Credit Crunch Delays Construction of BlueFire's California Cellulosic Ethanol Plant

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--BlueFire Ethanol Incorporated (OTC:BFRE) (Irvine, California) has experienced construction-start delays of its Lancaster, California, cellulosic-based fuel-ethanol plant because of the current credit crunch. The company received a conditional use permit from Los Angeles County to proceed with construction in 2008 and expected construction to already be under way.

There are currently 35 cellulosic ethanol plants under development in North America representing $3.7 billion in capital spending.

Click on the image at right to see a list of cellulosic ethanol plants under development in the U.S.

Today, it is not clear when construction will get under way at Waste Management's (NYSE:WMI) (Houston, Texas) Lancaster landfill, which will produce the waste material feedstock to feed the plant.

The plant will utilize a two-stage concentrated acid hydrolysis process to convert bio-waste, such as wood chips, grass cuttings, vegetable and fruit wastes, into a simple sugar solution that can be processed in a conventional ethanol production process of fermentation, distillation and dehydration. At nameplate capacity, the plant will generate 3.7 million gallons per year of ethanol from 170 tons per day of garbage at an estimated cost of $2 per gallon.

Once the project is funded, BlueFire will utilize Brinderson Engineers & Constructors (Costa Mesa, California) to design and build the plant. The company's long-term goals are to have 20 of these types of facilities running nationwide over the next seven years. Currently, the company is eyeing a second location in Mecca, California. If all plants move forward as planned, BlueFire will have the capacity of producing some 1 billion gallons per year of ethanol from landfill waste.

Industrial Info's Ethanol Database provides a comprehensive outline of all current development activities in the emerging alternative fuels market. This database covers 177 ethanol plants in operation and 530 plants under development. It also covers 145 operational biodiesel plants and 245 biodiesel plants under development.

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