Range Fuels has broken ground on its cellulosic ethanol plant in Georgia. (http://www.rangefuels.com/range_fuels_to_build_first_wood_cellulosic_ethanol _plant_in_georgia)

Range Fuels’ Soperton Plant will use wood and wood waste from Georgia’s pine forests and mills as its feedstock and will have the capacity to produce over one hundred million gallons of ethanol per year. Construction of the first 20 million-gallon-per-year phase is expected to be completed in 2008.

Mascoma Corp. is building the second one in Michigan. (http://www.mascoma.com/welcome/pdf/7-19-07%20Mascoma-MI%20Release.pdf)

Unlike most current biofuel production operations, Mascoma’s Michigan cellulosic plant
will make ethanol from mainly wood chips and other non-food agricultural crops. Most of the
nation’s biofuel facilities now in production, or under construction, convert corn and other food
crops into fuel. Because cellulosic ethanol production uses non-food agricultural feedstock, it is
critical to producing ethanol on a scale that could substitute for imported oil.
“Mascoma’s decision to choose Michigan is helping us achieve a key part of our economic
plan – making our state a leader in alternative energy production,” Granholm said. “Cellulosic is the
next step in wide-scale ethanol production, and this puts Michigan on the leading edge of
technology that will create good-paying jobs for Michigan citizens.”

Abengoa Bioenergy is building America's third cellulosic ethanol plant in Kansas. (http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/aug2007/2007-08-28-097.asp)

HUGOTON, Kansas, August 28, 2007 (ENS) - A Spanish energy company has selected the town of Hugoton in southwestern Kansas as the site of the first U.S. plant to turn corn stalks, switchgrass and other woody biomass into ethanol.

Abengoa Bioenergy announced the $400 million ethanol project on Thursday. The facility will include an 85 million gallon per year corn-to-ethanol production plant as well as the 30 million gallon per year cellulosic ethanol plant.

The cellulosic ethanol plant will use 700 tons per day of corn stover, wheat straw, milo stubble, switchgrass, and other feedstocks.

Lignol applies to build America's fourth cellulosic ethanol plant in Colorado (http://www.lignol.ca/news/2007-aug20.html)

VANCOUVER, Aug. 20 - Lignol Energy Corporation (TSX-V: LEC) ("Lignol") today announced that its U.S. subsidiary, Lignol Innovations Inc., has filed a formal application with the U.S. Department of Energy ("DOE") regarding a grant for US$30 million under the DOE's cellulosic ethanol and biofuels funding program, to fund the development of a cellulosic ethanol commercial demonstration plant in Colorado.

Florida Crystals Corp. is bulding America's fifth cellulosic ethanol plant in Florida (http://www.bizjournals.com/southflorida/stories/2007/08/20/daily23.html)

The University of Florida has selected Florida Crystals Corp. as the site to build a cellulosic ethanol plant that will produce 1 million to 2 million gallons of ethanol a year, university officials said.

The plant is financed by a $20 million state grant and will operate as a research and development lab as well as a commercial facility. It is the first of its kind in Florida. Attendees at the Monday meeting where the decision was announced said Florida Crystals was selected over the second front-runner, Memphis, Tenn.-based Buckeye Technologies, because it has a large supply of bagasse biomass and it is already in the sugar business.

Mascoma is building America's sixth cellulosic ethanol plant in Tennessee (http://www.utk.edu/news/article.php?id=4244)

CAMBRIDGE, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Mascoma Corporation, a leader in advanced low-carbon energy biotechnology, today announced that it intends to establish the country’s first operating facility producing cellulosic ethanol utilizing switchgrass as feedstock. The project represents one of the largest commitments of capital yet made in support of the cellulosic biofuels industry.

Mascoma and The University of Tennessee plan to jointly build and operate the five million gallon per year cellulosic biorefinery. Construction is expected to begin by the end of 2007 and the facility will be operational in 2009.

Mascoma is building America's seventh cellulosic ethanol plant in New York (http://home.businesswire.com/portal/site/google/index.jsp?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20070927005865&newsLang=en)

Mascoma has begun construction on its first facility announced in 2006, a multi-feedstock demonstration-scale biorefinery located in Rome, New York. This project is being developed in partnership with the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority and the New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets.

Poet is building America's Eighth Cellulosic Ethanol Plant In Iowa (http://www.poetenergy.com/news/showRelease.asp?id=96&year=2007&categoryid=0)

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (October 4, 2007) - POET and the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) announced that they have signed a cooperative agreement for a commercial cellulosic ethanol project in Emmetsburg, Iowa.
...
According to the cooperative agreement, phase one of the project will last approximately 20 months. A subsequent phase two agreement will then be negotiated to cover construction which is expected to take two years. Following construction, facility operation is expected to begin in 2011.

