Socioecology Research Today

In California, Propel Fuels has opened another in its chain of transformative Clean Mobility Centers — and the first station in Fresno to offer E85 Flex Fuel and biodiesel, sourced from Central Valley producers including Community Fuels in Stockton and Calgren Renewable Fuels in Pixley. Propel Fuels: Renewable Fuels | E85 Ethanol | Biodiesel – [...]

The concept of waste-to-energy (WtE) with regards to the utilization of byproducts from the bioethanol industry (e.g., distiller’s dried grain with solubles: DDGS) was employed to enhance the renewability of biodiesel, which would be an initiative stage of a biorefinery due to the conjunction between bioethanol and biodiesel. For example, DDGS is a strong candidate [...]

Nearly one hundred years ago, the fermentative production of acetone by Clostridium acetobutylicum provided a crucial alternative source of this solvent for manufacture of the explosive cordite. Today there is a resurgence of interest in solventogenic Clostridium species to produce n-butanol and ethanol for use as renewable alternative transportation fuels. Acetone, a product of acetone–n-butanol–ethanol [...]

The use of ethanol as a transportation fuel in the U.S. increased significantly from 2000–2009, and in 2010 nearly all gasoline contained 10% ethanol. In accordance with this increased use, atmospheric measurements of volatile organic compounds in Los Angeles in 2010 were significantly enriched in ethanol compared to measurements in urban outflow in the Northeast [...]

16 July 2012: The US Department of Energy’s (DOE) National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) has announced a new database, called the Transparent Cost Database (TCDB), which collects cost and performance estimates for energy efficiency and renewable energy technologies. The information is expected to facilitate corporate benchmarking, academic research and public decision making.The TCDB provides information [...]

In Washington, The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency approved the first applications for registration of e hanol for use in making gasoline that contains up to 15 percent ethanol – known as E15.To enable widespread use of E15, the Obama Administration has set a goal to help fueling station owners install 10,000 blender pumps over the [...]

In Washington, the 112th Congress adjourned without renewing the $0.45 VEETC tax credit for blenders of corn ethanol and the $0.54 per gallon tariff on imported ethanol. “With Congress in recess, there are no opportunities for further attempts to prolong the tax credit or the tariff, so we can confidently say these support mechanisms will [...]

In South Dakota, ethanol plants are being blamed for the rising level of carcinogens in the atmosphere, according to data from the Toxic Release Inventory. The analysis found that releases by ethanol plants has surpassed the releases by plastic factories, accounting for 40% of all reported carcinogens. For the past five years in South Dakota, [...]

In Washington, the U.S. Energy Information Administration says the U.S. has reached the ceiling of 14.2 billion gallons of annual ethanol production capacity, and the ethanol boom is essentially finished. There are more than 200 operational ethanol plants in the U.S. producing 14.2 billion to 14.7 billion gallons per year.Currently, the only major ethanol plant [...]

Instead of simply not collecting a portion of the fuel tax, the consumer is charged the whole amount, which is collected by the gas station and paid to the government. The government analyzes all this. Oil refiners then file a bunch of forms based on how much ethanol they blended into their fuel. The government [...]