Pacific Biodiesel “is the oldest biodiesel producer and refinery in the country, started in 1996,” said Vilsack during his remarks on Tuesday at the memorial, noting that USDA has provided assistance to help that company grow. “We provided recently a $5 million business and industry loan to Pacific Biodiesel to allow it to continue to expand its capacity.”

That loan, announced in February 2010, is being used to construct a $10 million, 5.5 million gallon per year biodiesel production plant in Kea’au on the Big Island. Pacific Biodiesel vice president and co-founder Kelly King says Big Island Biodiesel will be the companies 13th biodiesel plant. “We’ll be owning and operating five of them, the other ones we built for clients throughout the mainland, from the east coast to the west coast,” she says, with capacity ranging from a half million to six million gallons.

“We started in Maui, where we actually had the first available biodiesel pump for the public,” said King. “Back then, most of our customers were environmental hippies who would come and pay 70 cents a gallon more for fuel and thank us and tell us to keep the change!”

King says Pacific Biodiesel operates on a community-based sustainable model set up locally to benefit local communities. While all the plants can use any type of oil feedstocks, much of them operate on used cooking oil. “It can use the most degraded oils up to the purest oils,” she said. “The degraded oils make the best feedstock because it’s the cheapest!”

King and two of her Pacific Biodiesel team members were excited to be part of the secretary’s appearance at Pearl Harbor and to have him recognize the importance of renewable fuels in the Aloha State.DOMESTIC FUEL.

The proposed sites for development are in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka and will use an Algae Enhancement Technology, the GB3000 system, employed for growing algae for the production of fish feed, proteins and biofuel. Prime Inc India’s current clients include Exxon, Shell, General Electric (GE) and Siemens.

“We look forward to working with Prime Inc India in the design, development and support of a cost-efficient algae production farm,” Liran Kosman, CFO of WHEN, said. “We anticipate scaling up operations and completing a number of significant algae projects in 2012.”

World Health recently acquired GNE-India, an algae technology firm with the distribution and licensing rights to a unique and innovative technology, the GNE GB 3000 system, to grow algae quickly and efficiently to produce biodiesel and commercial fish food protein. GNE-India owns and retains the territorial rights for distribution and sales of the proprietary technology in India and Sri Lanka.

The company enjoys exclusive distribution and licensing rights to the GNE GB 3000 system in India and Croatia.

In 2011, the GB 3000 system was used to grow local algae species like spirulina, as well as chlorella, for fish feed and biodiesel markets, Biodiesel Magazine reports.

WHEN is focused on biofuels produced from algae because, the company explains, it gives substantially higher yields in comparison to ethanol derived from corn, rapeseed, jatropha and palm oil. The company also works with enterprises producing progressive, broad-based solutions for better physical, nutritional and environmental health worldwide.

In addition, World Health is pursuing another use of algae: the efficient production of high-protein fish feed for commercial fish farms.By Natalia Real.FIS.

The ASA highlighted accomplishments it made in several specific areas, including policy and advocacy, and domestic and international use of soy. Under the heading of policy and advocacy, the ASA noted it doggedly supported the biodiesel industry in an effort to extend the biodiesel tax credit in 2011, which helped the industry reach record biodiesel production levels in 2011. According to the ASA, it also worked alongside the United Soybean Board, U.S. Soybean Export Council, and soy exporters in an effort to maintain access for U.S. soybean exports to the EU that would otherwise be negatively affected by the EU’s Renewable Energy Directive. The ASA also noted that the U.S. government and the EU have agreed to enter into bilateral negotiations on how U.S. soybeans can be deemed compliant with RED requirements. In addition, the ASA efforts in the 2008 Farm Bill helped to establish the USDA’s BioPreferred program, a voluntary biobased product labeling program.

Regarding the use of soy, the ASA said record biodiesel production levels achieved in 2011 were the direct result of efforts by the National Biodiesel Board, the biodiesel industry and the ASA in supporting the development of a renewable fuel standard for biodiesel and extending the tax incentive through the end of 2011. In its statement, the ASA also noted its efforts have been supported by strong soybean checkoff investments in research and promotion.

