Nnfcc market review biofuels issue nineteen october 2013

NNFCC Market Review, October 2013, Page 1 of 9
Biofuels
Highlights
Page 2 Policy
Page 2 Markets
Page 4 Biodiesel
Page 5 Bioethanol/Biobutanol
Page 7 Aviation and Marine Biofuels
Page 7 Novel Technologies
Page 8 Events
Page 9 Commodity Prices
NNFCC Market Review
Issue Nineteen, October 2013
ach month we review the latest
announcements and news from
across the global biofuels market.
This service is exclusively for our
members.
Foreword
Welcome to the October issue of our biofuels
market review. This month the world’s largest
cellulosic ethanol refinery plant was
inaugurated in Crescentino Italy. The opening
marked the commercialisation of advance
biofuels in the European market.
The Beta Renewables advanced biofuels plant
was privately funded and was delivered using
BioChemTex’s accumulated knowledge of
petrochemical refining and Novozyme’s
expertise in lignocellulosic biomass processing.
The plant is reported to be capable of
producing fermentable sugars for around 10
cents/lb and ethanol for around $1.50 per US
gallon. This accomplishment will go a long way
to proving the feasibility of cost competitive
cellulosic ethanol, and paves the way for future
investments in the EU and global markets.
Already, GraalBio announced last May plans to
build five new commercial scale advanced
biofuel plants using the PROESA process and
ChemTex EPC services used for the Crescentino
plant. Furthermore, the European Commission
also awarded six advanced biofuel projects NER
300 programme funding last year in attempt to
stimulate deployment. In global developments,
project LIBERTY in the US is nearing completion
and is expected to produce 20 million gallons of
cellulosic ethanol per year once fully
operational.
Despite these positive developments, the EU
advanced biofuel industry suffered a setback
earlier this month when the Environment
Committee (ENVI) did not give Corinne
LePage (rapporteur for the file on proposals
to amend the Renewable Energy Directive
and Fuel Quality Directive), a mandate to
begin negotiations with European Council.
This means that biofuel reforms will likely be
delayed for at least another year, due to
upcoming elections in coming April.
Read on for all the latest sector news.
E

Policy
Biofuel reform delayed indefinitely
The European Parliament's Environment
Committee (ENVI) has voted to again deny a
negotiating mandate to Corinne LePage, the
French Liberal MEP in charge of a proposal to
limit the use of biofuels produced from food
crops in the EU.
Last month, MEPs backed the cap proposed
by the Commission, but did not give LePage
a mandate to begin negotiations. LePage
has since attempted to gain support for
bringing forward discussions with Council but
has not been successful.
The refusal will mean the legislation will likely
pass into a second reading, which could
delay proceedings for at least a year
because of the approaching end of the
parliamentary term in April 2014.
Click here for more information.
Aviation emissions: Commission
proposes applying EU ETS to European
regional airspace from 1 January 2014
Source: Wiki
The European Commission has proposed
amending the EU emissions trading system (EU
ETS) so that aviation emissions are covered for
the part of flights that takes place in
European regional airspace. The adjustment
in the legislation would apply from 1 January
2014 and would run until a planned global
market-based mechanism (MBM) becomes
applicable to international aviation emissions
by 2020, according to the International Civil
Aviation Organization (ICAO).
Connie Hedegaard, European Commissioner
for Climate Action, said:
"In the light of the recent progress made at
ICAO, not least thanks to Europe's hard work
and determination, the European
Commission today has proposed to adjust the
EU ETS so that emissions from the aviation
sector would be covered for the part of flights
that takes place in European regional
airspace.”
“The European Union has reduced
greenhouse gas emissions considerably, and
all the economic sectors are contributing to
these efforts. The aviation sector also has to
contribute, as aviation emission are increasing
fast – doubling since 1990. I am confident that
the European Parliament and the Council will
move swiftly and approve this proposal
without delay''.
Markets
Report: Virtually no biofuels on the EU
market come from grabbed land
In the debate on the sustainability of biofuels,
one concern is that EU demand may cause
large scale land acquisitions with negative
socio-economic impacts in countries all over
the world.
Commissioned by ePURE, a new Ecofys study
now claims that the acreage of land possibly
subject to land grabbing caused by EU
biofuels demand is far less than often
presented. Based on the Land Matrix of the
International Land Coalition, the analysis
found that, at best, only 0.5% of all deals ((or
180,000 hectares) concerned land grabs for
EU biofuels.

