The Credit Crunch: Yet Another Pitfall for Ethanol
The financial crisis will likely hurt the cleantech sector in more ways than one — access to capital, more risk-averse investors, the need for cheaper power, and declining oil prices. But one industry could be particularly hard hit: ethanol. Bluefire Ethanol CEO Arnold Klann, who previously told us that the company is trying to scale up to 20 waste-to-ethanol plants in just a decade, tells Reuters that the pullback from bank lending could slow down their plans inover the long term.
First-generation corn ethanol plants have hit tough times due to the rise in corn prices, the storms this summer, and a reduction in both political and public good will. Quite a few plans for ethanol plants have been delayed or downright canceled. But for the next generation of cellulosic ethanol, which in its early stage has been prohibitively expensive, this credit crunch could spell some real problems.
Cellulosic ethanol has been produced in labs and on a small scale for some time. The problem has been getting those nascent technologies at a scale large enough at a cost cheap enough to justify production. A company like Canadian Iogen has been producing cellulosic ethanol for years, and only just shipped a small 50,000 gallon commercial order to Shell. Particularly startup companies that need to raise capital to make the transition to production could face some really tough times.
[...] pm in Big Green Even as the Senate plans to vote on the financial bailout on Wednesday and the credit crunch is starting to threaten many factors of the cleantech industry, investment in the cleantech sector hit, yet another, record [...]
We need Cellulosic ethanol because corn-based ethanol is causing mnay problems. See:
http://www.ethanol-lie.com
[...] as the Senate plans to vote on the financial bailout on Wednesday and the credit crunch is starting to threaten many factors of the cleantech industry, investment in the cleantech sector hit, yet another, record [...]
[...] as the Senate plans to vote on the financial bailout on Wednesday and the credit crunch is starting to threaten many factors of the cleantech industry, investment in the cleantech sector hit, yet another, record [...]
[...] Credit Crunch Even as the Senate plans to vote on the financial bailout on Wednesday and the credit crunch is starting to threaten many factors of the cleantech industry, investment in the cleantech sector hit, yet another, record [...]
[...] Written by Craig Rubens No Comments Posted October 2nd, 2008 at 2:00 pm in Biofuels We worried last week that the credit crunch would hurt cleantech, and especially ethanol. Now this week there are two [...]
[...] We worried last week that the credit crunch would hurt cleantech, and especially ethanol. Now this week there are two more additions to our ethanol death watch map, Visions Fuels in Iowa and Oklahoma Sustainable Energy, embedded below. In both cases the financial crisis on Wall Street was blamed for drying up investments. [...]
[...] We worried last week that the credit crunch would hurt cleantech, and especially ethanol. Now this week there are two more additions to our ethanol death watch map, Visions Fuels in Iowa and Oklahoma Sustainable Energy, embedded below. In both cases the financial crisis on Wall Street was blamed for drying up investments. [...]
[...] some further reading: Cleantech Investing Still Hits Record, Despite Credit Crunch (Earth2tech.com) The Credit Crunch: Yet Another Pitfall for Ethanol [...]
[...] off of subsidies and the price of corn creeping way up. And with the recent financial turmoil, biofuel companies that are investing in next generation technologies have also started to express so… about raising project financing to build plants and scale [...]
[...] off of subsidies and the price of corn creeping way up. And with the recent financial turmoil, biofuel companies that are investing in next generation technologies have also started to express so… about raising project financing to build plants and scale [...]
[...] off of subsidies and the price of corn creeping way up. And with the recent financial turmoil, biofuel companies that are investing in next generation technologies have also started to express so… about raising project financing to build plants and scale [...]
[...] ethanol producers are feeling the crunch as well. Waste-to-ethanol producer Bluefire Ethanol has said that the pullback from bank lending could slow down its production plans over the long term. At the end of October, [...]
[...] ethanol producers are feeling the crunch as well. Waste-to-ethanol producer Bluefire Ethanol has said that the pullback from bank lending could slow down its production plans over the long term. At the end of October, [...]
[...] ethanol producers are feeling the crunch as well. Waste-to-ethanol producer Bluefire Ethanol has said that the pullback from bank lending could slow down its production plans over the long term. At the end of October, [...]