Routes to the summit: 3 keys to first commercial advanced biofuels, and beyond

July 11, 2013 |

everest-routesIs your team ready for the summit run?

Take our 3-question, 6 point quiz, and compare your route to the established routes that others have pioneered.

It’s become an cliché of late that “financing is tough” and that “the US is slowing” while “China is speeding up” on advanced biofuels. It’s also become a cliché that “cellulosic biofuels are slow, the economics are unworkable” and that “the next wav of investment will wait until 2015 or 2016, especially for commercial-scale.”

Like all clichés, they have their origin in real experience, but are generally over-broadened to represent a general trend — whether it is “white men can’t jump” or “women are lousy drivers” or “it never rains, but it pours” — it is important from time to time to re-validate the cliché against the hard data.

Here at the Digest, we see a lot of the same conditions that everyone else does. True, not every company is getting all the resources it could use, financially or otherwise. Neither did every US automotive company during the period when 200 carmakers were winnowed down to around five majors between 1920 and 1980. Not that there was anything wrong with a Stutz, DeSoto, DeLorean, Tucker, Packard, Checker or Olds — but the market generally supports a winnowing process, and financing is where it bites.

In today’s Digest, we explore the 3 Key Routes to the Summit for biofuels ventures chasing commercial scale, the geographies that work, a 6 point quiz, and the players that are in the financing game — and how they work, and what works for them – all via the page links below.

Prev1 of 4
Use your ← → (arrow) keys to browse

Category: Top Stories

Thank you for visting the Digest.