The ASA also noted several key policy issues it intends to focus on in 2012, including defending the biodiesel portion of the renewable fuel standard and supporting the extension of the biodiesel tax incentive. The association also plans to work to maintain market access in the EU by addressing the treatment of U.S. soybeans under the RED.

A full list of the ASA’s 2011 accomplishments can be downloaded from the organization’s website.BIODIESEL MAGAZINE.

According to a statement released by Evogene, the impetus behind establishing the subsidiary is due to the need for diversifying feedstock supply to fulfill worldwide demand of biodiesel, which currently relies mainly on edible oils such as soybeans and canola.

Originally launched in 2007, Evogene’s biofuel activity targets the development of second-gen feedstocks to serve as sustainable, viable and cost-effective sources of oil for the burgeoning global biodiesel industry. In addition to its castor bean seed development and commercialization efforts, the company stated that it “intends to broaden its activity to additional potential feedstocks for the biodiesel, biojet and ethanol markets.”

“With the biofuel industry’s continued growth and tremendous demand for cost-competitive feedstock, there is a strong and immediate need for a solution based on designated second-generation seed products,” said Ofer Haviv, president and CEO of Evogene. “The establishment of Evofuel as a separate company strongly positions it to address this substantial unmet need. We are reinforced by the progress and results of our castor seed in Brazil and believe that access to Evogene’s leading plant genomics capabilities will provide Evofuel with commercial advantages and opportunities in relevant markets.”

The formation of Evofuel follows on the heels of Evogene successfully completing field trials for its advanced castor varieties in Brazil in cooperation with SLC Agricola S.A., a leading agribusiness firm in the country, which will be cultivated for biodiesel feedstock. Under the expanded agreement, Evogene and SLC Agricola intend to continue to evaluate Evogene’s castor varieties at its farm locations in Brazil. The goal is to identify the best performing varieties and agronomic practices suitable for commercial-scale production.

In addition to Brazil and Israel, field trials of castor been cultivars are also being conducted in the U.S.; most notably at Texas A&M University. Additional collaborators in the program include NASA and Honeywell’s UOP.

In mid-2010, Evogene announced that biobased jet fuel produced using its castor varieties met international standards for alternative aviation fuels. The testing was completed in collaboration with NASA and Honeywell’s UOP. Also in 2010, the company announced that a life-cycle analysis of biodiesel using its castor varieties demonstrated a 90 percent greenhouse gas reduction when compared to petroleum.BIODIESEL MAGAZINE.

“Many biodiesel companies are already in a critical situation, and there is a risk that this will be transformed into companies closing in the next months,” said Raffaello Garofalo, secretary general of the European biodiesel industry association EBB.

“Many companies have already closed, especially in Germany and Spain.”

The EBB estimates European Union 2011 biodiesel production capacity is at 22.1 million tonnes but that the industry is reaching only 44 percent of that capacity.

“Although the EU has got a nominal biodiesel capacity of more than 22 million tonnes, many plants have been at least temporarily closed down or idled and are not really producing,” said Rabobank analyst Susan Hansen.

“This is for instance the case in Germany, Spain, or Italy but actually across the whole of the EU.”

A poor EU rapeseed crop has made palm oil and soyoil-based biodiesel more price attractive.

German oilseeds analysts Oil World forecasts EU biodiesel output will fall to 9.07 million tonnes in 2011 from 9.54 million last year largely because of competition from imports.

“EU imports of biodiesel have increased sharply so far this year and will probably reach a record 2.52 million tonnes in January/December 2011, up 21 percent from last year,” Oil World said.

“We expect 1.4 million tonnes of biodiesel to arrive from Argentina and at least 830,000 tonnes from Indonesia and Singapore,” Oil World says.

That compares with imports of 1.1 million tonnes from Argentina and 516,000 tonnes from Indonesia and Singapore last year.

European biodiesel producers came under extra pressure earlier this year as environmentalists questioned the EU policies for green fuels, after studies said the cultivation of rapeseed, palm or soybeans as a feedstock for biodiesel was worse for climate change than the use of regular diesel.

Biodiesel refiners themselves are often unwilling to talk about the depth of the problem.

“The industry is in a very bad way, and we could see more closures pretty soon, especially in south Europe,” said one German refiner, who declined to be named.

CRISIS CLOSE IN SPAIN AND ITALY?

