Why Waste? 10 Hot waste-to-fuels projects

2. Fulcrum BioEnergy

Last December, Fulcrum BioEnergy announced that it has successfully secured commitments and is proceeding toward closing $175 million in financing to fund construction of its first municipal solid waste to low-carbon fuels plant, the Sierra BioFuels Plant and to fund the development of future projects. The project is expected to be completed in 2015.

Fulcrum’s engineering and technology teams have recently made numerous enhancements to the design of Sierra and to its proprietary MSW to ethanol process. The Company expects these improvements will dramatically reduce its operating cost to produce renewable fuel to less than $0.75 per gallon at Sierra, down from approximately $1.25 per gallon as previously disclosed.

On capital expenditure for the first commercial plant, “we are still looking at $180 million [as overall project cost],” noted Barraza.The cost of production at future Fulcrum plants is now expected to be less than $0.50 per gallon, down from $0.70 per gallon as previously disclosed. “These enhancements underscore our confidence in the attractive economics of our business model while further advancing Fulcrum as the industry’s low-cost producer of low-carbon transportation fuels,” added Macias.

More on the project.

In today’s Digest, we preview the projects and prospects for Enerkem, Abengoa BioEnergy, Solena Fuels, Fiberight, Earth Energy Renewables, Coskata, BioenNW, and Greenwood Fuels – by following the page links below.