by Helena Tavares Kennedy (Biofuels Digest) 2017 was a roller coaster year. There was a paradigm shift in biofuels, technology advancements, innovations abounded, politics chaotic. Some companies shut down and disappeared like the Hobo vanishing in the snow atop the Polar Express. Some companies showed leadership and stayed strong getting through any challenge, like the Hero Girl who proved to be a solid example for others to follow.
But in the end, biofuels are pushing forward – not necessarily like a high-speed, short-distance Acela Express train, but a steady, reliable, Superliner train that is in it for the long-haul.
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#1 Ethanol and biodiesel: dropping below the production cost of fossil fuels?
The most clicked on story from 2017 is all about money. Well, mostly. It’s about the price of oil and what that means for renewable fuels and biofuels like ethanol and biodiesel. It looked at the cost for a barrel of oil and what it tells us about renewable fuel credit markets and actual carbon and fuel markets.
#2 Heat Death: Joule Unlimited collapses as oil prices flag, time passes, pressure mounts
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#3 DowDuPont to exit cellulosic biofuels business
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#4 Shell goes carbon negative, signs commercial-scale deal with SBI
Shell made big news with their announcement of going carbon negative and their deal with SBI Bioenergy giving it access to a fuel that emits Minus 14 grams of CO2 per megajoule of energy.
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#5 50 Hottest Companies in the Advanced Bioeconomy 2017
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#6 Ethanol battle escalates amid rumors of RFA-Icahn deal
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#7 The Top 100 People in the Advanced Bioeconomy 2017
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#8 Beta Renewables in cellulosic ethanol crisis, as Grupo M&G parent files for restructuring
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#9 ENVIA Energy’s GTL plant is underway, produces first biofuels
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#10 Breaking the Bottleneck – POET-DSM achieves cellulosic biofuel breakthrough
… With the newly installed pretreatment system, POET is now fine-tuning downstream processes and preparing for future licensing efforts that will spread this technology around the world.
#11 Fermentation Frontiers: Top 10 Trendlines in industrial biotech fermentation
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#12 Biofuels: ethanol’s growth is spelled I-N-D-I-A
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#13 Diamond Green Diesel expanding to 275M gallon capacity to meet booming renewable diesel demand
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#14 Thailand announces $11.3 billion 10-year plan to build sugarcane and cassava bioeconomy
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#15 The Hot 40: 40 Hottest Emerging Companies in the Advanced Bioeconomy, 2017-18
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#16 BioChar’s Buzzing and Cool Planet’s $20M cap raise is feeding it
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#17 MetGen, Sweetwater unlocking lignin – the roughest, toughest, ornieri’st material that ever bushwhack’d a pioneer in the Valley of Death
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… Luckily, we had more ups than downs and we are still on track to advance the bioeconomy. Cheers to the many successes, and even the failures, for we learn from failure. And don’t forget to believe…believe in biofuels, believe in our future, believe that we can make a difference. READ MORE