research organizations, government departments, private enterprise and especially NGOs.

We’ve seen five, this holiday season, that are especially worth devoting some pillow time to.

1. The USDA’s crop land report.

What: An in-depth analysis of U.S. land use patterns released this week by the U.S. Department of Agriculture shows total cropland decreased by 34 million acres from 2002 to 2007, the lowest level since USDA began collecting this data 1945.

The surprise: No sign of the ethanol-fueled land-use change that supposed to be going on all throughout this period?

Get it if: You run into food-vs-fuel or land conversion issues in your work.

How to get it. It’s a free download from the USDA, here.

2. LUX Research’s winners-and-losers report on new and emerging technologies in the field.

What: Lux Research applied the Lux Innovation Grid to rate technology developers in the alternative fuels field, in a report titled, “Refining Alternative Fuels Innovators into Winners and Losers.” “The alternative fuels space is hitting puberty, painfully. Some companies are reaching scale and raking in revenues, while others are going bankrupt, missing milestones, laying off employees, and squandering millions,” said Andrew Soare, Lux Analyst and the lead author of the report.

The surprise: No sign of POET, Abengoa, or KiOR in the headline-grabbing summaries of “winners”. But strong support for Codexis and Novozymes, Amyris, Solazyme, and Gevo, Enerkem, Agnion, Agilyx, BTG-BTL, and Ensyn.

Get it if: You are an investor or competitor in this space.

How to get it: There’s a (very, very, very tiny) free excerpt here.  For the full report, LUX is here to tell you about all the ways they accept payment.

3. Can the UK meet its renewable transport fuel goals?

What: It’s a report from E4tech: “Development of illustrative scenarios describing the quantity of different types of bioenergy potentially available to the UK transport sector in 2020, 2030 and 2050.”

The surprise: Sustainability thresholds could constrict availability of biodiesel by 2020. Beyond then, overcoming market barriers and freeing up land areas globally could dramatically increase the availability of energy crops for lignocellulosic biofuels. In 2050, the total supply potential available in the Medium intensity scenario  is ~80 % of the projected UK transport demand.

Get it if: You are looking at serving the UK market, or developing projects in the EU.

How to get it: A free download, available via Biofuels Digest.

4. What will the advanced biofuels industry look like in 5 years?

What: Well, it’s a video series, not strictly a report. But check it out.
The Advanced Biofuels Association is launching Biofuel STAT. Each episode of Biofuel STAT will feature the CEO of an ABFA member company answering three questions.

1 – What is the biggest challenge to growing your business?
2 – What is the next “aha moment” for America’s biofuels industry?
3 – What does the biofuels industry look like 5 years from now?

The surprise: It’s like attending a conference, only without the travel expense.

Get it if: You are working in, investing in, or analyzing the advanced biofuels space.

How to get it: You can view the series promo here.

5. The skinny on RINs – how are they working?

What: From Hart Energy, their new RINs Report, focusing on modeling for the Ethanol blendwall effects on the market.

The surprise: Very counter-intuitive results: the blend wall reduces market for sugarcane ethanol that is at a premium to corn ethanol.

Get it if: You are distributing, buying, or making corn-starch ethanol or any form of advanced biofuels in or for the US market.

How to get it: Start with a sample, here.  From there, Hart will be glad to sell you the full report.