For the latest in news, visit or blog site.
Virginia Attracts New Pellet Plant
Construction is expected to begin this spring on an $18.7 million pellet plant recently announced for Greensville County, Va. in the I-95 corridor near the North Carolina line. It will be built by Wood Fuel Developers, LLC, (WFD), a startup company affiliated with parent company Industrial TurnAround Corp., based in Chester, Va.
According to Steve Gordon, WFD president, the company decided to build in Virginia instead of Georgia after International Paper announced the permanent closure of its large paper mill at Franklin, Va., located some 40 miles to the east of the Emporia area site. Gordon says the company will initially manufacture for the domestic residential market but will keep an eye on commercial opportunities, both domestically and internationally. The plant will be situated only 60 miles from Virginia’s Atlantic ports.
Startup could occur by December, Gordon says, indicating that output may ultimately ramp up to 300,000 tons per year. He did not elaborate on the type or quantity of feedstock the company will require.
WFD reportedly will receive $3.65 million in incentives and site improvements from local, state and federal agencies.
Longview Fibre Plans Large Cogen Plant
More details have emerged for the new Longview Fibre cogen plant planned for southwest Washington near Longview. The plant is 65 MW, which will make it the largest in the Pacific Northwest, replacing the company’s existing 25 MW wood-fueled cogen plant. Feedstock for the facility includes wood waste from the company’s manufacture of kraft paper, container board and corrugated boxes. About 38,000 tons of wood waste per month would fire the process.
Company officials say the feedstock should be a mixture of solid wood products residuals, recycling operations and forest biomass. The plant should come on line the third quarter of 2011. Company officials are still deciding whether to sell the power produced on the grid or use it internally.
USDA Attempts To Fine-Tune BCAP
U.S. Dept. of Agriculture published its regulatory proposal for the Biomass Crop Assistance Program (BCAP). The proposal suspended the acceptance of new applications for BCAP subsidy funds until the regulation has been finalized. The proposal also states that USDA will refrain from “diverting any materials potentially eligible for BCAP matching payments from existing value-added production processes already occurring in the marketplace.”
Authorized in the Food, Conservation, and Energy Act of 2008, BCAP is designed to ensure that a sufficiently large base of new, non-food, non-feed biomass crops is established in anticipation of future demand for renewable energy consumption. BCAP is intended to reduce the financial risk for farmers, ranchers and forest landowners by providing incentive payments to those who invest in the production, harvest, storage and transportation of new first-generation energy crops that displace hydrocarbon-based materials now used for heat, power and vehicle fuel.
BCAP is authorized to fund two main types of activities. First, it provides funding for agriculture and forest landowners and operators to receive matching payments for eligible biomass materials sold to qualified biomass conversion facilities for the production of heat, power, bio-based products or advanced biofuels. The payment rate is intended to assist producers with the cost of collection, harvest, storage and transportation of the biomass to the facility for up to two years.
Additionally, BCAP will provide funding for producers of eligible renewable crops within a select geographical area to receive payments up to 75% of the cost of establishing the crop and annual payments for up to 15 years for crop production.
Following the comment period on the proposal, USDA will develop a more final set of implementation standards. Once these rules are announced, applications for the program will again be accepted. For applications received prior to the suspension of the program, payments were to continue through March 31.
The new rules highlight the fact that the 2009 implementation—based on the Notice of Funds Availability—allowed the USDA to get a small version of the program up and running so it could evaluate the effects of the program on markets, the total cost of the program, and whether the program accomplished its goals.
The most significant proposed change is to the amount of the payments themselves. In the original rules, suppliers to any facility that produced electricity either for sale to the grid or for its own use were eligible for a dollar for dollar matching payment, up to $45/ton, for every dry ton of delivered eligible material. The new rules recognize that this payment amount would make the program cost prohibitive. Based on an early report that the USDA would spend $517 million in the first quarter of 2010 alone, it was widely speculated that the program would cost $2 billion per year.
The new rules offer three options for structuring payments.
1. A dollar for dollar per bone dry ton (BDT) matching payment except for suppliers of facilities converting wood wastes and residues into heat or electricity for their own use. Suppliers to these facilities would receive dollar for dollar matching payments on eligible materials used to produce heat or electricity above the facilities historic baseline. This payment structure would accent the idea of “additionality,” driving more renewable energy production rather than rewarding those who have been producing renewable energy for years, sometimes decades.
2. A tiered approach where suppliers to biofuels facilities would receive the dollar for dollar per BDT matching payment, not to exceed $45/BDT. Suppliers to facilities producing heat, power, renewable energy or biobased products would receive a lesser amount, roughly $16 per BDT or an amount based on the value of lower carbon emissions. This payment structure would accent biofuels production over other types of renewable energy.
