Through cogeneration, POET reduced emissions equivalent to 16,016 vehicles in 2009

According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the cogeneration systems operating at three POET ethanol plants have reduced carbon emissions by an estimated 0.115 million metric tons over the lifetime of their operation. That includes 2009 annual reductions of 0.023 million metric tons of carbon equivalents, resulting in:

Emissions reductions equivalent to the emissions from 16,016 passenger vehicles

The Combined Heat & Power Partnership at the EPA issued the results to POET in a 2009 Certificate of Greenhouse Gas Reduction copied here.

 

General Clark at Announcement

During this morning's announcement at the Washington Auto Show, Growth Energy Co-Chairman General Wesley Clark spoke on national security and the importance of reducing our dependence on foreign oil.

Posted via email from Breukelman's posterous

National Clean Energy Summit 2.0

A few of us from POET will attend the National Clean Energy Summit 2.0 in Las Vegas on August 10. The event is hosted by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and the Center for American Progress Action Fund and the objective is to "bring together some of the most respected leaders from industry, science, government, and advocacy organizations to discuss a policy agenda for creating good jobs in the new economy by accelerating the deployment of clean energy and energy efficiency, advancing energy independence, and ensuring long-term prosperity for Nevada, the nation, and the world."

The impressive lineup at the event includes former President Bill Clinton and Vice President Al Gore, T. Boone Pickens, Energy Secretary Steven Chu, Center for American Progress President & CEO John Podesta, Growth Energy Co-Chairman Gen. Wesley Clark and many others. We're looking forward to some good conversations about how the transition to a clean energy economy can create jobs and economic development for America.

Clean Skies TV will provide a live stream of the event and I will be posting regular updates on Twitter.

POET VP Testifies to EPA on Renewable Fuel Rulemaking

Dr. Mark Stowers, Vice President of Science and Technology for POET, testified today at an EPA hearing on their Notice of Proposed Rulemaking for the Renewable Fuel Standard (POET statement here).

Dr. Stowers' testimony took issue with three pieces of the proposed rule:

1. EPA has not provided sufficient time and information for meaningful review and comment regarding the proposed rule.
2. EPA's proposed rule imposes extensive compliance mechanisms that will be costly and difficult to implement on the expedited schedule proposed by EPA.
3. EPA's proposed scheme for assessment and comparison of lifecycle greenhouse gas emission performance is flawed and has no basis in law or science.

On the third point, Dr. Stowers is primarily referring to indirect land use change, which was summarized in a recent post on this blog. To read his entire testimony click here.

Governor Culver outlines support for Ethanol in letter to POET

Iowa Governor Chet Culver (pictured right) sent a letter to Jeff Broin, the Chief Executive Officer of POET (pictured left), outlining some things he requested of the Obama administration to continue development of biofuels. It's a pretty good list.

• Establish an interagency task force to assess the lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions of transportation fuels.
• Initiate an immediate move to E13.
• Create new policy options that continue to increase the sustainability of biofuels feedstock production.
• Implement the nation's first comprehensive biofuel market development program.
• Approve Growth Energy's green jobs waiver.

To get the details behind each of these points, read the letter. Governor Culver closes it with this note to Broin:

On behalf of the State of Iowa, I thank you for your efforts to support the production and consumption of biofuels. The people of Iowa know that increasing the amount of ethanol that can be blended into the nation's fuel supply will create green jobs, environmental benefit and help eliminate our nation's dependence on foreign oil.

Making sense of indirect land use change

The production of ethanol continues to get more and more efficient, decreasing the carbon footprint of an already low-carbon fuel. Modern dry-grind ethanol plants now produce a fuel with less than half the carbon intensity of gasoline, according to the latest research (pdf) published in Yale's Journal of Industrial Ecology. Some of our ethanol plants, that use alternative energy or cogeneration, fair a little better. Cellulosic ethanol, made from waste such as corn cobs, even better.

So you would think that ethanol would do well in a low carbon fuel standard, right? Well, like anything, the devil is in the details. In this case, it's in the accounting.

The carbon score of fuels is determined through a process called life-cycle analysis (LCA), which is sometimes referred to as "well-to-wheels" because you account for all of carbon released from producing or extracting the feedstock, refining it into transportation fuel, transporting it to market and burning it in vehicles.

Some now want to expand the boundaries of what is accounted for in LCA to include indirect effects. A select few researchers say that the production and use of fuels also cause carbon release indirectly. That much is true and the ethanol industry is supportive of exploring indirect effects.

