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Work on Biofuel Plant Commences
DENMARK - DONG, a Danish energy company, turned the sod this week at its second generation bioethanol plant in northern Zealand Second generation bioethanol is seen by many as an answer to the world's energy needs. Currently, there is no commercial plant that produces the fuel. The sod was turned this week on the 300 million kroner plant in Kalundborg, northern Zealand. While the plant will be a demonstration facility, it is hoped that it can show that test results on new fuels can work on a large scale.
The race to develop second generation ethanol heats up as the global food crisis worsens. JP.dk reports that first generation ethanol is produced directly from food products, while second generation is derived from waste products.
The Danish company plans to use the plant to turn straw into fuel, and it will have a capacity to produce 30,000 tonnes of straw annually. This can be converted into 5.4 million litres of bioethanol, 8250 tons of solid biofuel, and 11,100 tons of animal feed.
Enzymes play a large part in the process of breaking down the raw materials into fuel. Denmark is one of the global leaders in the enzyme industry and Novozymes has developed a test product that can be used in the DONG plant.
Per Falholt, head of research at Novozymes told Berlingkse Tidende newspaper that if there is enough biomass available, there is a potential for bioethanol to corner a third of the world's fuel market.
The Danish biotech company invests hundreds of millions of kroner annually into the development of bioethanol-production enzymes. It also plans to have completely CO2-neutral electricity needs by 2012.
The bioethanol plant is expected to be open in time for the UN Climate Change Conference, hosted by Copenhagen in November 2009.
DONG's subsidiary Inbicon looks after its bioethanol interests and vice-president of Incibon said that if the demonstration plant is a success, they hope to have a full-scale plant ready for 2012 or 2013.
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