In Mexico, researchers at the Autonomous Meritorious University of Puebla have discovered that adding hydrated lime instead of calcium oxide more efficiently catalyzes the biodiesel transesterification process. After frying potatoes in soybean oil they bought at a local grocery store, they added lime from a local lime producer, then found that after two hours at […]
In India, the University of Agricultural Sciences (UAS) at the Rural Bio-Resource Complex Project (RBRC) at Hadonahalli has inaugurated its new biofuel plant established by Rural Bio-Fuel Growers Association. The governor opened the facility at the recent ceremony, also planting pongamia trees as a way to encourage the local population to do the same.
In Canada, a PhD student at the University of Sherbrooke is studying an algae that grows naturally in the St. Lawrence River as a possible feedstock for biodiesel because it has special properties that make it better withstand cold temperatures. The research is only six months into a three-year project but is already showing promising […]
In Minnesota, overall ethanol industry profitability gained by $0.08 per gallon in 2010, according to an annual benchmarking study released by Christianson & Associates. The study’s authors found that ethanol yields remained at an average of 2.725 gallons per bushel, and that plants reduced long term debt by an average of $0.20 per gallons. Total […]
In New York, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation awarded a $1.5 million award for a “Next-Generation Urban Sanitation Facility” in Accra, Ghana, that will develop the biotechnologies to turn the fecal sludge in sewage into methane and biodiesel. Kartick Chandran, associate professor of Earth and Environmental Engineering at Columbia Engineering heads up the project. […]
In Minnesota, scientists say they are close to producing super varieties of wheat that will resist from variants of Ug99, a new and deadly form of wheat rust and at the same time boost yields by as much as 15 percent. Scientists report that new data show key Ug99 variants have now been identified across […]
In Mexico, researchers at the la Universidad Autónoma de Baja California are isolating microalgae from a lake in San Quentin, south of Ensenada, to see if it would make an appropriate feedstock for biofuel. The species under investigation can be grown in poor conditions, as it is adapted to the water quality of the lake, […]
In Illinois, the Center for Advanced BioEnergy Research at the University of Illinois has opened a renovated CABER Bioprocessing Laboratory, that will focus on increasing efficiencies in current biofuel technologies, and developing new biofuel and biochemical technologies. The 2500 square foot lab features wet milling, dry grind and ethanol fermentation equipment. Biomass processing equipment will […]
In Massachusetts, a new five-year $750,000 Early Career Research grant from the DOE aims to determine the genetic mechanism that enables certain strains of the Q Microbe to produce up to 30 percent more ethanol from energy crop model system Brachypodium than other strains.. Samuel Hazen received one of 65 awarded grants from the DOE. […]
Advanced Biofuels USA today released a white paper detailing the mechanics of a third approach for producing cellulosic ethanol, called syngas fermentation, a hybrid of the two traditional major pathways, biochemical and thermochemical. The paper, “Syngas Fermentation, The Third Pathway for Cellulosic Ethanol,” discusses the benefits the process holds and seeks to garner awareness about […]
