The CEO and founder of the nation’s largest agricultural residue and forage harvesting business will be discussing biofuel feedstocks on a panel at the BIO Pacific Rim Summit in San Diego this week.

Bill Levy of Oregon-based Pacific Ag will take part in the panel which will explore the realities faced by feedstock producers in today’s marketplace. Panelists will delve into issues in production and logistics, feedstock availability, ability to scale, competing applications for feedstock use, and new markets.

“There are many concerns surrounding the economic feasibility of harvesting biomass for food and fuel. The biggest hurdle of biomass conversion is price and volume predictability,” said Levy of his panel remarks. “What Pacific Ag offers is a sustainable supply at a consistent price necessary for industrial uses of biomass.”

Pacific Ag is leading the biomass harvesting revolution and has been expertly handling biomass logistics for more than 16 years – longer than any other U.S. company. Today, Pacific Ag is the exclusive biomass harvesting and logistics company for Abengoa’s cellulosic ethanol plant located in Hugoton, Kansas and is also working with DuPont’s cellulosic ethanol facility expected to go online in early 2015.

The “Feedstocks: A Global Comparison” panel is taking place Tuesday, December 9, at 8:00 am PT during the BIO Pacific Rim Summit.

The Renewable Fuels Association (RFA) is urging the California Air Resource Board (CARB) to adjust its current indirect land use change (ILUC) analysis to better reflect real-world land use patterns.

In written comments submitted on Friday, RFA’s Senior Vice President Geoff Cooper pointed to the recent study released by Iowa State University’s Center for Agricultural and Rural Development (CARD) raising concerns about CARB’s current ILUC predictions. Cooper called on CARB to “take into account the new CARD/ISU research and use it to immediately re-calibrate” the agency’s ILUC model.

Cooper calls the study a “remarkably important—and potentially gamechanging—contribution to the debate over ILUC modeling” which used empirical data to conclude that “…the primary land use change response of the world’s farmers in the last 10 years has been to use available land resources more efficiently rather than to expand the amount of land brought into production.”

RFA’s comments urged CARB to calibrate its ILUC model using the new CARD/ISU analysis as a guide before sending the proposed rule for Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) re-adoption to the Board for consideration. If adjustments are unable to be made before the final proposal is submitted, RFA calls on CARB to “…delay proposing new ILUC factors until such time as the calibration is completed and new ILUC results are generated.”

Read more from RFA here.

The Windy City moved another step closer to cleaner air with 15% ethanol as the City Council Finance Committee passed the Chicago Clean with E15 Ordinance on Monday. The ordinance would make E15—a fuel blend containing more made-in-America biofuels—available as an option to Chicago drivers, and now moves to the full City Council for a hearing on Wednesday.

“I look forward to the full Council vote, and to giving Chicagoans a cleaner, less expensive option,” said co-sponsor Alderman Anthony Beale.

Supporters of the bill delivered a petition with 7,673 signatures to the committee meeting on Monday. “I’m very pleased this ordinance has such strong support within the Council and across Chicago,” Beale added.

Among the organizations supporting the ordinance are the American Coalition for Ethanol (ACE), Growth Energy, and the Renewable Fuels Association (RFA). “The city of Chicago has always been a leader when it comes to fuel. It was the first city in the United States to ban lead in gasoline, the first to choose ethanol over MTBE in reformulated gas, and this ordinance would make Chicago the first major city to guarantee drivers the choice of a lower cost, higher octane, clean E15 fuel,” said ACE Senior Vice President Ron Lamberty.

Growth Energy CEO Tom Buis noted that approval of the ordinance will provide choice for consumers and jobs for the state. “(T)hey have displayed their resolve to ensure that Chicago motorists and other consumers have market access to a sustainable, cleaner burning, less expensive homegrown fuel that supports 73,156 Illinois jobs and generates $4.7 billion for the state’s economy,” said Buis. “By moving to E15, Chicago can help create an additional 12,000 Illinois jobs that can’t be outsourced.”

