Read more about the project in this article in Ethanol Producer Magazine.

Some small engine manufacturers, however, have expressed concerns about the bill.  As a strong supporter of small engine manufacturers and users, the WBIA has worked to highlight how the proposed bill will actually protect jobs and benefit the small engine industry.

Here are a few ways in which the bill will protect small engine manufacturers:

1.  The bill guarantees the availability of ethanol-free gasoline.

2.  The bill ensures small engine users will be able to buy gasoline with ethanol blends recommended by the manufacturer.

3.  The bill protects small engine owners, should ethanol become to expensive or scarce.

For more details, including text from the bill, download our fact sheet below.

Small Engine fact sheet [PDF]

The workshop will include a morning “lecture” session and and afternoon “hands-on” session. Speakers will include biofuels experts, business leaders, state officials and educators from Wisconsin.

The program will be held on Saturday, April 10, 2010 from 8:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. at Fox Valley Tech College’s Agriculture Center in Appleton.

Registration is required.
Workshop Fee: $25.00*
Registration deadline: 4/5/2010
* WSSBPP members receive a $25.00 discount (cost is free)

Their team captain, Ryan Kubat, recently shared with us this update:

We have been extremely busy working on the sled and finishing up the design paper and our suggested manufactured retail price (MSRP). I have attached the design paper for this year if you would like to read through it or pass it along to anyone else on the board. Our final MSRP cost for our snowmobile came to $14,823.24 this year!

We have just over one week before we head up to our competition and are just wrapping up some fine tuning and even looking at possibilities for next year already! The whole team has been investing a great deal of time over the past weeks to help get our paper finalized and to get the sled ready to go. We are all excited and looking forward to competition. The following email is where the schedule of events can be seen at:

http://students.sae.org/competitions/snowmobile/schedule.htm

To download their design sheet, please click here.

Lehman discusses the new biorefinery they are helping to in Park Falls at the Flambeau River Paper mill:

Miron Construction is involved with an innovative project in Park Falls with the Flambeau River Papers mill. What can you share about that?

As we all know, pulp and paper mills were the bread and butter for the Fox Valley at one time. But paper mills today are having a tough time in the global marketplace. What’s happening in Park Falls is a unique opportunity. What they’re doing is creating a process … taking wood mass and converting it into wax and biofuel.

It takes a tremendous amount of heat to do this and what they’ll be able to do is take the heat to create steam to generate electricity for the plant. This will save a lot of money and help the plant become more competitive.

It certainly is a step toward energy independence and the technology is something that can help paper mills be more competitive in the global marketplace.

This is a key project for the bio industry in Wisconsin. With an ample supply of biomass materials, Wisconsin is poised to be a leader in this area. The Flambeau River project will be the second largest biorefinery of its kind in the US.

We at the WBIA are proud to see one of our members contributing so successfully to building this sector of the bio industry.

Click here to read the entire article.

According to the EPA, the Renewable Fuel Standard will reduce “greenhouse-gas emissions by up to 13.1 million metric tons annually by 2012” which will be equal to having 2.3 million less cars on the road. For more information, visit: http://www.epa.gov/oms/renewablefuels/index.htm

Project Apollo plans to utilize Westinghouse Plasma Corp.’s (WPC) plasma gasification technology to process municipal and industrial wastes into renewable energy. Because there is no combustion, the waste is not burned but converted into its original elemental form, creating significant quantities of clean syngas that can be used to generate electricity, steam or bio-fuels. There are several facilities operating commercially around the world using WPC technology and several more in final design phase and or construction.

The $225 million project is expected to create more than 250 jobs during the construction process and employ 45 full time people once operational. Approximately 30% of the waste feedstock is already committed from Badger Disposal of Wisconsin, one of region’s leading industrial waste management services companies. Discussions are underway with third parties for the sale of syngas and electricity.

AFE plans to have the project operational in late 2013. The first phase of the renewable energy facility is expected to process approximately 1200 tons of municipal and industrial waste per day, generating enough clean energy to power roughly 20,000 homes in the Milwaukee area. “This commercially proven technology is the ultimate in recycling,” said Christopher Maloney, CEO of Alliance Federated Energy, “and we are pleased to be building our first project right here in Wisconsin, a state committed to promoting environmental stewardship and technological innovation.”