A crisis could be approaching in Spain and Italy, where biodiesel capacity usage is falling to dramatically low levels.

“I cannot see how Spanish and Italian biodiesel producers will survive much longer at the terrible capacity usage rates we are currently seeing,” one oilseeds trader said.

“The signs are that biodiesel imports are causing an alarming fall in local output.”

Spain’s 2011 biodiesel output will drop 31 percent on the year to 550,000 tonnes, Oil World estimates. Spain’s biodiesel production capacity is 4.4 million tonnes.

Italy’s 2011 biodiesel output is likely to fall 40 percent on the year to 450,000 tonnes, Oil World forecasts. Italy’s annual capacity is 2.2 million tonnes.

More EU imports of palm-based biodiesel are expected, especially from Indonesia.

“Biodiesel demand for Europe at least keeps us in business and will keep palm oil prices very supportive next year despite expectations for strong production,” said an Indonesian trader who sells biodiesel to Germany.

But rising imports, especially from Indonesia, also threaten to create trade friction, with allegations of unfair prices.

“Palm oil and even biodiesel is sold in the internal market in Indonesia at a price which is higher than the price of exports to Europe,” said the EBB’s Garofalo. “There is clearly dumping. This also happens from time to time with Argentine imports.

“We are now talking to the EU Commission authorities to raise their attention to this issue.”

Rabobank’s Hansen said she would not be surprised if the EU moved to curb imports.

“Every time imports drastically increase, I believe the EU will find ways to – at least temporarily – put barriers in place by introducing tariffs on imported biodiesel for example,” she said.

The EBB is also calling on European governments to take more steps to reach the EU’s goal of 10 percent biofuel use in transport by 2020.

“This (low production) is a paradox when we have a desperate need to reduce greenhouse gases in transport to fight climate change,” Garofalo said.

(additional reporting by Niluksi Koswanage in Kuala Lumpur, editing by Jane Baird).REUTERS.

Output rose 5.5 percent to 9.57 million metric tons in 2010, the European Biodiesel Board said today in an e-mailed statement. Output growth slowed from 17 percent in 2009 and 35 percent in 2008, according to the Brussels-based group.

“Forecasts for 2011 show a reduction of European production compared to the same time last year,” the statement said. The region’s plants operated at 44 percent in the first half of this year, according to the group.

–Editors: Rob Verdonck, Raj Rajendran.

SOURCE: BLOOMBERG

The EPA’s designation of Canadian crops as a renewable biomass will allow U.S. biofuel makers to collect tax credits for using them, said Canola Council of Canada president JoAnne Buth.

“I suspect we will see more canola moving into the U.S. now,” Buth said in an interview.

ICE Canada canola futures closed up 1.9 percent exceeding gains in other related markets. Canada becomes the first country outside the United States to receive approval under the EPA’s land use test on an aggregate basis, said Ben Evans, spokesman for the U.S.-based National Biodiesel Board.

That means Canada has provided assurances that overall it is not bringing more net farm land into production, so farmers don’t have to individually prove the same thing to qualify under the U.S. biodiesel mandate.

The U.S. Congress has set a goal of blending 36 billion gallons of renewable fuel into transportation fuel by 2022 and that target is large enough that there’s little risk of Canadian crops displacing U.S. feedstocks like soybeans from the biodiesel mix, Evans said.

 “I don’t think you’ll see a huge flood, but a gradual increase” of canola entering the U.S. biodiesel industry, Evans said in an interview. “It’s a positive development.”

In 2010, soybean oil made up half of the feedstock used in production of U.S. biodiesel, followed by animal fats, Evans said.

The U.S. Canola Association also supports the decision, said Dale Thorenson, the association’s assistant director.

Last year, the EPA placed canola oil on an equal footing with soyoil, ruling that it emits low enough greenhouse gas levels to qualify for the U.S. mandate to increase renewable fuel production.

 That decision allowed biodiesel makers to get credits for using U.S. canola, but Canadian crops did not qualify.

Canada is the world’s top exporter of canola, a rapeseed variant that is used mostly for vegetable oil and livestock feed. Top Canadian canola crushers include Cargill Inc, Viterra Inc, Bunge Ltd, Richardson International Limited, Louis Dreyfus and Archer Daniels Midland.