The ordinance would require all filling stations in the city to provide dispensing pumps and offer mid-grade E15 for sale, with a phase-in period of nearly a year and an exemption for filling stations selling less than 850,000 gallons of fuel per year.

The facility has 3.2-MW of capacity to produce power, 400 kW of which it uses to power its own operations. The other 2.8 MW are exported to the local utility, Reedy Creek Energy Services, at a wholesale rate of $0.06 per kWh. Reedy Creek Energy Services is the municipality created to serve Disney’s 25,000 acres of amusement parts and attractions in Florida.

The Harvest Power system starts with food waste and FOG (fats, oils and grease) from Disney as well as T-WAS (thickened waste activated sludge) from the nearby wastewater treatment facility. The food waste is continuously fed into a turbo separator, which removes packaging including tin cans and cardboard boxes.  After separation, the food waste slurry is combined with FOG and T-WAS biosolids and sent to the anaerobic digester where it ferments for 28 days before heading to the mix tank for 4 days and then the post-digester.  At the end of the process, Harvest Power is left with fertilizer pellets that it sells for $800 per ton.  Disney has a 20-year contract with Harvest Power to supply food waste, which it does in a big way. According to Dole Doerr, plant operator, Disney delivers up to 100 tons of food waste every day and 20,000 gallons of FOG.

Through the anaerobic digestion process, the food waste, FOG and T-WAS create biogas, which is cooled, scrubbed and then fed into two 1.6-MW capacity generators to create power.  During the power conversion process, waste heat is also captured and used in the drying process to make the fertilizer pellets. The electricity is fed into the grid and meets about 3 percent of Disney’s electricity demand.

Doerr said that the waste-to-energy plant produces 31,000 cubic meters of biogas every day, runs 24 hours a day and employs 10 people.  The system is the largest private biogas facility in North America and cost $25 million to build when it was constructed in 2011.  Harvest Power received an $8 million grant from the U.S. government and the remaining $17 million was privately financed. Entec Biogas GmbH and Environ built the anaerobic digesters.

As one might imagine, odor control is important. “It’s all about the odor,” said Doerr, who explained that the Odotech odor detection technology that is in use at the plant not only detects when there is a strong odor in the air, but also knows from which direction it is coming and how to neutralize it.

Jake Jacobson of Ring Power took the 25 tour attendees (all with ear plugs) through the building that houses the two generators. Jacobson explained that Ring Power operates the two units plus one piece of switchgear and pointed out the substation, located right outside of building. 

Guy Van Doren of LAN Associates is assisting Harvest Power with the minor modifications to the plant and explained to attendees how the waste heat is captured and used. He said the Harvest Power Energy Garden works so well because it can use the heat in its operations. “When you have even distribution of heat and electricity and you can use the heat from the generator you have an ideal situation,” he said.

By Brent Erickson, Executive VP, BIO; Head, Industrial Environmental Section

The underlying legal constructs of the Renewable Fuels Standard (RFS) remain in working order, despite the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) failure to issue a final 2014 rule and its other regulatory missteps. Over the past five years, the program spurred billions of dollars of investment in the biofuels space, measurably reducing U.S. reliance on foreign oil along with greenhouse gas emissions.

EPA mishandled the 2014 rule over the past year after it got sidetracked by a spurious argument over how much of the transportation fuel market should be protected for the oil refining industry. Congress is right to conduct oversight on EPA’s administration of the program with an eye to ending the onerous administrative delays. But lawmakers should not try to fix or “reform” a program that is not really broken.

Tangible results of the RFS in action

If Congress needs proof that the RFS continues to work there are now tangible results. This year, first-of-a-kind commercial-scale cellulosic biofuel facilities began operations. POET-DSM’s 25-million-gallon-per-year Project Liberty in Emmetsburg, Iowa, opened in early September and is ramping up to full production. Abengoa opened its 25-million-gallon-per-year cellulosic ethanol biorefinery in Hugoton, Kansas, in October. And INEOS Bio began operating its 8-million-gallon-per-year facility in Vero Beach, Florida, at the beginning of the year.

