Further expansion of the Pannonia Ethanol biorefinery in Hungary
News with regard to the bioethanol
sector in Eastern Europe. Pannonia
Ethanol, subsidiary of the European bioethanol group Ethanol Europe Renewables (EERL), announced on
23th November that it had successfully completed an M€ 135 credit facility
agreement with a consortium of Hungarian banks (see press
release). The facility will support the expansion plans for its biorefinery
located in Dunaföldvár (Hungary). By the way, I will soon include it in the list of
advanced biorefineries at commercial scale in Europe, I had overlooked it in
spite of being one of the largest biorefineries in Europe.
This is not its first scaling-up of this
plant that produces bioethanol, high quality animal feed (DDGS) and corn oil.
Recently, an expansion lifted the production capacity of bioethanol from 280
million litres per year to 450 million. The feed production capacity was raised
from 200,000 tons per year to 325,000. The facility also produces 10,000 tons
of corn oil and utilizes more than 1,000,000 tons of corn annually.
Figure 1. Pannonia
Ethanol biorefinery in Dunaföldvár (extracted from Pannonia Ethanol web page)
Almost all of the corn processed by
Pannonia Ethanol comes from Hungarian family farms. The company’s business
model ensures that renewable ethanol production is integrated with local
agricultural communities. It plays an important part in realizing Hungary’s
potential in agriculture and in creating and sustaining new jobs. Pannonia
Ethanol adds nearly M€ 500 to Hungary’s GDP and supports 2,000 jobs (direct and
indirect), mostly in rural areas.
Now, the investment will be devoted to new
projects, cost reduction, additional jobs and increases in both corn buying and
animal feed output. Mark Turley (CEO of EERL) said: “This investment further
reduces costs and increases production capacity across the board. It also
supports the introduction of innovative new bioproducts that promise
significant benefits for human and animal health”.