New EU biofuels projects, are now giving as
much attention to the socio-economic
aspects of biofuel production as the fuel
production itself. This coupled with new
legislative and regulatory frameworks within
many developing countries effectively means
that the EU biofuels market has raised the bar
for land governance in many developing
nations.
IISD's biofuels failures tarnish a once
respectable institution
Eric Sievers, chief executive of Ethanol Europe
Renewables (EERL), has written a critique to
Peter Wooders, senior economist at the
International Institute for Sustainable
Development (IISD). Wooders displayed the
IISD as a paragon of integrity in a
commentary in EurActiv last month. However,
Sievers said, the facts painted a different
picture.
IISD has been criticised repeatedly of
publishing eronneous ‘facts’ and drawing
misleading conclusions in the report ‘Biofuels
at what cost?’ published in 2013.
Sievers wrote:
“How IISD has so easily misled Europe about
biofuels by orders of magnitude illustrates why
EU climate policy is in shambles today—
theatrics and unaccountability have pushed
aside science and honest debate.”
“The flawed IISD estimates have been widely
published as credible data and used to justify
regulatory changes that damage an
important European industry. The result has
been the loss of millions of investment funds
and thousands of jobs for hard pressed
European citizens.”
New Eurobserv’ER Barometer: Biofuels
in the European Union
A new Biofuels Barometer report has been
published with information pertaining to the
European Biofuels market, the main biofuel
producing countries, and industrial players for
2012.
According to the report biofuel consumption
growth was ‘firm’ in the European Union, rising
to almost 14.4 million tonnes of oil equivalent
(toe) in 2012, i.e. a year-on-year increase of
0.4 million toe. However the previous years’
weaker growth trend was confirmed at just
2.9% between 2011 and 2012 (5.3% between
2010 and 2011). This slowdown follows the
strong build-up in biofuel consumption
between 2005 and 2010.
Growth in 2012 was unevenly distributed
across EU member states; while consumption
in14 countries increased (including France,
Spain, Sweden and Finland), it decreased in
10 others (such as the UK, Poland, Hungary
and Italy).
In the UK biofuel consumption dropped 15.9%
compared to 2011; 83% of these biofuels were
certified as sustainable.
South Africa to blend biofuels from
2015
South African fuel producers will begin
mandatory blending of petrol and diesel with
biofuels from 1 October 2015 as the country
moves to encourage investment in its biofuels
sector and reduce its reliance on imported
fuel.
Energy Minister Ben Martins noted that the
government had approved South Africa's
biofuels industrial strategy in December 2007,
but incentives such as a 50% rebate on the
general fuel levy for biodiesel manufacturers
and a fuel tax exemption for bioethanol

