In Illinois, a study by researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Center for Advanced Bioenergy and Bioproducts Innovation (CABBI) found that energy sorghum (Sorghum bicolor) behaves more like miscanthus in the way it efficiently captures light and uses water to produce abundant biomass. It has higher nitrogen emissions like maize, but researchers believe […]
In the UK, the Independent newspaper reports Ultra Light Rail Partners has been awarded an £60,000 grant to further develop the BioUltra train, a biomethane powered train that will potentially replace trams and regional trains, focusing on smaller towns and cities. A prototype was released in July and now a 120-passenger train is under development, […]
In New York state, NGO Energy Vision released a new joint assessment of the US renewable natural gas (RNG) industry, performed on behalf of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Argonne National Laboratory. The assessment consists of a database of current and projected RNG projects. It shows rapid growth in RNG capacity and production nationwide, with the number of […]
In New York state, hundreds of naturally occurring specialty fatty acids (building blocks of oils) have potential for use as raw materials for making lubricants, plastics, pharmaceuticals, and more—if they could be produced at large scale by crop plants. But attempts to put genes for making these specialty building blocks into crops have had the […]
In the United Kingdom, Oxford University researchers turned carbon dioxide into jet fuel using novel, inexpensive iron-based catalysts – an organic combustion-synthesized Fe-Mn-K catalyst. This catalytic process provides an attractive route not only to mitigate carbon dioxide emissions but also to produce renewable and sustainable jet fuel. They prepared the Fe-Mn-K catalyst by the so-called […]
In India, the Economic Times of India reports the Indian Space Research Organization is working to develop green fuels like hydrogen peroxide for rockets, potentially as a co-propellant with ethanol, pointing to human passengers as the reason for using non-hazardous fuels aboard space missions. Liquid oxygen (LOX) together with methane are also possible fuel options […]
In New Jersey, with a massive, nationwide effort the United States could reach net-zero emissions of greenhouse gases by 2050 using existing technology and at costs aligned with historical spending on energy, according to a study led by Princeton University researchers. The new “Net-Zero America” research outlines five distinct technological pathways for the United States […]
In India, the Deccan Herald newspaper reports researchers from the Indian Institute of Science have developed a process to produce cellulosic ethanol from crop waste. At lab scale, researchers managed to produce 36 liters of ethanol from rice paddy and 53 liters of ethanol from wheat straw. Both feedstocks are major challenges for the country’s […]
In Denmark, the European Investment Bank (EIB) has signed a $122 million loan with Novozymes. The financing will support the company’s R&D investment plans for the coming years, and will mainly benefit R&D activities for discovering and producing enzymes that can be used in both industrial and home activities, reducing the need for traditional chemical products. […]
In the United Arab Emirates, The National News reports that researchers from United Arab Emirates University extracted a large amount of biofuel from date seeds from palm trees which will help boost the biofuel industry in the country. About one million tons of date seeds are produced from 40 million palm trees across the Emirates, […]