Verinium is building America's Ninth Cellulosic Ethanol Plant in Louisiana
(http://www.shreveporttimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071104/NEWS01/711040345/1060/NEWS01)
Based in Massachusetts, Verenium built a small-scale plant in Jennings in 2006, and began quietly cooking about two tons of local crop waste per day into ethanol. It's one of a few pilot plants in the U.S. acting like chemistry labs for cellulosic ethanol.

In February, Verenium broke ground on a 1.4 million gallon per-year demonstration plant right next to the pilot site. It would be the first cellulosic plant of its size in the U.S., and Verenium officials boast they're at least one year ahead of anyone else in the game.

This new plant should be built in March and start running later next year, but is still just the second of three phases, meant to help Verenium perfect the process on their way to building a commercial-scale plant.

That could make 25 million to 30 million gallons of ethanol per year from biomass as far away as New Iberia, if it were built in Jennings. Sites in Florida and Texas are also being considered for the large, third-phase plant.

Texas company "within matter of months" turning biodiesel waste product (glycerin) into ethanol (http://www.wired.com/science/planetearth/news/2007/11/glycerin)
The process uses a non-pathogenic strain of E. coli to convert glycerin into ethanol, a method its developers say is easier and cheaper than using corn or sugarcane and more viable than using grass and other plants.

But the discovery's greatest impact could be on the biodiesel industry by creating demand for what has become its Achilles' heel -- the millions of gallons of glycerin produced each year as a by-product of biodiesel. "There is a big glut of glycerin, and if they keep producing biodiesel, they will keep producing glycerin," said Ramon Gonzalez, one of the two Rice University professors behind the process.

The worldwide overabundance of glycerin poses one of the biggest challenges to expanding biodiesel production. Refiners operate on narrow profit margins and often sell glycerin to subsidize production.

Non-mandated (i.e., market driven) ethanol blending breaks new weekly record. (http://domesticfuel.com/?p=3361)
The Weekly Supply Estimates Report shows that conventional gasoline blending with ethanol reached an all-time high of 2.119 million barrels per day as of the week ending Friday, Nov. 2.

There now are 1378 E85 stations in the U.S. (http://www.e85refueling.com/)

This is the biggest waste of public money ever. And is going to take money out of your pocket every time you fill up. Your mileage will go down on an ethanol blend, therefore you will have to buy more gallons to go the same distance, and more gallons of oil will end up being imported because of the less mileage. The only thing ethanol is good for is oil company profits.

This is the biggest waste of public money ever. And is going to take money out of your pocket every time you fill up. Your mileage will go down on an ethanol blend, therefore you will have to buy more gallons to go the same distance, and more gallons of oil will end up being imported because of the less mileage. The only thing ethanol is good for is oil company profits.

Now let us look at the facts. Reformulated gasoline (what almost all of the country now uses) contains less than 112,000 BTUs per gallon. Ethanol contains 76,100 BTU's per gallon. So E85 contains 81,485. That means your mileage will go down 27%. So if E85 is at least 27% cheaper than gasoline, it is a better value.

And what do you know: (http://www.e85prices.com/)in Indianapolis, E85 is 40% cheaper than gasoline. In Freeport, Illinois, it is 36% cheaper. In Fargo, ND, it is 36% cheaper. In Fort Collins, Colorado, it is 33% cheaper. And on and on.

But let's not let facts get in the way. Oil will soon be $100/barrel. Gasoline is already $5/gallon in California, (http://www.theksbwchannel.com/news/14536489/detail.html) and approaching $4/gallon elsewhere. Meanwhile, the U.S. currently has the capacity to make 7 billion gallons of ethanol per year and when all current projects are complete, capacity will top 13 billion gallons per year. (http://www.ethanolrfa.org/industry/locations/) Care to guess what is going to happen to the price of E85 in the next 2 years.

One more fact: while it does take energy to make ethanol, most of that energy is in the form of domestic coal and domestic natural gas. If you look just at petroleum (most of which is imported in the U.S.), you find that (http://www.argusleader.com:80/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071020/VOICES05/710200319/0/VOICES) for every BTU of petroleum consumed, 7.34 BTUs of energy is created in the form of ethanol. So if a farmer burns a gallon of diesel fuel to plant, harvest and transport his corn to the ethanol plant, we end up with 10.05 gallons of ethanol (7.34 divided by .73). That strikes me as a pretty good way to get to energy independence.

Ethanol is only cheaper than Gas because its subsidized by our own tax dollars.

BUT, I don't believe its a waste of money. I think we need to get these plants running to reduce dependence on oil.

Oil is running out. This is a fact. Oil does not grow! WE HAVE TO DO SOMETHING!

Corn can be grown every year, and it puts oxygen back in the atmosphere.

However, corn itself is not the Long term answer because it does not produce as much energy as Sugar, Switchgrass, or Algae.

[QUOTE=hunter44102;37272]

Corn can be grown every year, and it puts oxygen back in the atmosphere.