Commercializing new technology is never easy or fast. The technology for all three facilities was in development for nearly a decade and will continue to be perfected in these first-of-kind facilities. But that is a very fast pace for commercializing a new technology. The RFS clearly accelerated the development of these and many additional technologies for advanced biofuels and renewable chemicals, all of which contribute to America’s energy security and a cleaner environment. And that is precisely what the RFS was designed to do.

Consistency is what is needed

Consistent implementation of the RFS is what we’ve needed all along. Companies have invested more than $6 billion in RD and commercialization efforts to get the advanced biofuel industry off the ground in the United States. We shouldn’t contemplate walking away from that now. We’ve already seen the damage that can be done. Just as these companies were bringing their projects to fruition, EPA proposed its change to the RFS methodology and put a severe chill on the industry’s visible progress. The agency created uncertainty for advanced biofuel producers, which undercut investment in the sector. And continued uncertainty about the future of the program will only further starve the advanced biofuel industry of necessary investment. To move forward, advanced biofuel producers need stable policy that ensures access to the market over time; that is the prerequisite for continued investment in advanced biofuels.

Further, the agency’s delays in administering other aspects of the program blocked more companies from reaching the market. The delays in approving new pathways for producing cellulosic biofuels, with new technologies and new energy crops, are approaching two years. Currently, more than 30 new biofuel pathways are awaiting agency review and approval or the start of lengthy rulemakings. EPA approved two pathways in July this year, enabling more than 17 million gallons of cellulosic biofuel to be brought to market within a few months’ time. The ongoing delay for other pathways is an obstacle to progress and to meeting the program’s goals. EPA must administer the program more efficiently.

Let’s face it: politics and business are full contact sports. The oil companies have been “rushing the passer” for two years now. A drawn out Congressional reform process would only serve to lengthen the delay in administrating the program, prolong the atmosphere of uncertainty for investors and continue to inhibit further development of advanced biofuels. The oil industry is advocating reform and repeal of the RFS precisely for this purpose. Congress should not act like the 12th man on the field for the oil refining industry.

Let RFS be the game changer it was designed to be

But no one should be fooled; the claim that the RFS needs reform is a canard. The oil refining industry protests that fuel efficiency standards and falling gasoline use in the United States should limit the amount of biofuel the United States uses. But as the oil industry was pressing this argument, gasoline use actually jumped by about 2 billion gallons in both 2013 and 2014. Current low oil prices will probably continue to drive higher gasoline use in 2015. In addition, Congress never intended to codify the so called “blend wall” and require only 10 percent biofuels in our gasoline. Simply put, the RFS was not designed to preserve market share for the oil refining industry; it was meant to be a game changer and to incentivize more biofuel blending. We should let it work.

The biofuels industry does not need negative legislative RFS “reform,” but Congress is right to continue urging EPA to get back on track with appropriate administration of the RFS. EPA’s ongoing delays in administering the RFS undermine the emerging advanced biofuel industry. A number of key Congressional leaders put pressure on EPA throughout the year, including a bipartisan group of 31 Senators who urged EPA to fix the methodology in public comments last January. With EPA’s withdrawal of the rule, the 2014 game has gone into overtime. The advanced biofuel industry needs the RFS to continue to work; it does not need further delays through attempts to fix what isn’t broken.

Tell us about your organization and it’s role in the advanced bioeconomy.

My consulting features work with investment firms on due diligence for biomass, biofuels and biochemical projects. Also, I advise investors on technology platforms regarding expected investment potentials in oil, gas, petrochemicals and petroleum refining.

Tell us about your role and what you are focused on in the next 12 months.

• Give 2-3 speeches on financial models used in petroleum and biomass extraction and processing.
• Continue to teach at Trident and also The Citadel.
• Work with the Israelis to develop biofuel projects.
• Take a leadership role in the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention.
• Continue to advise Gerson Lehrman Group clients on investment models used in biotechnology.

