Energy Beets for Fuel Heat Up Biofuels Market

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--Giant, 10-pound energy beets make a fine feedstock for biofuel production, as they are believed to have the lowest cost of any biofuel-processing material. They are classified as "advanced biofuels," as energy beets are not suitable for human consumption due to impurity levels.

There are only a handful of proposed energy-beet biofuel plants across the country. But within the next three years, biofuel from beets and capital spending to put these plants into production exceeds more than $360 million in capital investments and will add more than 118 million gallons of ethanol capacity.

The Mendota Advanced Bioenergy Beet Cooperative (Five Points, California) may very well be the first to construct a commercial-scale plant in California. The cooperative will learn in May whether the California Energy Commission will award some $5 million to develop a pilot refinery and hopes to develop a 30 million-gallon-per-year plant next year.

BeetsAll Biofuel LLC (Fargo, North Dakota) has an aggressive plan to construct 12 beet-to-ethanol plants in North Dakota next year. Each plant is expected to have the capacity to produce 20 million gallons per year of fuel ethanol by late 2014.

Maibach Agri-Energy Center LLC (Lancaster, Pennsylvania) is planning to construct a 38 million-gallon-per-year plant in Mount Joy, Pennsylvania, this year that is expected to produce 38 million gallons per year of ethanol, along with an 8-megawatt cogeneration unit that is expected to be completed in the second quarter of 2014.

North Dakota State University (Fargo, North Dakota) is performing feasibility studies to construct a 20 million-gallon-per-year plant on campus that could be operational by late 2013.

Montana Biopolymers Incorporated (Winnsboro, South Carolina) is looking into the possibility of constructing a sugar beets-to-polymers plant in South Carolina that is expected to process 20 metric tons per year of sugar beets into bio products.

Expect to see a strong focus on energy beets and plant genetics in the coming years. Yields can improve up to 20% in the next few years through genetic pool and breeding programs. Some irrigated crops yield in excess of 40 tons per acre at 18% sugar. It's time for the U.S. to get out of pilot plant mode and work on commercial-scale facilities.

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