QUOTE]

So does soybeans,rapeseed,and sunflowers. These can be used to make bio-diesel. And you don't lose mileage with bio-diesel. And bio is more lubricating than dino-diesel, and very low polluting. But again, our government,and auto makers seem to have something against us in the US having smaller economical diesel powered autos.:doh:

isnt there a certain south american country self reliant running ethanol and not reliant on oil?....hint: they grow shyte loads of sugar cane, thier president runs a "aussie" car as his main vehicle made by GM that continue to say that it wont run on alcohol based fuel aswell...hehehehe

[QUOTE=hunter44102;37272]
Oil is running out.QUOTE]

. . . and how long will it take to "run out"? While I agree we need to look at all alternatives to oil, don't make it sound as if we will be running out of oil in the next 5 or 10 years.

BTW, Indiana is one of the biggest producers of corn based ethanol. What no one is talking about on this forum, is what it does to the price increases of OTHER products. With more and more farmers replacing other crops with corn, it is raising the price of those crops--remember supply and demand.

While we may be saving on ethanol-based gas, look at the whole picture and then make an informed decision.

isnt there a certain south american country self reliant running ethanol and not reliant on oil?....hint: they grow shyte loads of sugar cane, thier president runs a "aussie" car as his main vehicle made by GM that continue to say that it wont run on alcohol based fuel aswell...hehehehe

I have that the wealthy in that country still use real gas . Their cars get better mileage on it and run better.

hydrogen

hydrogen

Just saw this story today! may hold some promise!
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20071112/ts_alt_afp/ussciencefuel;_ylt=AtxvBJ5KqcGLqrWerjYJ0AQDW7oF

isnt there a certain south american country self reliant running ethanol and not reliant on oil?....hint: they grow shyte loads of sugar cane, thier president runs a "aussie" car as his main vehicle made by GM that continue to say that it wont run on alcohol based fuel aswell...hehehehe

Brazil.

If ethanol is going to ever be a long term solution to our fuel woes, it is going to have to wean itself off of tax subsidies. It will also need to focus more of non-food stocks, since it is driving up the price of food in its current iteration.

IMO, ethanol probably won't be the solution; I'd expect hydrogen to be a better technology, but it has its own pitfalls as well. Either way, we're going to need many more non-fossil fuel power generating stations in order to move forward. Otherwise, we're just moving the problem around instead of solving anything.

Maybe a little off topic but inthe late 70's (the last big oil price increase)
On a PBS show they had an old guy that had a Chevy Pickup truck
8 cylinder,He was makeing his own Hydrogen, compressing it and had installed a tank on his truck that was connected to an injector and into the carberator. With this setup he was getting 40 miles to the US Gallon. Improved power and cleaner emissions. So why can't that be done today???

solid rocket fuel!

Maybe a little off topic but inthe late 70's (the last big oil price increase)
On a PBS show they had an old guy that had a Chevy Pickup truck
8 cylinder,He was makeing his own Hydrogen, compressing it and had installed a tank on his truck that was connected to an injector and into the carberator. With this setup he was getting 40 miles to the US Gallon. Improved power and cleaner emissions. So why can't that be done today???

it can be done - we HAVE the technology to make cars go 100+mi/gal. Why don't we? Can you imagine the price gas would sky rocket too? And then how would the people with older cars be able to afford gas? How would anyone afford food? This slow raising prices in gas forces everyone to move to more efficient transportation slowly so the whole economy doesn't topple. The problem now is that the snails pace won't work in the big environmental picture so we are forced to look at new technologies - that still use gas of course - you have to support the oil cos.

Brazil.

If ethanol is going to ever be a long term solution to our fuel woes, it is going to have to wean itself off of tax subsidies. It will also need to focus more of non-food stocks, since it is driving up the price of food in its current iteration.

IMO, ethanol probably won't be the solution; I'd expect hydrogen to be a better technology, but it has its own pitfalls as well. Either way, we're going to need many more non-fossil fuel power generating stations in order to move forward. Otherwise, we're just moving the problem around instead of solving anything.

Did you read the first post in this thread? The nine facilities listed will not use food stock. Cellulosic ethanol is exactly what you say we need.

Also, in three years, we will have the Chevy Volt. 40 miles on electricity. Plug it in at night. Use the on-board generator for long trips. Anyone who buys a Volt will reduce his or her gasoline consumption by 95%.

even if they focus on non-food crops, won't the farmer shift to growing which ever crop pays the most? so the result is still less food crop... and higher prices.

even if they focus on non-food crops, won't the farmer shift to growing which ever crop pays the most? so the result is still less food crop... and higher prices.

No. The plant under construction in Georgia will use waste wood product from a paper mill plant (bark, pine needles, wood chips, saw dust). Other cellulosic ethanol plants will use the leftover part of the corn plant (cob, stalk, leaves). Still others will use switchgrass which grows on land where corn and soybeans won't grow. None of these will result in food farmers switching to non-food crops.