Teru Talk Newsletter
Volume III, Issue
51, December 23,
2013
Teru Talk by Michael
Theroux (pronounced
"Terú")
Teru's Trash Talk
If we do
this waste conversion thing
right, nobody will even
notice. That seems to be
this year's lesson for
finding the safest and
surest path forward, just
not the most glamorous. If
you've got a widget that
does what it is supposed to
do, find a place where you
can make that magic work
and get busy. Perhaps we've
been playing this all
wrong, calling attention to
how brand new and shiny we
are when really all we want
to do is convert that most
plentiful of resources,
Trash, back into the things
we need. Looking down the
Yellow Brick Road, we can
almost see that place and
time when the tools and the
know-how we have can simply
be absorbed into the
marketplace.
There's
been some evidence in 2013
that this is occurring.
Take anaerobic digestion
(AD), as an example:
well-designed AD systems
are turning the liability
of food waste into the
valuable product biogas,
whether as stand-alone
reactors or as
modifications to existing
sewage treatment plants.
That main system acceptance
opens the door for
processing finesse: if you
are going to spend the time
and money to develop a
biogas plant, find someone
who can help with input
pre-treatment and back-end
refining. Enzymatics,
cavitation, electrolysis,
heat, and pressure can all
play their part in breaking
down the tougher organics,
and this expands the range
of acceptable feedstock.
Biogas upgrading has also
seen many new entrants,
including pipeline quality
gas production and
catalysis to chemicals and
liquid fuels. More front
and back end processing
diversity translates to a
more stable and cheaper
input supply, more biogas
output per buck spent and
ton converted, and higher
value for the finished
product. The rapid growth
this past year of
companies, technologies,
and methods providing front
and back-end processing
finesse is our best example
of an opening, receptive
marketplace.
But there's that perpetual
problem: how to let folks
know what you are doing.
You still must use some
sort of advertising to get
the attention of the
marketplace. Doing business
without marketing, so the
saying goes, is like
winking in the dark. But
the best marketing will
always be doing instead of
talking; you need a
successful "reference
project" where people can
come see the thing work.
Around the globe, it is the
financial ability and
political willingness of a
region's government to
support reference
installations that
effectively jump-starts
Clean Tech, and this is
especially true for waste
conversion to energy,
fuels, and other
commodities. It just stands
to reason that there must
be as much attention paid
to securing proper Policy
in support of early
projects as there is focus
on new technologies and
methods, as we communally
try to close that loop of
the Circular
Economy.
Hey
Rube!
Legislative
attempts to make sense of
turning low value residuals and
wastes into high value
commodities have resulted in
some reasonably solid new laws.
Yet the battle is only
partially won, as there are
plenty of good folks out there
who would like the
non-disruptive status quo.
Unless we advocates of sane
Waste Conversion attend to the
proper implementation of those
new legal frameworks, each
effort will be dismantled and
sidelined. In California, the
Air and Waste Management
agencies are charged in 2014
with implementing better
climate-friendly resource
recovery for compliance with AB
32 / AB 341, while our Energy
agencies do the same with
small-scale conversion of
biomass to heat, power and
fuels, in rolling out SB 1122.
This latter action has reached
another milestone, which we
have covered in this week's
news. Read on - and
have a very warm and
happy Holiday
Season!
This Week's Top Story
Greenbelt
Resources Selected to
Provide Waste-to-Ethanol
System in
Australia
California
based Greenbelt Resources
Corporation has announced
its selection by Standard
Ethanol Pty. Ltd., an
Australian company, to
design and deliver a
complete,
commercial-scale advanced
biofuel system for
converting wheat
feedstock to ethanol and
organic fertilizer.
12/16/2013
The
Week's News
NIB Invests
in Danish Crown's New Energy
and Water Efficient
Slaughterhouse
The Nordic Investment Bank
(NIB) has announced its
investment in Denmark
company Danish Crown A/S
by approving a new loan
agreement with a 10-year
maturity, totaling DKK 340
million (EUR 46 million) for
the construction of a cattle
slaughterhouse in Holsted,
Denmark.
12/20/2013
BAC Comments
on CPUC Implementation Plan
of Bioenergy Feed-in
Tariff
The
Bioenergy Association of
California (BAC) has
formally filed opening
comments to the
California Public
Utilities Commission
(CPUC) regarding agency
staff's proposal for
implementation of Senate
Bill (SB) 1122 (Rubio,
2012).
12/20/2013
Pacific
Ethanol and Sweetwater
Energy Partner to Produce
Cellulosic
Ethanol
New York based Sweetwater
Energy, Inc and Sacramento
company Pacific Ethanol, Inc
have announced an agreement to
supply customized industrial
sugars for the production of
cellulosic ethanol.
12/19/2013
Global Clean
Energy Advances AD
Development at Seneca AgBio
Energy
Park
Texas based Global Clean
Energy, Inc (GCE) and
California company Full Circle
Renewables, LLC are moving
ahead to develop an Anaerobic
Digestion (AD) facility at the
Seneca AgBio Energy Park
located on the former Seneca
Army Storage Depot in Romulus,
New York.
12/18/2013
Renewable
Energy Group Agrees to
Acquire Syntroleum
Corporation
Renewable Energy Group, Inc
(REG) has announced entering
into an asset purchase
agreement with Syntroleum
Corporation in which REG would
acquire substantially all of
the assets and assume
substantially all of the
material liabilities of
Syntroleum.
12/18/2013
Calysta
Completes $3 Million
Financing for Methane to
Chemicals and
Fuels
California based Calysta
Energy™ Inc has announced
completion of a Series A
financing round totaling $3
million to advance development
of biological routes to high
value industrial chemicals and
fuels based on methane as a
feedstock.
12/16/2013
NIB Finances
UPM-Kymmene's Renewable
Diesel Refinery in
Finland
Nordic Investment Bank (NIB)
has announced signing a EUR 50
million loan agreement with
UPM-Kymmene Corp. to construct
the world’s first industrial
biorefinery producing
wood-based renewable diesel in
Lappeenranta, Finland.
12/16/2013
The Week's Action
Items
Due
02/27/2014: Scholarship
Applications to Iberdrola
USA
Foundation
Based in Spain, the Iberdrola
USA Foundation in conjunction
with Fundacion Iberdrola has
announced that it is now
accepting applications for
scholarships for master's
studies in energy and/or the
environment at the University
of Rochester and the University
of Maine for the 2014/2015
academic year.
12/19/2013
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