Canada is normally a net importer of corn.

(Reporting by Rod Nickel; Editing by David Gregorio and Sofina Mirza-Reid)

Jeffrey T. Wilson, President of Imperial said, “We’re very excited about the Company’s growth prospects. As a result of the turnaround of the biodiesel operations and robust demand for the product created by the RFS2 (Renewable Fuel Standard) our Company is set to experience built-in revenue growth for fiscal 2012 based on a full year of operation at plant capacity. At the Middletown, Indiana facility’s current production rates, the Company is on pace to produce in excess of 34 million gallons of fuel in fiscal 2012 or an annual increase of about 30%.

“In the fourth quarter of fiscal 2011 we settled or resolved all of the past vendor and litigation issues that had faced e-Biofuels at the time of its acquisition by the Company, we extended our credit facility and we can now focus on our efforts to expand operations in both biofuels and oil sand production and refinance of the Company’s debt. We are excited about the opportunity to share our unique story with the investment community at the Rodman & Renshaw Global Investment Conference in New York City.”

About Imperial Petroleum

Imperial Petroleum, Inc. is a diversified energy company headquartered in Evansville, Indiana. The Company is engaged in three principal areas of energy production: (i.) biodiesel and biofuels production; (ii.) traditional oil and gas exploration and production and (iii.) non-traditional oil production of heavy oil from mineable tar sands. For more information, visit the Imperial Petroleum corporate web site at: www.imperialpetroleuminc.com .

This press release may contain “forward-looking statements” as that term is defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such statements are based on management’s current expectations and are subject to a number of factors and uncertainties which could cause actual results to differ materially from those described herein. Although the Company believes that the expectations in such statements are reasonable, there can be no assurance that such expectations will prove to be correct.

SOURCE: Imperial Petroleum, Inc.

Becky Williams removes a pumping tube from a truck delivering oil to Renewable Energy Group’s biodiesel plant in Glenville, Minn. The plant was idled in March 2008 but has a new lease on life. (Renee Jones Schneider, MCT / September 19, 2011).Lufthansa flights take off using biofuel mix in engines./By David Shaffer.

Reporting from Glenville, Minn.— For more than three years, the SoyMor Biodiesel plant sat idle — victim of a slump that took down more than a quarter of the plants in the industry.

But biodiesel is booming again, and a sign of the revival happened recently in this small southern Minnesota town. Workers started up the plant, and soon the fuel was flowing.

“Everybody kept their fingers crossed and hoped it would be a lot shorter,” rehired worker Aaron Kuennen said of the long layoff as he unloaded tanker trucks full of soybean oil Thursday.

Across the nation, biodiesel plants have been restarting or ramping up production, spurred by a revived federal tax credit and renewable energy mandates. The industry’s trade group, the National Biodiesel Board, last month reported that U.S. production was headed toward a record year after three consecutive months of record output.

It comes after biodiesel’s big bust. At least 52 of the nation’s 170 biodiesel plants were idled last year, and others scaled back production, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. In the two years that ended in December, output of U.S. biodiesel for trucks and heavy equipment fell 54%.

In Minnesota, the Glenville plant was among the first to shut down. Its local owners last month sold the plant to the Ames, Iowa, company that built and formerly managed it, Renewable Energy Group Inc.

The plant’s sign now is draped with a temporary one bearing the company’s initials: REG.

Another of Minnesota’s four biodiesel plants, FUMPA Bio-fuels in Redwood Falls, has remained closed since December. The plant, the state’s first biodiesel producer in 2004, is for sale, and because it’s small and portable, it probably will be moved after it is sold, said Chuck Neece, who heads the biofuels division of the cooperative that owns it.

The U.S. biodiesel industry grew out of a desire by soybean farmers to get better prices early in the last decade.

Minnesota began requiring that biodiesel be blended into diesel fuel sold at pumps in 2005 and now mandates a 5% mix. Nineteen other states offer various incentives in addition to the federal tax credit that has encouraged blenders to use biodiesel in motor fuel.

