FPInnovations and Bioénergie La Tuque team on wood biodiesel project

In Canada, FPInnovations and Bioénergie La Tuque (BELT) are proud to announce the signing of a collaborative agreement, the main purpose of which is to lead to the installation of a biorefinery facility supplied with forest residues.

The agreement has an initial term of four years and consists of three phases. The first phase includes assessing the technical and economic feasibility of the biorefinery project and confirming the availability of biomass at a competitive cost, identifying technological bottlenecks in the most promising process lines, and determining an acceptable technical and economical level of risk.

Phase 2 of the agreement includes a detailed evaluation of the technologies identified in Phase 1; this phase will be assigned specifically to FPInnovations’ research teams, in collaboration with BELT and the developing regional bioeconomy/bioenergy chair held by Mangin at UQTR.

The construction of a demonstration plant in La Tuque, with a defined capacity based on results obtained during Phases 1 and 2, represents Phase 3 of the project. The project resulting from the collaboration between FPInnovations and BELT aims at producing more than 200 million liters of biodiesel annually from the conversion of forest residues.

This green energy should replace non-renewable fuels in transportation, therefore leading to a projected annual reduction in CO2 emissions of 575,000 tons.