In Finland, researchers at Aalto University have discovered a method to produce butanol from wood biomass using microbes. The university says that when wood biomass is boiled in a mixture of water, alcohol and sulphur dioxide, all parts of the wood – cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin – are separated into clean fractions. The cellulose can […]
In Germany, the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology is the lead on a European-funded project called BIOBOOST (‘Biomass-based energy intermediates boosting biofuel production’) that will launch in early 2012 develop novel energy carriers, generating energy-rich intermediate products from biogenous residues, assess environmental compatibility and optimize logistics chains. The project received $6.6 million in EU funding.
In Georgia, the University of Georgia has teamed with the University of Puerto Rico to develop a new R&D center that will focus on algae-based biofuels thanks to a $4 million grant from the Dept. of Defense. In Athens, where UGA operates a state-of-the-art algae research facility, researchers will focus their efforts on production of […]
In Georgia, the University of Georgia has teamed with the University of Puerto Rico to develop a new R&D center that will focus on algae-based biofuels thanks to a $4 million grant from the Dept. of Defense. In Athens, where UGA operates a state-of-the-art algae research facility, researchers will focus their efforts on production of […]
In Pennsylvania, Carnegie Mellon’s Wolf Frommer and his team have identified how the sucrose produced in the leaves via photosynthesis is delivered to the transporters that move it into the phloem. In this new research they have identified the missing piece of the molecular pump system – a protein that moves the sucrose to the […]
In Pennsylvania, Penn State reports that researchers have corrected a mistake from a 1967 study by showing that cyanobacteria do in fact have the genes for an alternate means of completing the critical tricarboxilic acid cycle. The researchers used tools that were lacking in 1967 to show that the two enzymes required to complete the […]
In Washington state, partially in thanks to the $80 million, five year USDA grant to the University of Washington and Washington State University for biofuels research, a drop-in fuel pilot plant at WSU-Tri Cities is under development that is intended to be feedstock agnostic. The facility could be commercial scale in five years.
In Malaysia, the new Aerospace Malaysia Innovation Center—funded by grants from the national government, EADS and Rolls Royce–will be first tasked with identifying an optimal algae strain to produce jet fuel domestically. Later priorities will include developing innovative new standards in aero structure manufacturing and sustainable green aeronautic materials.
In Northern Ireland, scientists from the Biomolecular Diagnostics and Engineering Group at the University of Ulster and children from St John the Baptist Primary School are involved in a novel research project to investigate the potential of sunflowers as a fuel source. Children at the school planted sunflower seeds in small pots in their classrooms […]
In Canada, Whitecourt Alberta has successfully harvested its first crop of waste-irrigated willow and poplar trees. The trees, planted two years ago, have been part of a biomass study regarding how fast-growing trees naturally break down effluent. According to Peter Yackulik, the town’s project manager, “the irrigated trees were 30-percent larger than the ones that […]
