BioGasol, a Danish engineering and technology company that develops and designs technologies needed for second-generation bioethanol production, has been awarded a $24.3 million grant from the US Department of Energy (DOE) as part of the US administration's ambitious plan to implement second-generation bioethanol production throughout the USA.
The Danish company shares the grant with American ethanol producer Pacific Ethanol.
BioGasol's technology will be integrated with an existing bioethanol plant at Boardman, Oregon. Owned and operated by Pacific Ethanol, the Boardman plant will be the first ethanol plant in the north-western United States that can produce ethanol from cellulosic biomasses.
The annual production of the demonstration plant will reach 10 million litres of ethanol from a diverse mixture of biomasses that are readily available in the region. In addition, the plant will produce 10,000 tonnes of fuel pellets and methane to run the plant.
'Our process technology could set the standard for second-generation biofuel production,' said Birgitte Ahring, the chief executive of BioGasol. 'The cost-effectiveness of our process concept has already been validated in pilot plant scale and we believe that the future production cost can be less than $1.00 a gallon - even less when the technologies are fully matured.
She added that the DOE grant gives the Danish company an excellent opportunity to bring its process concept one step closer to commercial viability.
'We're looking forward to working with Pacific Ethanol and the DOE's Joint BioEnergy Institute to realise the full potential of this project,' Ahring said.