While
sustainability continues to dominate several industry-wide conversations,
perhaps the most pressing question is whether climate crisis is too far gone,
or if there are solutions out there to reverse humans’ damaging impact on the
planet.
What
if we told you that New Energy Blue has a solution that can not only slow down
our impact on the environment, but also has the potential to transform almost
every aspect of our daily lives? Thanks to a worldwide shift in the urgency of
carbon reduction, New Energy Blue is delivering ‘a green carbon cure to heal
our blue planet.’
With
its first biomass refinery under construction, New Energy Blue is poised to
deliver a new generation of bioenergy. Boasting the potential to change life as
we know it, clean technology can replace petroleum products from gasoline and
plastics to road pavements and healthy snacking.
Green
ethanol industry
Having worked in the ethanol industry for 27 years, New Energy Blue’s CEO,
Thomas Corle, played a key role in developing the green ethanol industry in the
US, and now his team are scaling up that industry. “My focus has always been on
the next generation,” Thomas begins. “I ended up purchasing the technology from
the developers in Denmark, and along with several team members, I’ve worked
with their research and development (R&D) and operations teams on proving
its efficacy and commercial reliability over the past decade. It’s essential to
what we’re designing and building in Iowa and across the American Midwest.
“To
put it simply, the technology enables us to process biomass to produce clean
renewables like lignin, taking out the sugars, nutrient value, metals, and ash
content to leave a clean burning fuel. My focus is on producing biomass using
feedstocks other than corn. Unlike oil refineries, we use raw materials that
are grown and harvested, not drilled and extracted, meaning our carbon is drawn
from the air and either sequestered into the products produced or recycled and
drawn into the plants that grow into next year’s feedstock.
“Whereas
conventional biofuels are produced using corn kernels, we’re the first
organization to convert corn stover (the straws and stalks left behind in
farmers’ fields after the annual harvest) into liquid biofuel and a bio-solid
at a large commercial scale – and, of course, do it sustainably. The corn stalk
is the best solar panel in the world; it takes in the sun, captures the carbon
dioxide, and allows us to harvest the sugars within that plant and reuse those
carbons. We’ve also engineered wheat straw conversion, sugar bagasse leftover
from the sugar industry, and palm oil bunches, the leftovers from the palm
industry that are otherwise a pollution.
Optimized
refining
To give some background understanding, greenhouse gases in the troposphere,
primarily carbon dioxide, trap some of the sun’s radiation that would otherwise
be reflected into space, causing the planet to warm up. Plants then absorb
carbon dioxide, store the sun’s energy as sugar, and release oxygen, meaning
America’s Midwest is the ideal location for biomass conversion, as it produces
115 million acres of wheat and corn every year.
Every
five years the US Department of Energy (DOE) produces the Billion Ton Report,
which concludes that the US has the potential to produce at least one billion
dry tons of biomass resources on an annual basis without adversely affecting
the environment. In other words, that’s enough renewable feedstock to feed 1800
biomass refineries that annually process 550,000 tons each.
“On
the process side, we’ve scaled up commercial operations, which are currently
focused on Iowa, one of the world leaders in corn production,” Thomas explains.
“Here, we see more than 200 bushels per acre, as well as five tons of corn
stover from the harvest. We’ve also established a special system that allows us
to aggregate efficiently, manage costs, reduce dirt, and lower moisture content
to optimize refining.
As
well as being a cleaner process than oil refineries, the biomass refineries
also use significantly less water. “Our biofuel is a pure alcohol made from
cellulose called ethanol and is kinder to the environment than gasoline, which
contains carcinogens toxic to groundwater,” Thomas elaborates. “Instead of
using fresh water in our processing, our enclosed-loop design captures and
recycles the moisture from the biomass, which can also produce a surplus of
clean water for other purposes.
“For
the last ten months, our team of 80 engineers have been working on our first
facility in Mason City, Iowa. The engineering is now being completed and we’re
working with one of the largest world banks, as well as the USDA and Danish
loan guarantee programs, to help secure final funding. Once complete, the site
will be capable of producing between 16 million and 20 million gallons of
ethanol every year, which will be reduced from 275,000 dry tons of corn
stover.”
