Friday Edition

09.26.08

GLOBAL

The Sustainable Aviation Fuel Users Group, an organization to accelerate the development of sustainable aviation fuels, has been established. Organizers claim they will make commercial aviation the first global transportation sector to voluntarily bring sustainability practices into its fuel supply chain.

Global company Syngenta has won the United Nations’ 2008 World Business and Development Award (WBDA) for the development of a new sugar beet that can be grown in tropical climates. The tropical sugar beet will be a significant advantage for sugar and ethanol industries, according to the company.

NORTH AMERICA

The US House passed an energy tax extenders package today that included the $1.00 per gallon biodiesel tax credit, but the measure is different from the Senate’s bill passed earlier in the week. The White House earlier this week signaled its willingness to sign the Senate bill, but differences in the House and Senate versions may stall the legislation.

Tellurian Biodiesel and Golden State Foods are launching a new biodiesel storage and distribution terminal located at DK Environmental storage and rail facility south of downtown Los Angeles, CA. It is expected to begin operations later this month.

In Vermont, First Student, which is contracted to supply bus service to Brattleboro, announced it was switching school buses o B5 with a grant from the US EPA.

Green Global Energy, a new biodiesel company in New York that processes waste vegetable oil from area restaurants, has been established with help from loans made by the Niagara County Development Corp., a subsidiary of the Industrial Development Agency, and from M&T Bank.

Snohomish County officials in Washington State dedicated a new facility to store, dry, and crush seed oil that will be refined locally into biodiesel to power county vehicles. By 2014, the county hopes to power all of its diesel fleet on local biodiesel.

Freedom Environmental Services, Inc. will execute an agreement with a biodiesel producer of Florida and Pennsylvania that will allow FESI to acquire the assets of the company. The venture will include a wholly owned cooking oil collection company that currently has 1200 active customers.

The city of Bay Minette, AL has been awarded $195,000 to work with Auburn University and Cello Energy to explore the feasibility of converting the city’s municipal solid waste into a synthetic fuel similar to diesel fuel.

At Brunswick Community College, DE, teachers and students in the biotechnology program plan to grow enough algae to produce 75 pounds of oil each month to fuel tractors and utility vehicles on campus.

In Portage la Prairie, Canada, a study was conducted to evaluate the potential for a biodiesel plant using canola oil and used fry oil from local potato processing plants.

SOUTH AMERICA

Bunge Alimentos has bought a majority stake in sugar and ethanol plant, Monteverde Agroenergetica, in Brazil that is scheduled to become operational in 2009. Initial sugarcane crushing capacity will be 1.4 million tons a year, to be increased to 4.5 million tons in the next four years.

Ecodiesel Brasil has announced the resignation of its director of Investor Relations, the mortgage of its crushing unit located in Rio Grande do Sul, and the authorization of the negotiation of a $60 million loan for working capital. In the last quarter, the company reported loss of $82.5 million.

ASIA / PACIFIC

DuPont India has opened its first biotech research facility at the DuPont Knowledge Centre in Hyderabad, the first integrated agriculture and industrial biotechnology research centre for DuPont outside the US. Its main focuses will be the application of industrial biotechnology to produce biofuels.

According to an Indian Oil Corporation executive, India, which has around 40 million hectares of wasteland available for jatropha cultivation, could replace a tenth of diesel consumption by 2012 if only a fourth of the wasteland was planted.

Local traders said that between September 1to 25, Malaysia's palm oil exports are likely to be down 11%-12% on the month, Dow Jones reports. The traders announced that shipments in the last five days have been close to 200,000 mt.

Three subsidiaries of the Vietnam National Oil and Gas Group (PetroVietnam) will invest in a $120 million cassava ethanol plant at the Dung Quat Economic Zone in central Quang Ngai province. Construction is due to start next year.

South Korea has signed an initial deal to lease 25,000 hectares of Indonesian coastal waters to grow seaweed for biofuel, the government says. The letter of intent was signed between the Ministry for Food, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries and its Indonesian counterpart.

J-Ward Co., a start-up affiliated with the Tokyo University of Agriculture, will begin a jatropha cultivation project in collaboration with more than a dozen agricultural companies in Miyazaki Prefecture. The planting of seedlings will start this year, with plans to expand cultivation to 20 locations during 2009.

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