Segetis granted $325K, plans commercial capability

According to the current declaration of Segetis, the company has been awarded with $325,000 under the Next Gen Energy Grant funding by the Dept. of agriculture of Minnesota. Earlier, Segetis also got the fund of $ 21.2 million from IRRRB (Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation Board). From the account of the Biomass magazine, this fund is to be use for buying operational materials, equipments and capital construction. The pilot plant of the company in Minnesota will be developed with this fund through utilization of optimization process. Know more about the matter here at -http://greenchemicalsblog.com/2014/06/09/segetis-gets-325k-grant-plans-commercial-facility/

According to the report, the company is currently planning for set up of a commercial plant in Hoyt Lakes, Minnesota for the production of levulinic acid with the expected capacity of 35 million pounds of plasticizer. The company is currently receiving levulinic acid from China. Due to lack of the lignocellulosic feedstock, there are not many sources of levulinic acid in the world. The projected pilot plant of Segetis is expected for building within 18 months. With the expected investment of $105 million in set up of this commercial plant, Segetis declares to invest 70 percent of the fund for the project. Levulinic acid is known to be one among the top 12 biobased chemical building blocks.

Biochemicals, biofuels, biomass receive incentive in Minnesota

A pending Minnesota Bill, H.F. 2456, which was first introduced in the Minnesota House of Representatives on the 27th of February, aims to initiate the commercial production of advances biofuels, biomass and renewable chemicals by providing incentives such as a capital equipment loan scheme. A companion Bill to the above, S.F. 2101, was also introduced in the House of Representatives in the state.

The Bill states that in order to be eligible for the program, renewable chemical facilities must produce a yield of 30m lb/year, biomass projects to must produce 7,500 mmbtu/year and advanced biofuel facilities must have a yield of 950,000 mmbtu/year.

Another eligibility criterion for the incentive program is that the renewable chemicals facility must use 80% of the raw materials from the state of Minnesota and this raw material must come from the forestry or agricultural sources or from the Municipal solid waste’s organic content. The facility also needs to be located within the state and should start operating after the 1st of January 2015. Eligible companies include some existing companies that are expanding in order to fulfill the criterion of production and some new and upcoming companies.

Payments for all the qualifying facilities will be made by the 30th of June, 2020. If a facility becomes ineligible within a period of 5 years then the payments must be refunded.  The source of this article is  http://greenchemicalsblog.com/2014/03/14/minnesota-bill-for-renewable-chems-incentives/