Energy oil gas
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.”