A man stands in the mansion of a zillionaire explaining how his rug has been unmistakably peed on — and how the zillionaire is responsible. “Well, sir, it’s this rug I have. It really tied the room together. They were looking for you… these two guys… they tried to— well, they tried to pee on […]
In the Imperial Valley, the wind carries two kinds of dust. One is literal — sun-scorched soil lifting off 48,000 acres of irrigated farmland near Brawley, California. The other is political — immigration headlines, ICE raids, unemployment charts, and the lingering ache left behind when the Spreckels sugar plant shuttered in 2025. What left with […]
By Steven Slome, FGE NexantECA Special to The Digest To date, efforts on energy transition have been characterized by an “all of the above” approach, with a wide range of feedstocks and technologies seeking to decarbonize a wide range of different fossil fuel end-uses. This approach is hampered mainly by insufficient renewable power, insufficient biomass feedstock, high costs for many “end-use” […]
It’s 6 o’clock at the Digest editorial desk, and screens have given way to sunscreen. We’re scanning the day’s headlines from the shade, a glass of something red-amber in hand — the Diablito, a Florida Keys invention of rum, blood orange, lime, and a hint of trouble. In the late light, it looks suspiciously like […]
The cold mountain air of the Milano Cortina Winter Games cuts like glass, but for a Giant Slalom skier crouched in the starting gate at Tofane, the world has narrowed to a single thing: the line. Five seconds. Beep… beep… beep… heart rate up, muscles coiled, then green. Attack. That’s where Europe’s advanced biofuels sector […]
Groucho Marx once wrote Many Happy Returns, a tongue-in-cheek tax guide. If he were here for Section 45Z, he might add a subtitle: “Provided You Registered Before the IRS Looked.” The good news: Treasury has — wait for it — released the proposed regulations for the 45Z clean fuel production credit. The document contains proposed […]
It’s Oh-dark-thirty at Fort Methanol. Reveille has sounded. Intake complete. Heads shaved. Civilian clothes gone. Racks made. Fall in! “I don’t care where you came from,” the drill instructor shouts. “Corn stover. Landfill gas. Forest residues. Steel mill exhaust. Direct air capture. Doesn’t matter. I’m going to run you through heat, pressure, and current until […]
Ten years ago, Visolis entered the federal innovation pipeline through Cyclotron Road—the DOE-backed fellowship that helped define the climate-tech generation. Founder Deepak Dugar was part of a wave of scientists trying to turn low-carbon chemistry into real industry. Today, Visolis is winning scale-up funding from the Department of Defense. Same company. Same core science. Different […]
There’s a quiet bond among people who choose this work, the bioeconomy. You don’t end up here because it’s easy. If easy were the goal, there are cleaner career paths, simpler markets, less friction. Heck, go get rich working on petroleum. Here, progress comes with resistance. Every gain seems to arrive with a counterforce — […]
The spreadsheet worked. The chemistry was sound. The model penciled. And yet the project stalled, downsized, or died somewhere between final investment decision and steel in the ground. If you’ve worked on a first-of-a-kind (FOAK) project in the bioeconomy, this story will feel familiar. The usual explanations follow: demand softness, policy uncertainty, buyer hesitation, macro […]