producers had been insufficient to lure
investments in the biofuels sector.
A Biofuels Pricing Framework would be
finalised by the end of 2013, the minister said,
and a Biofuels Implementation Committee
had been set up to resolve all "practical or
operational aspects pertaining to the
blending of biofuels with mineral petrol and
diesel".
Biodiesel
Greener bio-buses to cut pollution in
Canterbury
Stagecoach and University of Kent staff and
guests mark the investment. Source: ThisisKent
Ultra-modern "bio-buses" have hit the roads of
Canterbury in east Kent, ferrying university
students between campus and the city
centre.
The six new buses, which run on 100 per cent
biofuel, are being used by Stagecoach on
the Unibus route between the University of
Kent and city bus station. The biofuel is made
by blending and refining used cooking oil and
waste fat sourced from the UK food industry.
The new vehicles represent an investment of
£1.1million.
As well as using sustainable fuel, the new
buses are equipped with technologically-
advanced Euro 5 engines. Operator
Stagecoach expects the combination of
biofuel and environmentally-friendly engines
to reduce emissions by up to 50 per cent.
Pacific ethanol begins production of
corn oil at Stockton plant
Pacific Ethanol, Inc. the leading marketer and
producer of low-carbon renewable fuels in
the Western United States, has begun
commercial production of corn oil utilizing
Edeniq, Inc.’s Oil Plus™ proprietary process at
its Stockton, CA plant.
Neil Koehler, the company’s president and
CEO, stated:
“We are pleased to be producing corn oil at
our Stockton plant. Corn oil is a high value co-
product with multiple markets including
animal feed and biodiesel. Corn oil
production at our ethanol plants is an
important strategy to further diversify our
plant revenue streams and significantly
improve operating income.”
US biodiesel production surpasses set
target for second straight year
The US biodiesel industry is on track to
produce more than the 1.28 billion gallons set
under the Renewable Fuels Standard (RFS) for
this year, says a new report from research and
consulting firm GlobalData.
According to the report, biodiesel is the first
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)-
designated ‘advanced biofuel’ — a category
that lists alternative fuels possessing at least
50% fewer emissions than gasoline — to reach
1 billion gallons of annual production. This
growth is driven in large part by a $1 per-
gallon production tax credit extended
through the end of 2013 by the US Congress.

Several cities in the US have been making
strides to institutionalise the use of biodiesel. In
September, New York City Mayor Mike
Bloomberg signed a law that requires all city
diesel vehicles to use a fuel blend of 5%
biodiesel (B5) by 2014, and 20% (B20) by 2016
during the warm weather months. The law
also calls for the city to conduct a pilot
program that studies the feasibility of using
B20 throughout the whole year.
In addition, the Port Authority of New York
and New Jersey has been operating on B20
since 2000. Their case studies of using B20
year-round in airport emergency and snow
removal equipment show biodiesel's
performance capabilities are acceptable
during the winter months.
Bioethanol/Biobutanol
Crescentino biorefinery opened
Ethanol refinery in Crescentino Italy, Source:
Beta Renewables
The world's largest advanced bioethanol
production facility has been opened in
Northern Italy. The biorefinery was
constructed by Beta Renewables (Mossi
Ghisolfi Group) and cost €150 million euros.
Operating at full capacity, the plant will
produce 75 million litres a year of bioethanol,
produced from non-food biomass such as
agricultural residues and energy crops. The
project was supported by the European
Commission within the 7th Framework
Programme for Research and Technological
Development.
The “revolutionary” feature of the bio-refinery
is the technology platform. The innovative
PROESATM (PROduzione di Etanolo da
biomasSA - Production of ethanol from
biomass) technology developed by
Biochemtex (a Mossi Ghisolfi Group
engineering company), combined with
Cellic® enzymes produced by Novozymes,
makes use of sugars that are present in
lignocellulosic (non-food) biomass to obtain
alcohol, fuel and other chemical products.
Moreover, the PROESA technology produces
biofuels that ensure a reduction in
greenhouse gas emissions close to 90% of
those generated by fossil fuels.
Ensus bioethanol plant restarts in UK
Ensus bioethanol plant, Source: Ensus
The Ensus bioethanol plant in the UK has
restarted production in September after
completion of essential maintenance work.
Germany-headquartered CropEnergies
purchased Ensus over the summer and
promised to inject £50 million (€59.8 million)
into the facility and site in Teeside.
CropEnergies claimed:
“Essential maintenance work taking place
since July is now complete and market
conditions have improved meaning the
process of getting the plant up to full
production can now begin”.

