Green Plains Renewable Energy, Inc. (NASDAQ: GPRE) and BioProcessAlgae LLC have received a $2.1 million research and development grant from the Iowa Power Fund to build an algae pilot project at Green Plains’ ethanol plant in Shenandoah, Iowa.
BioProcessAlgae LLC is a joint venture between Green Plains, CLARCOR Inc. (NYSE: CLC), BioProcessH2O LLC and NTR plc.
The grant provides matching funds to install a series
of photobioreactor units.
Water, heat and carbon dioxide will be recycled from the ethanol
manufacturing process to support continuous algae production. The grant
provides funding through the end of 1Q10 with installation of the pilot project expected in 3Q09.
"Algae has the potential to become an important carbon sequestration solution, biofuel feedstock and feed product," said Todd Becker, President and CEO of Green Plains. "If the pilot project is successful, BioProcessAlgae will move to expand the photobioreactor system to full commercial scale. We believe that this pilot project will be one of the first operational installations of a photobioreactor system at an industrial plant in the United Sates utilizing emerging technology out of the laboratory."
"BioProcessAlgae and its technology partners have made significant progress in the engineering, design and development of photobioreactor systems for algae production," said Kevin Lynch, CEO of BioProcessAlgae. "The project will give us the opportunity to test our systems on a larger scale. This is a very important step toward system commercialization of algae technology."
Green Plains Renewable Energy, Inc. is based in Omaha, Nebraska. The company is a vertically-integrated ethanol producer operating four ethanol plants in Iowa, Indiana and Tennessee with a combined expected operating capacity of 330 million gallons of ethanol per year. Green Plains also operates an independent third-party ethanol marketing service, with marketing capacity of 305 million gallons of ethanol per year. Green Plains owns 51% of Blendstar, LLC, a Houston-based biofuel terminal operator with 6 facilities in 5 states. Green Plains’ Agribusiness segment operates grain storage facilities and complementary agronomy, feed, and fuel businesses.
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