In Japan, Nippon Paper Group, Sumitomo Corporation and Green Earth Institute have reached an agreement to establish a joint venture company, Morisora Bio Refinery LLC, which will focus on the production and sale of bioethanol and biochemicals derived from woody biomass.
Establishment of the joint venture is scheduled for March 2025.
The joint venture will construct a semi-commercial plant at Nippon Paper’s Iwanuma Mill in Miyagi Prefecture. Using sustainable forest resources from the Tohoku region, such as wood scraps from sawmills, GEI’s proprietary low-carbon, cost-efficient bioethanol production process will be used to produce over 1,000 kL of bioethanol annually starting in 2027, Nippon Paper Group.
The firm also said that the bioethanol produced by the project will be a low-carbon, non-food biomass-based ethanol (E2G) made from wood chips.
Additionally, the project will actively explore the effective use of bio-generated CO2 and fermentation by-products.
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