The plant employs 100 people and produces
400,000 litres of ethanol, 350,000 tonnes of
dried high protein animal feed and 350,000
tonnes of carbon dioxide for the food and
drink industry annually.
New ASTM International Standard
establishes performance requirements
for butanol for use as automotive
engine fuel
Butanol shows strong potential to be used as
a biofuel. Now, a new ASTM International
standard specification, ASTM D7862-13,
covers butanol that is intended to be
blended with gasoline at 1 to 12.5 volume
percent for use as an automotive spark-
ignition engine fuel.
Glenn Johnston, executive vice president,
regulatory affairs, of Gevo Inc., and member
of the ASTM Subcommittee D02.A0 on
Gasoline and Oxygenated Fuels,
commented:
“The new ASTM standard for butanol will
further commercialisation of a new
renewable fuel, and provide a fuel quality
standard to govern the production and
marketing of butanol.”
Johnston encourages all interested parties to
join in the standards developing activities of
ASTM. The subcommittee next plans to
develop a proposed standard on the use of
butanol in flexible fuel vehicles.
KiOR announces project to double
columbus production capacity
KiOR, Inc. has announced that it is planning to
double production capacity at its Columbus,
Mississippi, cellulosic fuels facility through
construction of a second facility
incorporating KiOR's commercially proven
technology.
KiOR estimates that Columbus II will cost
approximately $225 million and will take
approximately 18 months to construct once
financing has been achieved. KiOR expects
that the Columbus II project will allow each
Columbus facility to achieve improved yields,
production capacity and feedstock flexibility
over the original design, enabling KiOR to
more quickly make progress towards its long-
term goal of 92 gallons of hydrocarbon fuels
per dry ton of biomass.
KiOR has also announced that it has received
commitments, subject only to negotiation
and execution of final documentation, from
Khosla Ventures and Vinod Khosla for an
aggregate commitment of up to $50 million
as the cornerstone investor for the Columbus II
project and to meet the Company's ongoing
liquidity needs
Another US state offers E15 biofuel at
the pumps
North Dakota has become the ninth state in
the US to offer the public E15 fuel at the
pumps. A total of six petrol stations now offer
the blended fuel and the Renewable Fuels
Association believes the US public is
becoming more and more receptive to
green fuel options.
Robert White RFA director of market
development said:
“A recent Fuels America poll showed that 82%
of Americans want E15 to be available at the
petrol station.”
“It is tremendous to see stations in state after
state begin to offer E15 and I hope this trend
will continue.”

Aviation and Marine Biofuels
First gasoline produced from biomass
with ‘Bioliq’ process
The bioliq plant at KIT, Source: Dailyfusion
For the first time, synthetic gasoline was
produced by Karlsruhe Institute of Technology
(KIT). The synthesis stage of the “bioliq” pilot
plant successfully started operation. So far, all
stages of the bioliq process, i.e. flash pyrolysis,
high-pressure entrained-flow gasification, and
synthesis, have been performed successfully.
The project will then be completed by testing
the entire process chain and optimising it for
the large industrial scale.
The pilot plant is expected to begin supplying
high-quality fuel from straw, during mid-2014
once all stages of the bioliq process have
been optimized.
Construction of the bioliq synthesis stage has
required an investment of about €22 million.
Fifty percent was financed by the Federal
Ministry of Food, Agriculture, and Consumer
Protection (BMELV) and from the European
Regional Development Fund (ERDF). The
BMELV funds were provided via the
Fachagentur
Novel Technologies
New metabolic pathway more
efficiently converts sugars into biofuel
University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA)
chemical engineering researchers have
developed a new synthetic metabolic
pathway for breaking down glucose that
could lead to a 50% increase in the
production of biofuels.
The new pathway, described in an article
recently published in the journal Nature, is
intended to replace the natural metabolic
pathway known as glycolysis. Glycolysis
converts four of the six carbon atoms found in
glucose into two-carbon molecules known as
acetyl-CoenzymeA, a precursor to biofuels
like ethanol and butanol. The two remaining
glucose carbons are lost as carbon dioxide.
Glycolysis is currently used in fermentation
processes in biorefineries to convert sugars
derived from plant biomass into biofuels, but
the loss of two carbon atoms for every six that
are input is seen as a major gap in the
efficiency of the process. The UCLA research
team's synthetic glycolytic pathway converts
all six glucose carbon atoms into three
molecules of acetyl-CoA. This synthetic
pathway uses enzymes found in several
distinct pathways in nature.
James Liao, UCLA's Ralph M. Parsons
Foundation Prof. of Chemical Engineering
and chair of the chemical and biomolecular
engineering department commented:
"This pathway solved one of the most
significant limitations in biofuel production
and biorefining: losing one third of carbon
from carbohydrate raw materials"
"This limitation was previously thought to be
insurmountable because of the way glycolysis
evolved."
Click here for more information

