“GRowing Advanced industrial Crops on marginal lands for biorEfineries” (GRACE): this is the name of the BBI demonstration project under the coordination of the University of Hohenheim in Stuttgart (Germany) and with a unique consortium made up of universities, agricultural companies and industry. The aims will be achieved by knowledge exchange between these groups, together with new crop varieties and cultivation experiments on areas that have been polluted by heavy metals, for example, or are unattractive for food production due to lower yields.
Finland is the cradle of the bioeconomy. And maybe someone could someday propose to change the name from Finland to Bio-land. The latest news is that buses in the Helsinki region and most of machinery and trucks used by the City of Helsinki are switching to waste and residue-based biofuels. Helsinki Region Transport HSL, the City of Helsinki and the producers of renewable fuels involved in the project are all pioneers in carbon-neutral transport. The project is internationally significant.
Covestro, the leading supplier of high-tech polymers headquartered in Leverkusen, Germany, has scored a research breakthrough for the use of plant-based raw materials in plastics production: aniline, an important basic chemical, can now be derived from biomass. The German materials manufacturer achieved this by collaborating with partners on the development of a completely new process, initially in the laboratory. Until now, only fossil raw materials had been used for the production of aniline, which plays an important role in the chemical industry and is used as starting material for numerous products.
Finnish company KaiCell Fibers completed a technical-commercial feasibility study (FS), mainly delivered by CTS Engtec Oy, and now is ready for the next steps towards making the biorefinery in Paltamo, northeast Finland, a reality.
Used vegetable oils can be transformed into biofuels. Eni and CONOE, the Italian Consortium for the Collection and Treatment of Used Oils and Fats, signed a Memorandum of Understanding to promote and increase the collection of vegetable oils that will supply Eni’s Venice biorefinery and, from 2018, Gela. The Minister for the Environment and the Protection of Land and Sea Gian Luca Galletti and the Director General for Energy Supply Security and Infrastructure of the Ministry of Economic Development Gilberto Dialuce were present at the event.
Finnish oil refining and marketing company Neste and Fazer Bakery, the leading bakery company in Finland and Russia’s major markets of St Petersburg and Moscow, are joining forces with their “Doughnut Trick campaign”. The oil that was used to fry Fazer Bakery’s May Day doughnuts will be recycled by refining it to produce Neste MY renewable diesel. The value of the fuel will be donated to the Finnish chapter of the charity SOS Children’s Village International. The amount of diesel that’s made from the oil used to fry every three doughnuts is enough to drive a distance of about one kilometer.
IL BIOECONOMISTA 