The South American country of Uruguay is now generating 95% of its power from renewable sources. While Uruguay has no nuclear power plants and has not built new hydropower in 20 years, biomass, wind, and solar power are booming. The massive shift to renewable energy was triggered by the country’s need to break away from its dependence on foreign oil, which in 2000... [Read More]

EnviTec Biogas has begun the construction of an EnviThan gas upgrading plant for WEFRI, a Danish agricultural company. The plant, with a capacity of 524m³, will be built in the Jutland town of Hammel and is scheduled to go online by summer 2016. As feedstock the plant will process grass silage, sugar beets, straw, chicken manure, and glycerine, and the produced gas... [Read More]

German manufacturer Weltec Biopower has begun the construction of its second anaerobic digestion plant in South Korea. Work at the site, located in Gyeonggi-do province about 80 km north of the capital Seoul, started in October and the 450kW biogas plant is to go live in the early summer of 2016. The plant will have the capacity to process 100 tonnes of organic waste a... [Read More]

The Brazilian state of Mato Grosso do Sul has granted preliminary licenses to ten biomass projects in order to increase its renewable energy output. The Environmental Institute of Mato Grosso do Sul (Imasul) gave the licenses to a total of 535.75MW worth of eucalyptus-based biomass projects. The 10 schemes, with a combined investement of $734 million (€679m), will... [Read More]

The Aberystwyth University in Wales, UK and the supply chain specialist Terravesta are running new trials to examine how the energy crop miscanthus survives in water-logged land and its effect on the soil after flooding. The trials come some 18 months after the floods which devastated the Somerset Levels and are being funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research... [Read More]

The announced £1.15 billion allocation for the Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) budget by 2021 could quadruple the number of UK biomethane plants. The forecast, released by the Anaerobic Digestion and Bioresources Association (ADBA), says that the Chancellor George Osborne’s spending review could support the construction of an additional 140 biomethane plants. These... [Read More]

Three pasteurisation systems made by Landia are helping Shropshire Energy produce 2.5MW of renewable energy at its AD plant in Littleport, Cambridgeshire, UK. Designed as a free-standing unit that heat-treats organic waste so that the resulting thin substance can be used as an energy-efficient substrate, each of the three 8m3 pasteurisers at Shropshire Energy is fitted... [Read More]

Vega Biofuels has entered into a joint venture agreement to manufacture green energy products from industrial hemp. The joint venture (JV) company includes Vega Biofuels and Oregon, US-based Now Corp., and it will operate under the name Vega Now from the Now Corp.'s property in Colorado. The two companies will be working together to test industrial hemp as a feedstock... [Read More]

UK energy regulator, Ofgem, has published a summary of the results of its benchmarking exercise of voluntary schemes against the UK's Renewables Obligation land criteria for woody biomass. The SBP Framework has been evaluated and found to be fully compliant with the legislation. The summary of results can be found in Ofgem's updated Renewables Obligation: Sustainability... [Read More]

The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has released the final volume requirements for bioethanol under the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) for the years 2014, 2015, and 2016. In addition, the final volume requirements for biodiesel for 2014 and 2017. The EPA has increased the required levels from its earlier suggestion in June, and hopes that the rule will boost renewable... [Read More]

Statkraft, a European renewable energy generator, has shipped over 3,000 tonnes of woodchips to a customer in Denmark. The consignment is the first woodchip cargo to be shipped from Statkraft's new biomass trading hub which opened in August at the site of the former Södra Cell paper mill, located south of Oslo, Norway, at Tofte. Statkraft is processing round wood... [Read More]

The US fuel manufacturer Energex has been qualified into the Pellet Fuels Institute (PFI) Standards Program, a third-party accreditation programme providing specifications for residential and commercial-grade pellet fuel. Energex has qualified its Mifflintown, Pennsylvania, and Lac-Megantic, Quebec, facilities, becoming the eighth company to join the PFI Standards Program. The... [Read More]

E.ON UK, a subsidiary of the German power company E.ON has confirmed that Ironbridge Power Station in Shropshire will cease commercial generation and will close permanently following. The iconic plant, which has reached its 20,000 hours limit of generation under the Large Combustion Plant Directive, was officially first synchronised to the grid by former E.ON colleague... [Read More]

Full Circle Generation, a UK green investment consortium, is planning to build a major waste-to-energy farm in Northern Ireland. The Belfast Waste for Energy site, to be located at aerospace company Bombardier’s factory, is set to become one of, if not the largest waste energy facility in Northern Ireland at an annual capacity of 61GWh, enough to power 14,500 homes. An... [Read More]

Sierra Energy has chosen Andy Egan as its engineering and procurement partner in delivering renewable energy solutions to the US Army and California Energy Commission. Andy Egan’s first mission will be to design and fabricate the FastOx gasification system at Fort Hunter Liggett, a US Army garrison in California. FastOx gasification will assist the Army in achieving... [Read More]

Rentech, a US wood fibre processing company, says its Atikokan plant in Ontario, Canada, has achieved record production of approximately 1,850 tonnes of pellets for the week ended 14 November. The plant’s design capacity is 110,000 tpy, or 2,115 tonnes a week. Pellet production at the company’s Wawa facility recently resumed, having been offline to modify the... [Read More]