New Energy Blue intends to construct a cellulosic ethanol biorefinery in Iowa


Type of post: NEWS IN BRIEF.

New Energy Blue has announced its intention of constructing a cellulosic ethanol biorefinery (New Energy Freedom project) in Iowa (USA).
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Figure 1. Model of the New Energy Freedom plant

The company is developing the biomass refinery on a 155-acre site near Mason City. 275,000 tons of crop residue (cornstalks and wheat straw) will be locally sourced and converted into 20 million gallons of cellulosic ethanol and 95 tons of lignin.

Apparently, the company has abandoned a previously announced project in North Dakota, as it is stating that New Energy Freedom represents the first large-scale use of Inbicon bioconversion technology outside of Denmark. New Energy Blue’s team is a spin-off of the technology’s development. The company purchased exclusive rights to license and build-out refineries from Ørsted in 2019. Freedom’s CapEx is about 200 M$, about the same amount invested in Inbicon’s 15-year development. Ørsted built and operated a demonstration refinery for five years, supplying 2G ethanol to Danish petrol stations.

New Energy Blue has completed process engineering around several different feedstocks and is now completing a site-specific design for construction next year in Iowa. The company plans to build four more biomass refineries over the next 6 years.

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