New Energy Blue plans to break ground on its first cellulosic ethanol biorefinery in spring 2019

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Type of post: NEWS.

In August 2016, the Blog reported the plans of a company called New Energy Investors to build a cellulosic ethanol plant at the Spiritwood Industrial Park near Jamestown. The biorefinery would based on the Inbicon Biomass Refinery technology, developed by DONG Energy.
See: “Plans for a new cellulosic ethanol biorefinery in North Dakota”, 3/8/2016.

It seems that New Energy Investors passed the baton to New Energy Blue. This firm has just announced that it will start the construction of the biorefinery by the spring of 2019 (see press release, 24/9/2018). New Energy Spirit Biomass Refinery, registered North Dakota special purpose company and wholly owned by New Energy Blue, will develop, build, own and operate the new plant.

Location
Spiritwood Industrial Park near Jamestown (North Dakota, USA).
Feedstock and processing capacity
280,000 tons of locally harvested wheat straw, barley straw and corn stover.
Products and production capacity
- 16 Mgal/year of cellulosic ethanol.
- 109,000 tons of lignin pellets.
- Other outputs: biogas for producing process steam and a potassium-rich nutrient for fertilizing farm fields.
Economic impact
- Over 400 construction jobs for 24 months.
- Over 100 full-time jobs (42 of them at the biorefinery).
- Over 15 M$ paid for biomass acquisition. Local farmers can see a windfall second cash crop from the same harvest.
- Over 80 M$ in annual revenue, much of it paid back to the local community.
Timeline
- Break ground: spring 2019.
 - Duration of the construction phase: 20 to 22 months.
- Duration of the commissioning process: 4 to 5 months.
- Commercial operations: 2Q 2021.
- An EPC contractor is expected to be selected within the next four to five months.

Figure 1. Model of the New Energy Spirit Biomass Refinery (extracted from the website of New Energy Blue)

The cellulosic ethanol will be marketed to California in order to receive the premium from its Low Carbon Fuels Standard (LCFS) program. It pays on the reduction of carbon emissions from production to end-user taking conventional gasoline as baseline. New Energy Blue ethanol could eventually achieve a reduction of 130% comparing to the baseline.

Thomas Corle, CEO of New Energy Blue, envisions a series of biorefineries throughout the grain belts of USA and Canada, each producing 32 Mgal/year of cellulosic ethanol and attracting escalating support from capital markets keen on catching the next wave of renewable energy.

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