Podcast: Dr. Rick Wilson on Plans to Produce Biobutanol From Wood Waste
BFJ.com Podcast with Dr. Rick Wilson, CEO of Cobalt Technologies, Inc. on Plans to Produce Biobutanol From Wood Waste
BioFuels Journal
Published: May 28, 2010
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Highlights From the Podcast
• The focus is on producing butanol from a variety of biomass feedstocks, including pine beetle kill and waste wood from paper mills.
• Butanol is a drop-in equivalent for gasoline with no requirement for modifications to engines or storage/transportation facilities.
• Butanol can be used for other chemicals and pharmaceuticals and can also be used to produce jet and diesel fuel as well.
• Cobalt has improved the existing process to allow it to process all sugars in cellulose and accelerated the fermentation process from 96 hours to four hours.
• Cobalt is to license and build plants later. A demonstration facility will be built early. The demo plant will be operational by 2012.
• Costs per gallon vary depending on feedstock costs, but could be under $2 or as low as $1 per gallon.