At first, biodiesel producers relied almost entirely on soybean oil as a feedstock, subjecting it to a chemical reaction with alcohol to produce fuel similar to petroleum diesel. Some plants now have the technology to process waste oils from restaurants and unrefined oils and fats from rendering, meatpacking and ethanol industries. About half of U.S. production still is derived from soy oil, industry officials said.

In the industry’s first boom, U.S. output expanded eightfold from 2004 to 2008, peaking at 691 million gallons annually.

“It was awfully exciting,” said Ed Hegland, a farmer near Appleton, Minn., who served as chairman of the National Biodiesel Board from 2007 to 2010.

Then the troubles hit — the global financial meltdown, trade barriers that hurt sales to Europe and high soybean prices, Hegland and others said. The worst blow came last year when Congress temporarily eliminated a $1-a-gallon tax credit to encourage blenders to use biofuel.

“It was extremely difficult to see a renewable energy industry that was just getting legs under it to be so dramatically set back by a number of things out of our control,” Hegland said.

At the Glenville biodiesel plant, one of two large Minnesota plants with capacities of 30 million gallons a year, the end came suddenly in March 2008. Rachel Asmus, who recently returned to run the plant’s lab, remembered the shock and sadness. “One week I had a job,” she said. “Then they told us we wouldn’t have jobs at the end of the week.”

Biodiesel’s revival began after Congress in December restored the tax credit for one year and the EPA established higher biodiesel blending mandates under its renewable fuel standards.

At some plants, production ramped up immediately. But the SoyMor plant in Glenville remained idle until it was sold in July in a stock transaction to REG, the nation’s largest biodiesel producer.

In a major industry consolidation, REG has acquired three other plants in the last 18 months. It wants to raise $100 million in an initial public stock offering to acquire another plant it now leases. It also wants to complete work on three plants whose construction was halted during the biodiesel bust.

Myron Danzer, who manages the Glenville plant and two others for REG, said the restart went smoothly. Some electrical components had been damaged by a voltage surge. One pipe was damaged by freezing, others needed to be cleaned and everything needed to be tested, he said.

He hired 20 people, including five former workers, and by Wednesday the first soybean oil was pumped into the system. Six hours later, at 9:14 p.m., Danzer was holding a flashlight and “sitting up on the tank waiting for it to come in.” After the first gallons flowed, everyone gathered in the plant’s control room to celebrate.

“It’s been running ever since then,” he said, and over the first 24 hours had processed about 50,000 gallons. Tanker trucks will begin hauling fuel to blenders this week, he said.

After experiencing one bust, many in the industry wonder whether this plant and others will keep running, given the recent resistance in Congress to extending biofuel tax credits. The industry has been lobbying to retain the $1-a-gallon credit, and Rep. Collin C. Peterson (D-Minn.), an industry supporter, is co-sponsor of the House bill.

One question is whether the EPA mandate to blend biodiesel into motor fuels — without the tax incentive to blenders — is enough to keep the industry growing. The effect would be to boost the cost of biodiesel to blenders who supply fuel to pumps.

“It will be very, very challenging as we have seen last year with the lapse of the tax credit,” said Hegland, who is on the board of the Minnesota Soybean Growers Assn. “I think it would cause a significant downturn in the market.”

Shaffer writes for the Star Tribune (Minneapolis)/McClatchy.

SOURCE: Los Angeles Times

* Production to be ramped up in stages

* Lifts Neste Oil’s total renewable diesel capacity to 2 mln tonnes a year (Adds CEO comments)

HELSINKI, Sept 20 – Neste Oil has started up its new renewable diesel plant in Rotterdam, in the Netherlands, the Finnish refiner said on Tuesday.

The plant, with a total capacity of 800,000 tonnes per year, is the largest in Europe and can make renewable diesel from different types of vegetable oils and waste fats.

Production of renewable diesel would be ramped up in stages, the company said.

“With its start-up, our major 1.5 billion euros ($2.0 bln) investment program aimed at increasing our renewable diesel production capacity has entered its final stage,” Neste Oil Chief Executive Matti Lievonen said in a statement.

The new plant lifts Neste Oil’s total renewable diesel capacity to 2 million tonnes per year. Last year Neste Oil opened a similar plant in Singapore and it has two renewable diesel lines in Porvoo, Finland. ($1 = 0.735 Euros) (Reporting by Helsinki Newsroom).REUTERS.