In Washington, DC, the U.S. Energy Department released two studies from the Co-Optimization of Engines & Fuels initiative. The study, Fuel Blendstocks with the Potential to Optimize Future Gasoline Engine Performance, identifies eight representative high-octane blendstocks across five chemical groups that could be blended into gasoline for better performance. These new blendstocks, co-optimized with advanced […]
In Sweden, researchers from Karolinska Institutet have developed a quick and non-destructive method to map the carbohydrates of plant matter. By making composition analysis more easy and accessible, this method will help to understand where inefficiencies lie in many processes from paper recycling to the production of biofuel and will eventually lead to less waste […]
In Georgia, a research team led by the University of Georgia has discovered that manipulation of the same gene in poplar trees and switchgrass produced plants that grow better and are more efficiently converted to biofuels. In a paper published recently in Nature Biotechnology, the researchers report that reducing the activity of a specific gene […]
In Washington, the U.S. Department of Energy’s Bioenergy Technologies Office published the results of last year’s Peer Review. The 2017 Project Peer Review Report contains project and technology area recommendations on the focus, management, and impact of the projects in each technology area, as well as project investigators’, technology area managers’, and BETO leadership’s responses to reviewer recommendations. […]
In Denmark, researchers from the National Food Institute, Technical University of Denmark, have developed a patented technology which uses lactic acid bacteria to efficiently convert lactose in the whey into ethanol. Ethanol is the type of alcohol that is found in spirits. The researchers have formed the company Alcowhey, which aims to help smaller dairies […]
In Illinois, a multi-institution report provides practical agronomic data for five cellulosic feedstocks, which could improve adoption and increase production across the country. The project, backed by the U.S. Department of Energy and the Sun Grant Initiative, began in 2008 and includes researchers from 26 institutions. Together, they evaluated the bioenergy potential of switchgrass, Miscanthus, […]
In Oman, researchers from the Sultan Qaboos University believe the sultanate is ideal for macroalgae production for biofuels in the longer term thanks to a number of suitable wadis. Algae grows naturally in the wadis following rains when nutrients accumulate. By studying the wadis’ different green and blue algae species, they believe some that produce […]
In Tennessee, a novel method developed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory creates supertough renewable plastic with improved manufacturability. Working with polylactic acid, a biobased plastic often used in packaging, textiles, biomedical implants and 3D printing, the research team added tiny amounts of silicon-based materials called silanes to design a new polymer. “Our fast, scalable approach […]
In New York state, the key to redox flow batteries is finding chemicals that can not only “carry” sufficient charge, but also be stored without degrading for long periods, thereby maximizing power generation and minimizing the costs of replenishing the system. Researchers at the University of Rochester made “a simple molecular modification”— replacing the compound’s […]
In Massachusetts, microbial species that grow in environments where carbon is mainly available as lignin are promising for finding new ways of removing lignin that protects cellulose for improved conversion of lignin to fuel precursors. One candidate species that can use lignin for growth in the absence of oxygen is Enterobacter lignolyticus SCF1, a bacterium […]