3. A dollar for dollar per BDT matching payment for all facilities based on production above an historic baseline. The full payment, up to $45/ BDT, would go to new facilities and facilities like schools, and public buildings that convert from fossil fuel use to renewable biomass, for eligible materials showing exceptional promise and innovation, and for consumption above a baseline. Payments would be reduced for facilities that do not increase production over their historic levels. This structure would also accent additionality, but it would also provide some level of payment to those who have historically produced their own heat and electricity from biomass.
Another major change in policy concerns the eligible materials list. The new rules prohibit payments for mill residues that are used to make higher value products, like composite panels.
Other rule changes:
• Originally, suppliers were eligible for matching payments for up to two years after they filed their first application; under the new rules, the two-year clock starts ticking when suppliers receive their first payment.
• The original rule called for measuring the moisture content of each load of biomass; the new rule accepts industry standards for measuring moisture content, including random sampling and the use of historical statistical data.
• The proposed rules slightly modify the requirement for “arms-length transactions.” The program still precludes payments for “related-party transactions” but allows facility stockholders or cooperative members to participate.
• The original rules required that forest biomass be harvested in accordance with a forest stewardship plan. The proposed rule has expanded the types of plans acceptable to include the American Tree Farm Program, the Sustainable Forestry Initiatives Program and State Best Management Practices Programs.
(Much of this release is from Forest2Market.com)
Europe Stays On Renewable Course
Recent reports suggest the European Union will exceed its target of getting 20% of its energy from renewable sources in 2020. The latest national projections submitted by governments to the EU executive suggest the 27-nation bloc could reach an overall renewable share of 20.3% by the end of the decade.
Spain and Germany are projecting the largest surpluses in 2020, predicting they will exceed their national renewable targets by 2.7 and 0.7 percentage points, respectively. However, there are projected shortfalls in several EU countries, including Italy, which expects to miss its 17% target by 1 percentage point. EU governments that miss their 2020 targets will be forced to buy surplus renewable production from other countries to make up the difference, or could face legal action from the Commission.
Site Plan Approved For Florida Plant
Manatee County (Fla.) commissioners have approved a rezoning of about 48 acres and the preliminary site plan for a power plant that will produce electricity by burning wood chips, to be built by Florida Biomass Energy LLC. The plant will create 150 jobs during construction and 75 for the operation of the plant.
The plant will be located at U.S. 41 at Armstrong Road, just south of Port Manatee, and will burn mostly wood chips and other non-food plant material to generate up to 60 MW.
Penn State Delves Into Biomass Potential
Blending biomass into the coal stream that feeds electricity-generation plants offers the opportunity to reduce harmful emissions and create a market for renewable fuel, according to researchers at the Penn State College of Agricultural Sciences.
The state’s Alternative Fuels Portfolio Standard is a state mandate that requires that 18% of Pennsylvania’s electricity be generated from renewable or alternative energy sources by 2021.
Several experiments have shown the feasibility of co-firing biomass with coal, including tests at the Shawville power plant in Clearfield County and the Seward power plant in Westmoreland County. While the most common type of facilities for co-firing are large, coal-fired power plants, other coal-burning facilities, such as cement kilns, industrial boilers and coal-fired heating plants, are good candidates for co-firing as well.
One of the reasons biomass is well suited for co-firing with coal is that both biomass and coal are solid fuels. Therefore, equipment designed to burn coal can burn biomass as well. However, several differences between biomass and coal — such as biomass’s typically higher moisture content and its propensity to clog equipment when burned — have scientists scrambling for solutions to allow co-firing.
The chemical composition of coal is different from that of biomass, aaccording to PSU officials; most notably, biomass has a higher hydrogen and oxygen content, and less carbon than coal. As a result, biomass tends to generate less energy than coal—about two-thirds as much.
One of the possible methods for reducing these problems is to convert the biomass to charcoal, which has a consistency similar to that of coal, or to densify biomass fuel into hard pellets or briquettes that may be more compatible with a combustor’s fuel-handling system.
Pennsylvania uses approximately 57 million tons of coal per year. If 5% of the fuel were replaced with biomass, it would amount to 4.4 million tons of biomass per year, according to PSU. “That would nearly triple the current rate of biomass use for energy,” Ciolkosz said.
We Energies Files To Build Plant
We Energies has filed an application with state regulators to build a $255 million biomass power plant near Wausau, Wis. The 50 MW plant would supply steam to Domtar Corp.’s paper mill in Rothschild and create up to 150 jobs.
