Weighing Butanol as an Alternative to Ethanol

The following is an excerpt from an article in:


The New York Times
Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Weighing Butanol as an Alternative to Ethanol

By HENRY FOUNTAIN

NEARLY a decade after the adoption of federal renewable fuel standards led to a sharp increase in production of ethanol, some producers in the Corn Belt are considering making a different fuel. The fuel, butyl alcohol, or butanol, is worth more to refiners because it has more energy than ethanol, is easier to handle and more of it can be blended into each gallon of gasoline. But producing it will require costly retrofitting of ethanol plants, and plant capacity will be reduced.

Several companies are leading the push for butanol, including Gevo of Englewood, Colo., and Butamax Advanced Biofuels, a joint venture of BP and DuPont based in Wilmington, Del. They have developed ways to make butanol the same way ethanol is made, through yeast-based fermentation and then distillation.

“There are few if any new biofuel molecules that can be made from an existing ethanol plant,” said Paul Beckwith, chief executive of Butamax. “The beauty of what we’re offering is, it’s so similar.”

New butanol-specific plants could also be built, he said, including ones that, like cellulosic ethanol plants, use switch grass or other nonfood raw materials rather than corn.

Butamax is producing butanol at a demonstration plant in Hull, England. And in the United States, it has organized an alliance of ethanol producers who are considering making the shift. The idea, Mr. Beckwith said, is to convert many plants simultaneously, beginning in 2013.

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