However, most researchers have only focused on one indirect effect - indirect land use change (ILUC) - and the research is very new with widely varying results. If you want to learn more, I wrote a piece on it for the latest issue of Vital. There's nothing wrong with research, but now many opponents of ethanol want to insert this one indirect effect into regulatory rules in an attempt to disadvantage ethanol in the marketplace. There are at least three big problems with adding ILUC to the existing LCA of biofuels:

1. Because the research is very new, different researchers have come up with widely varying results. Some researchers have found that the land use change can be carbon negative if managed appropriately. Others, like Tim Searchinger who came up with the most dramatic ILUC impacts, have seen their research completely discredited. This give and take and the wide variations in carbon intensity attributed to ILUC has led many to conclude that the theory is not ready for regulatory use. This poin was made most recently by Professors John Matthews and Hao Tan in their appropriately titled paper Biofuels and indirect land use change effects: the debate continues (pdf).
2. The theory of ILUC is directly contradicted by real-world data. The main theory goes something like this: using corn for ethanol takes land out of the food supply and extra land will need to come into production somewhere to meet the need. The data debunking this theory was well presented in a policy paper (pdf) by Growth Energy. Suffice it to say that corn acres this year will be virtually the same as 1976, exports are within their ten-year average and deforestation drastically declined as ethanol production drastically increased.
3. But the biggest problem is that ILUC is being selectively applied by regulatory agencies like EPA and CARB. These agencies appear to be preparing carbon intensity rulings that include ILUC as the only indirect effect and then apply it only to biofuels. Unbelievably, they ignore the indirect effects for all other fuels, including petroleum, despite the fact that researchers have identified those indirect effects (pdf) as well. Other indirect effects include enhanced oil recovery projects like the Canadian Tar Sands. What's especially amazing about the lack of fairness stems from the way they calculate ILUC. It isn't done on the basis of monitoring land (since that conflicts with real-world data; see point #2 above) but rather through economic modeling. It goes somewhat like this: using more corn for ethanol makes corn more valuable, causing more farmers to switch from beans to corn, which makes beans more valuable, which causes soy producers to tear down the Amazon to plant soybeans (again, never mind the data which shows that cattle, not soy, drives Amazon deforestation). But with that model, one could fairly easily see the indirect impacts of other low-carbon means of transportation. Take natural gas. Using more natural gas in our vehicles would make natural gas more expensive, which would cause natural gas to be a less likely source for power production, which would push more power production to coal. In order to be consistent with ILUC, those emissions from the coal plant should be counted as an indirect effect of natural gas-powered vehicles.

Despite these severe problems with the theory of ILUC, many in the news media have largely taken it as gospel. The Newshour with Jim Lehrer recently ran a piece produced by Climate Central discussing the merits of ethanol as a solution to climate change and it mentioned ILUC. You can watch the piece here:

CARB is expected to rule on the inclusion of ILUC in their low carbon fuel standard this week and EPA could soon address ILUC in their LCA of biofuels under the Renewable Fuel Standard. The right thing to do is to hold off on ILUC until science has had a chance to look at all indirect effects of all fuels. To do otherwise is unfair and could increase our country's dependence on foreign oil.

Landfill gas powers POET ethanol plant

Today, POET Chief Executive Office Jeff Broin joined representatives from the City of Sioux Falls and the Landfill Methane Outreach Program (LMOP) of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for a ribbon cutting ceremony at the Sioux Falls Landfill. The ribbon cutting was for the completion of the landfill gas project that will provide the POET ethanol plant in Chancellor, S.D. with methane to power the plant.

According to LMOP, by using methane at the ethanol plant in place of natural gas, it will reduce greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to removing 27,000 passenger vehicles, removing carbon dioxide 344,000 barrels of oil or sequestering carbon with nearly 34,000 acres of pine or fir forests.

The program from the ribbon cutting is posted on POET TV and can be watched here:

Poet plant donates equipment to County

It's been a while since I've posted anything, so I thought I'd post a story from today about our plant in Hudson, S.D. donating an emergency trailer to Lincoln County. Here's the coverage from KELO TV:

For more details, read our release.

General Clark to lead the fight for ethanol

We were in Washington, DC today to announce that General Wesley Clark is the new co-chair of Growth Energy. As the other co-chair, POET CEO Jeff Broin (pictured at the podium) introduced General Clark at the press conference.

In conjunction with the announcement, Growth Energy also launched an expanded web site, with opportunities to help promote the ethanol industry. General Clark also appeared on Fox Business News this morning, to tell their audience about his new role in the ethanol industry:

 

President-Elect Obama and Ethanol

As the largest producer of ethanol in the world, POET gets a lot of inquiries about what we expect from an Obama administration. Rather than venture our own guess, we'd like to let the words of his campaign speak for itself.

On October 27, just a few days before the election, Heather Zichal, the Obama National Campaign Policy Director for Energy, Environment and Agriculture, spoke at the grand opening ceremony of POET Biorefining - Marion, our newest of 26 ethanol production facilities. you can watch her speech here in its entirety:

In her speech, she reads a statement from then candidate Obama regarding the opening of the plant in Marion, Ohio and his position on ethanol. The statement reads:

I'm proud to support biofuels, which can reduce our dependence on foreign oil, lower the price of gasoline, and help grow our economy. This plant is both an investment in the Marion Community and a timely reminder of the incredible economic potential of alternative fuels.