We Energies and Domtar will work with loggers to obtain wastewood—logging residues, as well as wood waste from sawmills and are confident there is sufficient wood within a 75 mile radius of the Domtar paper mill.
Missouri Schools Receive Grants
Southern Reynolds School District, Ellington, Mo., has been awarded a nearly $1 million grant to install a new energy heating system for its buildings. The system could provide more than $300,000 in energy savings for Ellington schools over the next decade.
The Fuels for Schools grant provides seven southern Missouri school districts with funds to purchase biomass heating systems. The grant is administered by the Missouri Dept. of Conservation and comes from $6 million in American Recovery Reinvestment Act money. Grant money was given to districts in areas with a strong forest industry. Districts will utilize a boiler that burns wood chips or sawdust to generate heat, which will be piped into buildings.
Southern Reynolds currently heats its buildings with a mix of propane and electric units, with parts of the system up to 30 years old. The new system must be in place by June 2011, according to grant requirements.
Recipient selections were based on each district’s economic needs, how dependent it is on the forest products industry, its ability to implement the project quickly, it proximity to public and private forestland and its partnership with other public entities that could benefit from the biomass energy system.
Duke To Integrate Wood At Two Plants
Duke Energy plans to run two of its coal-burning power plants partly on wood, a switch that will help the utility meet North Carolina’s green-energy law. Duke has asked the N.C. Utilities Commission to register its Buck plant in Rowan County and Lee plant in Williamston, SC as renewable energy facilities. The plants would burn sawdust or wood chips with coal.
Currently biomass reportedly produces 4% of North Carolina energy, but experts say it could produce another 10% with existing resources.
Duke has has partnered with the French nuclear services company, Areva, to turn waste wood into energy.
Hughes Hardwood Joins ClearFuels
ClearFuels Technology Inc. and Hughes Hardwood have signed a Memorandum of Understanding to develop a biorefinery that will convert 1,000 dry tons of wood product per day to renewable diesel or jet fuel. Hawaii-based ClearFuels will site the facility at the Hughes Hardwood wood component products manufacturing facility in Collinwood, Tenn.
The Collinwood facility will represent an investment of $200 million by ClearFuels and the creation of 50 direct jobs, with additional jobs to be created in relation to the collection and transportation of feedstock. At standard capacity, the biorefinery will be capable of producing 16 million gallons of diesel and 4 million gallons of the gasoline feedstock naphtha each year, along with six to eight megawatts of excess electricity.
ClearFuels is scheduled to break ground on the biorefinery in late 2011, and the facility will reach commercial operation by late 2013 to early 2014.
“We are very pleased to play an integral part in the successful implementation of a biorefinery in Wayne County which, when fully operational, should benefit the timber industry in a multi-county area,” says Bill Hughes, president of Hughes Hardwood.
The technology that will allow the Collinwood biorefinery to produce multiple liquid fuels from one site results from a partnership between ClearFuels and Rentech, Inc. Prior to construction in Tennessee, ClearFuels expects to complete its joint demonstration project next year at Rentech’s Product Demonstration Unit (PDU) in Commerce City, Co. The ClearFuels gasification and Rentech Fischer-Tropsch conversion technologies have been developed, tested and improved independently over the past 15 years.
Weyerhaeuser Allies With Mitsubishi
Mitsubishi Corp. and Weyerhaeuser Co. have signed a Strategic Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to explore the possibilities of collaborating in the biomass-to-energy business. The companies are interested in assessing the feasibility of jointly investing in and operating a commercial-scale bio-pellet production facility in the U.S. by 2011. Depending on the success of the joint feasibility study, more facilities could follow. Mitsubishi operates two bio-pellet facilities in Japan.
John Deere Joins Joint Bio-Venture
ADAGE LLC, a bioenergy joint venture formed between AREVA and Duke Energy, and John Deere announced an alliance to bring technology and process innovation to the fuel supply for sustainable woody biomass power projects. The first project to be developed as part of the alliance will be ADAGE’s proposed facility in Mason County, Wash., 80 miles west of Seattle.
The project involves collecting, bundling, and transporting branches and other wood debris from regional logging operations to the ADAGE biomass power facility. Deere reports it makes all of the forestry equipment used to gather and bundle the wood debris.
The Mason County project will implement ADAGE’s plant design which employs advanced environmental controls to minimize air emissions and water usage. The proposed 55 MW facility will provide enough power for more than 40,000 homes. The $250 million initial investment will create more than 400 direct jobs during construction and more than 100 direct jobs during permanent operation. ADAGE plans to begin construction in late 2010.
^ Top