China Academy of Sciences, BP ink $3 million research deal; BP China research team to work in China’s Energy Innovation Lab

The Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics (DICP) announced that BP will provide $3 million to support the Energy Innovation Lab which focuses on clean energy. The BP China research team will work in the lab in cooperation with DICP scientists.

The deal is a follow up to an cooperation agreement signed in October between BP, DISP and the water-purication company, Hyflux, to develop a zeolite membrane to purify ethanol.

In England, 15 climate change activists from protest group Food Not Fuel recently threw a cream pie in the face of Oliver Mace, CEO of BP Fuels. Protester Thomas Bradshaw told IndyTimes “Biofuels will be taking food from the mouths of the hungry when there are already 800 million people suffering from malnutrition. These corporations are effectively encouraging the erosion of valuable arable farmland and rainforests vital for combating climate change.”

Last week, the Chinese Ministry of Finance announced policies to promote the production of biofuels from non-food feedstocks. The subsidies will be tied to the price of crude oil. Farmers will receive up to $878 per acre planted with forest products for biofuels, and up to $791 per acre for crops planted for biofuels.

The Ministry also said it would subsidize demonstration projects for cellulosic ethanol, sweet sorghum, cassava or forest-product biodiesel feedstocks. Incentives would cover up to 40 percent of project cost.

China has recently announced abandonment of ethanol projects that use foodstocks, excepting existing plants and those already under construction. China is the third-largest ethanol producer, behind Brazil and the US.

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