Canada’s Environment Minister John Baird announced on March 14 that Ottawa, Ontario, -based Iogen Corp.’s application to receive funding for the country’s first commercial-scale cellulosic ethanol plant has progressed to the due diligence phase.
Following the due diligence phase, Sustainable Development Technology Canada, a non-profit government foundation that finances and supports the development and demonstration of clean technologies, will make a final funding decision.
“Cellulosic ethanol has the potential to help Canada meet its Renewable Fuels Standard in a sustainable way,” said Vicky J. Sharpe, president and chief executive officer of SDTC. “With an abundance of potential feedstocks that is unmatched, Canada has a huge advantage in the race to bring cellulosic ethanol to market.”
Iogen’s application for a Saskatchewan-based cellulosic ethanol biorefinery was submitted to SDTC under the recently launched NextGen Biofuels Fund, which supports up to 40 percent of eligible project costs for large demonstration-scale next-generation renewable fuels facilities that are a first-of-its-kind. After the project’s completion, the contribution is repayable, based on free cash flow, over a 10 year period.
Iogen and its partners, Shell and Goldman Sachs, are developing a process that uses specialized enzymes to convert plant fiber into sugars, which can be fermented to produce ethanol.
Iogen currently operates a demonstration-scale facility in Ottawa that converts biomass to ethanol. In February 2007, the company was one of six cellulosic ethanol projects selected to receive up to $80 million in U.S. Department of Energy funding. The 18 MMgy proposed plant, would be built in Shelley, Idaho, and produce ethanol from agricultural residues, such as wheat straw, barley straw, corn stover, switchgrass and rice straw.