Perennial
energy grasses
It’s crucial to note that the process provides a mutually beneficial
relationship for both local farmers and biomass refineries. “Although it might
seem like we’re taking away from the fields, Iowa’s corn population is so dense
that it benefits farmers to remove three of the five tons of stover per acre because
it can increase the next year’s yield. Also, most of the nutrients needed in
the soil are in the bottom part of the plant and in the cobs, which we leave on
the field. We take only the top part of the plant and the leaves where the
sugars are, and, of course, farmers also get a very nice extra income for
working with us.
“The
process is advantageous beyond the extra income, as our farmers’ program allows
them to play a bigger role in the industry and improve farming practices for
the future,” he continues. “For the figures I’ve outlined, it takes around
150,000 acres of land, which relies on about a 20 percent farmer participation
rate within a 30-mile radius of each of our refineries. To achieve this, we’re
offering farmers ownership units and educational services, so that they can
grow the biomass side of their business alongside us. By working together, we
can ultimately scale up the industry much quicker.”
The
applications of New Energy Blue’s products are far-reaching. From automotive
fuels and lubricants to road binders, textiles, and even sneakers, many of the
products we buy or use every single day can be produced from bio-based
materials. “To be clear, we’re not an ethanol plant, but we produce ethanol
molecules,” Thomas clarifies. “We plan to produce everything that an oil and
gas refinery is producing today, but from waste feedstocks and grasses.
“We’ve
recently signed a huge contract with Dow Chemical (Dow) to provide ethanol from
our sites in the Midwest to Port Lavaca, Texas, where we’re developing an
ethylene project. We’ll be shipping around 40 percent of our ethanol to their
ethanol-to-ethylene unit, which uses a specific catalyst to produce poly-grade
ethylene. This will then be used to produce bio-based plastics at one of Dow’s
four facilities that are along the Gulf Coast pipeline.
“Once
it’s at ethylene, it can be used for almost any of Dow’s thousands of products,
including cosmetics and textiles,” Thomas reveals. “Because of our clean
process, we can also turn part of our sugars into xylitol, for probiotics or
prebiotics. Our process can take food-grade, hemicellulose sugar, or C5 sugar
as it is, and separate it upfront to produce xylitol, a non-fat sugar, which
gives us the potential to create healthier snacks.
“We’ve
also tested our process to utilize energy grasses in arid regions that can no
longer grow food produce. Research shows enormous potential for carbon
sequestration and improved water retention in soil restored by introducing
perennial energy grasses. Our process can help communities adapt, planting and
harvesting fast-growing, drought-tolerant grasses that can restore land to the
point where food crops can grow bountifully again. With many countries thinking
about food security, this is what government organizations are interested in,
as it can restore previously arid land.”
Revolutionary
change
However, New Energy Blue’s operations are currently consumer-driven with no
widespread governmental support on biobased chemicals; there is only policy on
auto and jet fuels, at present. “Consumers are becoming aware of the
environmental impact of what they’re buying, but governments need to pay more
attention,” Thomas proposes. “Chemical companies, which are striving to meet
reduction targets, are taking note, but we need widespread policy to catch up
and pull these projects through. By creating products made from atmospheric
carbons, as opposed to fossil carbons, we can slow down or even reverse climate
crisis.”
As
our conversation draws to a close, Thomas’ thoughts turn to the future: “We’re
hoping to build five sites over the next six years and we’re already looking at
maybe seven shovel-ready sites in Iowa and Nebraska, all of which have plenty
of feedstock around and logistical advantages. We’re also planning the New
Energy Biomass Technology Campus at the Freedom project in Mason City to
continue the research and development of downstream products. Here we’ll also
house New Energy Farmers and train our future workforce.
“We
see a future not just in the US, where our bioenergy could replace 23 metric
tons of oil-derived polyethylene, but across the globe. We’re constantly
looking at global funding opportunities to replicate what we’re doing in Iowa.
With biomass aggregation spending around $20-million-to-$40-million a year to
support local farmers and the whole project resulting in more than a $1 billion
impact on the local economy, we can empower and revitalize communities wherever
we build. That’s what my focus is; to drive revolutionary change on a world
dominating platform, starting with the delivery of the clean, green American
dream.”