“We are pleased that AFE has selected Wisconsin for their first renewable energy project,” said Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle. “This technology has real potential to help us address the growing need for clean renewable power. Project Apollo will create new clean energy jobs in our state, reduce the need for continued land filling of our wastes, and reduce greenhouse gases.”

“The site AFE has chosen for this project is well suited for this facility”, said Mike Zebell P.E. of AECOM (NYSE:ACM), a Fortune 500 company serving clients in more than 100 countries and a global provider of professional technical, environmental and management support services. “We believe that this technology is not only environmentally friendly but ready for large-scale commercialization. We are excited to partner with an entrepreneurial firm like AFE, one of the industries leading developers focused on building environmentally responsible energy projects using plasma gasification technology.”

CorVal-Ryan (CorVal), a leading EPC firm in the alternative energy sector, has been selected to design and fabricate the facility, bringing their 85-year history of performance excellence to the AFE team. “We believe that plasma gasification technology has the potential to be a major player in the renewable energy market and are excited to be working with AFE on their Apollo Project” said Bob Cutshall, President at CorVal-Ryan. “We have a number of plasma gasification based renewable energy projects in design or under construction and see that number growing in the coming years” he added.

About Alliance Federated Energy
Established in 2005, Alliance Federated Energy is a developer of renewable energy and related infrastructure projects focused on environmentally sustainable technologies, with a specific focus on plasma gasification technology for electric generation and energy production. For more information, please visit http://www.afeservices.com.

The press release from Miron Construction and Flambeau River Biofuels gives more details about the project:

“The Flambeau River bio-refinery will create permanent, high-skilled operating jobs in the region, long-term logging jobs, and short-term engineering and construction jobs, contributing to the economic stimulus of Park Falls, Wisconsin,” said Butch Johnson, majority owner of Flambeau River Papers and Flambeau River Biofuels.

“The AMEC-Miron team was selected for its experience and innovation in developing green energy and biofuel facilities,” said Johnson.  “When completed, Flambeau will have the first integrated pulp and paper mill in North America to run on fossil-free energy.”

Tim Gelbar, President, AMEC’s Power and Process Americas business said: “The Flambeau program has been a long-term strategic focus of AMEC’s and it will play a key role in our continued development of new bioprocesses and the expansion of clean renewable energy.”

“We have been working with Flambeau for two years developing this project” said David G. Voss, Jr., President, Miron Construction. “The Flambeau BioFuels project is key to developing “green fuel” renewable energy alternatives and will have a significant positive economic impact in Wisconsin.”

On July 29, officials released Phase One of the study conducted by Resource Analytics, which found that sufficient biomass resources exist in the surrounding area to support a cellulosic ethanol plant.

Phase Two demonstrates substantial interest among individuals and companies to provide biomass resources – particularly wood resources – to such a facility, provided the plant could support diverse types of feedstocks.

“As second generation biofuels emerge as a fuel source, the New North is well positioned to take advantage with the resources and infrastructure necessary to create them,” said Jerry Murphy, Executive Director of the New North, Inc. “This study has demonstrated that a cellulosic ethanol facility at the former Niagara paper mill site has a great deal of promise for potential investors.”

In addition to wood resources – which provide the best option in the short-term – the study also notes the possibility of creating switchgrass supplier cooperatives in conjunction with the establishment of an ethanol plant over the coming years.

Phase II of the study is available for download at www.tinyurl.com/biomassstudy2. Phase one is also available at www.tinyurl.com/biomassstudy.

New North, Inc. is a regional collaboration effort focused on promoting regional cooperation and economic development in an 18-county region in Northeast Wisconsin. The 18 counties included in the New North are Outagamie, Winnebago, Calumet, Waupaca, Brown, Shawano, Oconto, Marinette, Door, Kewaunee, Sheboygan, Manitowoc, Fond du Lac, Green Lake, Marquette, Florence, Menominee, and Waushara. To find out more information about New North, Inc., please visit www.thenewnorth.com.

• Expected to be complete in 2012, the plant will be the largest in the Midwest burning biomass.

• The project will convert a coal-fired boiler to burn wood waste.

• With two out of three boilers already burning wood, the conversion will enable the plant to run entirely on renewable sources.

“Bio Industry Basics” is a series of weekly facts from the Wisconsin Bio Industry Alliance highlighting the positive benefits of bio fuel, bio power, and bio products production and use in Wisconsin.

Bio Industry Basic 9