First commerical US biofuels plant planned this year

Recently, the banned alcoholic drink Four Loko was being recycled into car fuel, and today, it’s non-food waste from crops and wood scraps. Cellulosic ethanol is by no means a new idea, but no one has been producing it in bulk amounts.

However, Mascoma Corporation a biofuels company, will break ground on the first commercial production cellulosic ethanol plant in the U.S. this year. In mid January, they announced that Valero, the nation’s largest independent oil refinery, will take the entire commercial output of the plant, set to open by 2013.

The biorefinery is planned to have an annual production of 40 million gallons of low-carbon cellulosic ethanol, to be covered by the off-take arrangement with Valero. Frontier will use hardwood pulpwood in the area surrounding the Kinross biorefinery. Mascoma’s 200,000 gallons of cellulosic ethanol per year demonstration facility in Rome, New York, has demonstrated the viability of the technology over the past two years and sets the stage for the commercial facility. Source: Inhabitat

http://www.mascoma.com/download/Mascoma%20Valero%20Release_FINAL_011311.pdf