Microbial production of short-chain
alkanes
Nature journal has published an article
reporting the development of a bacterial
strain for production of short chain alkanes,
which could serve as drop in replacements
for fossil-derived petroleum and diesel fuels.
The article outlines the engineering of an
Escherichia coli strain for biosynthesis of a
variety of metabolites, including short-chain
alkanes, free fatty acids, fatty esters and fatty
alcohols.
The strain produced up to 580.8 milligrams per
litre of alkanes consisting of nonane,
dodecane, tridecane, 2-methyl-dodecane
and tetradecane, together with small
amounts of other hydrocarbons.
Events
Gasification 2013, 6 - 7 Nov 2013 in
London, UK
www.wplgroup.com/aci/conferences/eu-
ecg3.asp
ACI’s 3rd Annual Gasification Summit will
comprise two days of formal presentations,
interactive roundtable discussions and
excellent networking opportunities, providing
an ideal setting to convene with your peers to
discuss both current operational & future
planned gasification plants, end product
markets, potential barriers & support policies
as well as project economics & finance.
NNFCC members get 15% discount on the
registration fee, please email
enquiries@nnfcc.co.uk for the discount code.
LCA Workshops, 29-30 April in York, UK
www.nnfcc.co.uk/events/new-life-cycle-
assessment-workshops
Following the success of our previous Life
Cycle Assessment (LCA) workshops, NNFCC
and North Energy bring you two new training
workshops providing you with insight into how
LCA's work and their applications. The
workshops take place over two days;
 Day 1: 29 April 2014. Introduction to
LCA Workshop
 Day 30 April 2014. Advanced LCA
Workshop
This is an
NNFCC
Event

Commodity Prices
Arrows indicate rise (↑), constant (–) or fall (↓) from previous month.
Price, pence/RTFC
Item May 13 Jul 13 Sep 13
Renewable Transport Fuel Certificate 15.50 12.10 12.15
RTFC prices, source www.nfpas-auctions.co.uk
Item Price, €/tonne Oct 13
Ethanol Spot (FOB ARA T2) ↓ 731.3
Price, US$/tonne Oct 13
Biodiesel Spot (Fatty Acid Methyl Ester (FAME), 0°C, CFPP FOB ARA) ↑ 1125.25
Biodiesel Spot (Soy Methyl Ester (SME), CIF ARA T2) ↑ 1132.75
Biodiesel Spot (Palm Methyl Ester (PME), CIF ARA T2) ↑ 1052.50
Biodiesel Spot (Rapeseed Methyl Ester (RME), FOB NWE) ↑ 1247.75
European ethanol and biodiesel spot price, www.kingsman.com
Price, US$/US gallon
Item Nov 13 Dec 13 Jan 14 Feb 14
Ethanol Futures
(CBOT)
↑ 1.791 ↑ 1.665 ↑1.636 1.636
Chicago ethanol futures, source www.cmegroup.com
Item Sep 08 Sep 13 % change
Petrol (NY) 2.36 ↓ 2.59 9.74
Diesel (NY) 3.04 ↓ 3.05 0.32
New York Harbour petrol/diesel prices, source www.indexmundi.com
Item Oct 12 Oct 13 Expected 2013 avg. Index value (2000=100%)
Jet Fuel (Global) 3.785 ↓ 2.978 – 2.964 341.9
Global jet fuel prices, source www.iata.org
Disclaimer
The Review has been compiled in good faith by Dr Efthalia Arvaniti and NNFCC does not accept
responsibility for any inaccuracies or the products or services shown.
NNFCC
The Bioeconomy Consultants
NNFCC, Biocentre, Phone: +44 (0)1904 435182
York Science Park, Fax: +44 (0)1904 435345
Innovation Way, E: enquiries@nnfcc.co.uk
Heslington, York, Web: www.nnfcc.co.uk
YO10 5DG.

Nnfcc market review biofuels issue nineteen october 2013

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Nnfcc market review biofuels issue nineteen october 2013