BTG and GoodFuels exploring joint investment in a biorefinery to produce an advanced marine biofuel

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Type of post: NEWS.

BTG and GoodFuels are exploring options for a joint investment in a biorefinery to produce an advanced marine biofuel based on pyrolysis oil.
- Press release: “BTG and GoodFuels preparing for major investment in bio-refinery to support shipping’s low carbon fuels demands”, 14/11/2019.
- Posts about Pyrolysis.
- “Fast pyrolysis plants”, 17/7/2019.

Figure 1. BTG and GoodFuels exploring joint investment in a biorefinery to produce an advanced marine biofuel

The facility will be operated by a new company named BTG-neXt. In the first phase, BTG-nexT will focus on building a pilot refinery for converting pyrolysis oil into sustainable diesel for ships in order to demonstrate that continuous production is feasible.

Location
Pilot
The intended location for the new pilot plant is ‘as close to home as possible’ to achieve short lines of communication and efficient services.
Commercial
The ports of Rotterdam and Eemshaven are the locations being considered for the first commercial plant.
Rotterdam would be the preferred location as most of the GoodFuels shipping clients are active there. In addition, Rotterdam offers many opportunities for further integration due to the existing infrastructure.
Production capacity
Pilot
1,000 tons of advanced marine fuel per year.
That capacity is sufficient to demonstrate that the technology works and will serve as a basis for further scaling up the operations.
GoodFuels intends to market the pilot volumes produced in order to be able to also optimise the commercial business case.
Commercial
The goal is to use the pre-commercial facility as a reference for rolling out commercial refineries with a capacity of possibly hundreds of thousands of tons per year.
Investment
Pilot
The pilot will require a six-figure investment. A more precise estimate of that figure is being calculated.
Commercial
Investments in the order of 200 M€ are being considered.
But it seems that many potential clients, due to market demand, would prefer building larger facilities.

Biofuels in the shipping sector

At present, most ships, in particular seagoing vessels, use low-quality fuel oil that is almost tar-like in nature. The potential for growth in terms of sustainability is therefore extremely high for this sector. Over the last five years, GoodFuels has prepared the road for the use of biofuels in the shipping sector. Together with partners such as Boskalis Loodswezen, Port of Rotterdam, Norden, Jan de Nul and its portfolio of GoodShipping A-Brand clients have shown that these fuels will play an essential role in making shipping more sustainable. The next step is to scale up the processes without making any concessions in terms of the sustainability of the feedstocks used.

The low-sulphur diesel fuel made from pyrolysis oil also complies with the stringent standards that will be introduced in 2020 for sulphur emissions in the shipping industry. BTG’s project meets all the crucial success criteria.

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