Abengoa opens pilot biomass plant in Nebraska

Madrid's Abengoa announced today that it opened a pilot biomass plant in Nebraska. The $35 million facility was constructed under a U.S. Department of Energy grant.

The DOE awarded the grant in 2003 to Abengoa Bioenergy, an Abengoa unit, to develop technology for advanced biorefining.

The pilot plant will be used for the research and development of biofuel production processes from lignocellulosic biomass, including herbaceous and woody materials.

"With this project, Abengoa Bioenergy continues the journey it began in 1995 to establish a leadership position in biofuels technology and production capacity to provide a sustainable energy alternative to the transportation sector," said Javier Salgado, president and CEO of Abengoa Bioenergy.

"This new pilot plant strengthens our technological and research capacity to continue pursuing major milestones in our program."

Located at Abengoa Bioenergy's ethanol production facility in York, the company said the technology developed at the pilot plant would be used in commercial-scale conversion of biomass into ethanol at a refinery it's building in Kansas.

The company received a $38 million grant from the DOE for the Hugoton, Kansas facility. The plant is expected to process daily 700 metric tons of biomass to produce 12 million gallons of ethanol per year, as well as electricity and vapor.

Abengoa said the Kansas biomass plant would be sited next to a conventional cereal to ethanol plant of 88 million gallons. The company said the cost of both plants would exceed $300 million.

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