Siemens executive says mowing a lawn produces more emissions than driving a new car from New York to LA
September 27, 2007
At a Detroit panel discussion titled “The Gasoline Engine Is Dead. Or Is It?†Siemens executive Michael Crane said “For the foreseeable future, the gasoline engine will continue to dominate.†“If I mow my lawn for one hour,†says Crane, “I’d produce more emissions than if I drove a new car from New York to Los Angeles.†An article on Cranes remarks in the National Review pointed out that Ford’s Durotech engine meets California’s zero-emissions standard as well as the Toyota Prius hybrid.
Swedish government pledges increased spending on biofuels
September 27, 2007
In Sweden, the newly elected conservative Reinfeldt government has pledged to spend nearly $100 million on the development of biofuels. The government has signed technology partnerships with the US and Brazil in recent months regarding biofuel development. Already in Sweden, there is a $1500 rebate on the purchase of a flex-fuel vehicle and 40,000 cars on the road (1% market share) are flex-fuel.
Recently in Sweden, ethanol taxes were abolished, and Scania has commenced increased exports of its biofuel-powered city buses. The head of Saab recently criticized the British government for dragging its feet on support of biofuels.
New Spanish corn ethanol plants moves forward despite Abengoa ethanol shutdown
September 27, 2007
In Spain, Alcoholes Biocarburantes de Extremadura (Albiex) has commenced construction of a 29 Mgy corn ethanol plant near Badajoz, which will also produce 87,000 metric tonnes of distillers grains for livestock feed. Total plant investment is $59 million and plant is expected to open in 2009. Read more
CNN Money article calls biodiesel the “rock star of fuels”; profiles rumored IPOs for Renewable Energy, Imperium Renewables
September 27, 2007
“Biodiesel is the rock star of fuels,” said Will Thurmond, author of Biodiesel 2020: A Global Market Survey, in a glowing review of biodiesel entrepreneurs and companies published by cnn.com. “The U.S. market for the combustible stuff has more than doubled every year since 2004 and will hit $1 billion this year. The number of retail pumps nationwide has grown from 350 in 2005 to more than 1,000 today. A couple of biodiesel IPOs are in the offing - and opportunities abound. It has moved from Woodstock to Wall Street,” the article stated.
The article profiles the expected IPO of Renewable Energy Group, which controls 27% of US biodiesel production after being formed from an Iowa soybean farmer cooperative. REG expects to increase production to 240 million gallons by 2008. The article suggests that Imperium Renewables, in Washington State, the Paul Allen-backed venture, may also file an IPO.
PrioBio biodiesel brand to launch in UK on November 1
September 27, 2007
In the UK, FCL Biofuels and Portuguese biofuels company Prio will launch the Portuguese consumer biodiesel brand, PrioBio, in the UK on November 1. FCL Biofuel, expects to have more than 50 million gallons in biodiesel capacity in the UK by the end of the year and will double than by 2010.
New biodiesel plant opens in Pennsylvania; Kansas corn ethanol project stalls
September 27, 2007
In Kansas, Sunflower Electric Power and Scoular officially ended their partnership to construct a 100 Mgy ethanol facility at the Sunflower Integrated Bioenergy Center in Holcomb. Scoular had announced its intention to build the plant in January, but did not give reasons for the change in plans.
Pennsylvania Bio Diesel commenced production yesterday in Beaver County. The $15 million facility was officially opened by Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell, who this week began a new push for his Energy Independence Fund. Read more
Shell UK head says: Don’t impose more penalties on gasoline, biofuels boost food prices
September 27, 2007
Shell UK chairman James Smith warned against imposing too many penalties on fossil fuels as a means of addressing emissions and climate change. “Wind farms are expensive, nuclear stations have difficulty dealing with waste, biofuels boost food prices and oil sands produce even higher emissions than oil,” Smith said. “Energy demand is going to continue to accelerate. If lawmakers reject some energy sources, we won’t get anything left.”
In related news, BusinessWeek ran a story on the efforts of major oil companies to undermine demand for E85 by linking the rise in food prices to the increased demand for biofuels.
Primate researcher Jane Goodall says biofuel crop growing is damaging rainforest in Brazil; former Brazilian ag minister says “It is an absurdity”
September 27, 2007
At the Clinton Global Initiative, primate scientist Jane Goodall said that crops growing for biofuels is damaging rain forests in Asia, Africa and South America and adding to the emissions blamed for global warming. “We’re cutting down forests now to grow sugarcane and palm oil for biofuels and our forests are being hacked into by so many interests that it makes them more and more important to save now,” Goodall said.
Last week, at the Americas Conference in Miami, former Brazilian Minister of Agriculture Roberto Rodrigues pointed out that sugar cane does not grow in the Amazon region, and that Amazonian rainforest is not being destroyed in Brazil for sugar cane cultivation. “It is an absurdity to suggest otherwise”, Rodrigues said.
Daily Biofuels Summary for September 27
September 27, 2007
Top Story: BusinessWeek ran a stinging article on the efforts of oil companies to slow the spread of E85. The article pointed out that, as fuel blenders, it is the oil industry that receives the 51 cent per gallon tax credit for ethanol. According to BusinessWeek, the industry - which did not request the subsidy - has been funding anti-biofuel studies, stimulating a food vs. fuel debate by suggesting that biofuels are driving up the price of food, and refused to launch E85 through their own brands — thereby forcing E85 to be distributed through independents.
The Business Week article said that the opposition from biofuels advocates was expected, but that Big Oil has earned the enmity of US automakers, who are pushing E85 for among other reasons, the potential of E85 to relieve them of a $100 billion investment in reaching tough CAFE emission standards. The article quoted Mark N. Cooper, research director at the Consumer Federation of America, in saying that Big Oil has “reacted aggressively against the expansion of ethanol production, suggesting that it perceives the growth of biofuels as an independent, competitive threat to its market power in refining and gasoline marketing.” The food vs. fuel debate picked up in June on the heels of a report released by the American Petroleum Institute that concluded that consumers would pay “$12 billion-plus a year more for food as corn prices rise to meet ethanol demand.” Read more
Biofuels Digest Indexâ„¢ rockets up 1.62% as sector recovers
September 26, 2007
The Biofuels Digest Indexâ„¢, a basket of 21 public biofuels stocks, rose 1.62% to 99.28 following a pummeling earlier in the week. The Index remains down for the week as a whole but has recovered substantially from big losses triggered by analyst downgrades on weak ethanol pricing and rising costs.
Star performers were primarily among services companies, with Environmental Power (EPG) up 9.38% to $6.30 and Green Plains Renewable Energy up 4.57% to $10.71. Winners outpaced losers 3 to 1, with losses primarily occuring for microcap stocks, excepting MGP Ingredients down 4.6% to $11.62.
In the broader markets, the Dow was up 99.50 points to 13.878.15, the S&P 500 up 8.21 points to 1525.42 and the Nasdaq up 15.58 to 2699.03. All sectors including biofuels were assisted by news that the UAW strike against General Motors had been ended.
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