What do you feel are the most important milestones the industry must achieve in the next 5 years?

The industry must come to grips with the disconnect between feedstock producers and companies that convert feedstocks to products. In petroleum, the oil and gas producers enjoy higher returns than the oil refiners fitting typical economic and financial models of risk and reward. Recent research shows advanced biotechnology must reverse their model.

If you could snap your fingers and change one thing about the Advanced Bioeconomy, what would you change?

In the US oils, fats, sugar and other raw materials are protected to a degree hence the move of many companies from the US to Brazil (low cost sugar) and to SEAsia (low cost lipids). The US needs to rethink these protective programs. And, developers need to be more candid about expected investment returns to investors. The industry needs prudence.

Of all the reasons that influenced you to join the Advanced Bioeconomy industry, what single reason stands out for you as still being compelling and important to you?

I left petroleum processing in 2002, to lead the Crown Iron team in first generation biodiesel. Earlier in my career, I developed new technology inside oil and gas for drilling and production so it was a natural step to move to fuels. I enjoy meeting with oil and gas companies who are leading investors in biofuels, biomass and new biochemicals.

Where are you from? 

My father was a Conoco geologist so I grew up in CA, LA and TX. I worked in the oilfields as a teen and joined the industry for nearly 20 years after university in Europe, Middle East and Africa.

What was your undergraduate major in college, and where did you attend? Why did you choose that school and that pathway? 

I followed my father into geology, geography and some law school, graduate school and completed EPA RCRA planning for the State of Texas in the 1970s. My great aunts earned degrees at Texas in Austin 100 years ago, my father graduated in 1942 and I finished in 1973. Later at Arizona State and Texas AM I enjoyed teaching and environmental research.

Who do you consider your mentors. What have you learned from them?

My boss at Conoco UK managed aviation fuels for Europe from two refineries. He had the confidence in me to provide my advanced engineering and business training and helped me understand how oil and gas companies do international business. He also supported my efforts inside Conoco’s parent Dupont to help them develop new technologies for oil and gas to lower GHG impacts in the early 1990s. He had the courage to tell the jet fuel industry that new fuels would be needed and he was 25 years ahead of his time!

What’s the biggest lesson you ever learned during a period of adversity?

I was assigned to drilling rigs as an engineer in the middle of the Sahara Desert (Libya) and learned to manage operations in extremely remote locations, how to motivate multinational crews and learn Italian! I was assigned to the Italian oil giant Agip and learned from them safety, leadership and self confidence from their world class engineering staff. It was early in my career and the reward was assignment to engineering in Milan.

What hobbies do you pursue, away from your work in the industry? 

In Charleston, I learned to sail on a 37 foot boat in the harbor and later in the Atlantic. I restored some old Triumph motorcycles and, in South Carolina, golf is a year around burden…

What 3 books would you take to read, if stranded on a desert island?

The Bible, the works of Shakespeare and Catch-22 by Joseph Heller. Catch-22 features a protagonist who learns that he will, “live forever or die trying…”

What books or articles are on your reading list right now, or you just completed and really enjoyed?

“Measuring and Addressing Investment Risk in the Second-Generation Biofuels Industry” by ICCT in December 2013. www.theicct.org

What’s your favorite city or place to visit, for a holiday?

I learned Italian so Rome is fine for a visit but the Umbria countryside and Sicily and Malta (my home for three years) all feature in my ideal vacation.

VecoPlan — complete systems for shredding, screening, separation, conveying, metered feeding of biomass prior to conversion to advanced biofuels

West Salem — Introducing WSM BioPrep — Biomass Feedstock Preparation Machines Systems

VecoPlan — complete systems for shredding, screening, separation, conveying, metered feeding of biomass prior to conversion to advanced biofuels

West Salem — Introducing WSM BioPrep — Biomass Feedstock Preparation Machines Systems