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Dutch IGCC pioneers chalk up pain and gain Emergency response is behind schedule in the European public sector A new refining industry in Europe's Asian Corridor Commission proposes milestone energy proposal Replace fuel oil with distillate? Cancelled projects will sustain margins “Marine distillate not fuel oil from 2010” Branson's biofuels megastore You heard it here first: refinery CO2 storage a reality in Norway Buncefield 2: Investigation critical Where now for Swedish Class 1 diesel My slow awakening to climate change The luckiest motorist alive Safety row goes on over Europe's largest LNG terminal New WHO guidelines on city air quality put focus on diesel Would LNG really 'evaporate harmlessly' in an accident? Another lesson in the thermobaric bomb Spare a thought for the oil-rich But will the good times keep on rolling? Carbon storage and the zero emissions refinery Everything just changed E85 and high octane gasolines The problem of small-minded young engineers New Permit Regulations Biodiesel newbuilds and a new green superfuel Spilled wine and our split industry Drilling down into the prospects for IGCC The beginning of the start of the end of oil | Biodiesel newbuilds and a new green superfuel Greenergy will go ahead and build its first biodiesel plant in the Humber Estuary in the UK, near to the ConocoPhillips refinery. Greenergy may be a seasoned ‘early bird’ in new fuels, but it certainly won’t have the biofuels market to itself by the time its plant is up and running. I mentioned the UK independent’s plans in my January ‘look-ahead’ column. Well, now they’ve got the finance lined up and, assuming they get don’t get snared by red tape, then they’re on course to start producing 100,000tpy of fatty acid methyl ester by Spring next year. Others are moving in too, including an oil company promising a next generation process and a diesel superfuel. Although fuels from vegetables and animals aren’t new in Europe, the UK is expected by the end of the year to see six-fold growth in biofuels, a heading which can encompass biodiesel, bio-gaseous fuel and bioethanol and bio etbe/mtbe. Biofuels directive The UK is not alone in that kind of growth. The Biofuels Directive (2003/30/EC) has European member states generally on a timetable to ensure that 5.75% of road fuels market share is biofuel by 2010. According to the directive, they should have hit 2% share by now. But European directives aren’t laws. They’re an agreement to make laws. It’s generally necessary to get your own sense of how far the member states are on track with their legislative work, and how effective their laws, tax changes, and other sticks and carrots are being in creating change. The capital projects are lining up now, that’s clear. Near to where Greenergy intends to build its biodiesel plant (a little further north), Biofuels Corporation – a publicly listed start-up put together by two Australians – is building the world’s largest biofuels manufacturing plant. It expects to start its 250,000tpy biodiesel plant this year and possibly to build a second stage to double that capacity. While Greenergy has a memo of understanding to supply ConocoPhillips, Biofuels Corporation has a deal with Dutch independent refining and logistics operator, Petroplus. Petroplus has good track record on the forecourt and an excellent asset for ULSD production at the former ICI/Phillips refinery nearby on Teesside. Petroplus has had a rough experience on the Dutch stock exchange and is going private again, but claims to be leaner and stronger as a result. Against Greenergy’s already somewhat established GlobalDiesel brand, Petroplus is fielding Bio-Plus. Neste invests €100m Oil companies are not taking a lead in biodiesel technology, with the exception of Neste Oil – formerly part of Fortum– which has gone public on plans to build a 170,000tpy plant of its own, located beside the vast and growing 4mtpy diesel plant at Porvoo refinery. Neste will use its own “next generation” technology and says it will invest Euros 100m, a figure larger than the announced capitalisation of the two UK projects put together. So why spend so much more money? Kimmo Rahkamo, Executive Vice President, Components, Neste Oil, told me there’s a lot of excitement at Neste about their plans. He says they’re going to spend more money to get a process with much more feedstock flexibility and produce a product like no other on the market today – including GTL diesels. “Others are using a esterification process; we’re isomerising and hydrogenating the molecules to get a cetane number of up to 99 and a very good cloud point [important for their Finnish and Baltic States retailing operation],” he says. He says Neste is the first oil company in the market with its own process and manufacturing project. But how, I asked, does he justify the very large investment? “Well, apart from the improved feedstock economics compared to our rather constrained competitors, we’ll have an amazing quality. We’re starting to see a premium diesel market, for example in Germany you can buy a diesel blended with 5-10% GTL diesel and it’s getting a 5 eurocent premium.” Rahkamo explains that their plans rely in part on hydrogen capacity from a residue hydrocracker at the Porvoo refinery. Aside from producers, testing organisations typically have a good finger on the pulse of emerging trends in fuels. Intertek Group confirms that there are a lot of players taking an interest in product quality for the emerging biofuels market. “We're seeing a great deal of activity in bio-fuels testing – in everything from animal to agricultural feedstocks” says Dr Andrew Swift, Vice President of Caleb Brett’s global Outsourcing Division. Swift says there has been a big pick-up in Europe, Australia and the US for bio-fuel analysis and testin: “I can see this globally across our organisation, where meeting the increasing demand for bio-fuels testing and quality certification is part of our core competence. Testing volumes are up, apparently as projects move from the pilot plant phase – initiatives backed by governments or grant assistance in one way or another – to commercial-scale projects backed by venture capital and other investment. Reliable testing accelerates both the route to market for these new producers and the return on their capital”. There’s rather a lot of biofuels capacity already on the ground in Europe. Germany and Austria have led the way in biodiesel, with industries which have benefited from tax incentives for some years. France has had ETBE in gasoline and was a leader in biodiesel before Germany took its lead. Italy has seen biodiesel used for heating oil. The latter market has been the testing ground for the Novaol/Ballestra technology and engineering partnership that are supplying the Greenergy project. Biofuels Corporation is using Austrian technology from Energea to build its plant. Lurgi of Germany is another major technology player and so is Westfalia. Both have played an important part in the 2million tpy German biofuels market. A good source of competence in biofuels is the Austrian Biofuels Institute (www.biodiesel.at), a largely non-profit organisation run on association lines, whose expert panel has advised on biofuels developments in Europe and Australia. The organisation has published a CD Rom which tackles standardisation issues, a report on 17 best-case biodiesel plants and other items of interest. Chairman, Werner Koerbitz, is clearly excited to see projects materialising now, after a lot of hard work advocating the benefits of biofuels. The pebble in his shoe is the backyard refining industry that has grown up over recent years and ‘reinvents the wheel’ on an almost monthly basis. Not unlike the early days of mineral oil refining, small open vessel refineries are appearing everywhere: “We see it from Denmark to Paraguay – the local inventor who has created a wonder process and driven his tractor 100km on the resulting liquid,” says Koerbitz. “The internet is full of them, the local paper thinks they’re a genius, they’re proud and the product is awful.” To contrast that ‘grass roots’ activity, he says there’s a very serious body of technology and expertise ready to undertake the demanding projects that are now appearing. | |||||||
Download Energy Industry Resumé with work samples Profile: Tim Lloyd Wright MA Here you'll find a brief profile of my work with international energy, transport and associated environmental issues. Energy trends articles You heard it here first: refinery CO2 storage a reality in Norway From the archive... Over-processed fuel leaves oil tankers adrift | ||||||||
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