[tt] General Motors announces partnership with Coskata to make ethanol from garbage -- chicagotribune.com

[Brian Atkins]

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-mon_garbage_0114jan14,0,483202,print.story?coll=sns-travel-headlines

Warrenville firm says it can make more efficient, less costly fuel; hopes to 
produce 100 million gallons a year by 2010

By Rick Popely

Tribune staff reporter

January 14, 2008

Bags of garbage and bald tires that go to landfills today could wind up in your 
gas tank in a few years, along with wood chips, crop residue and plastic pop 
bottles.

That's what Coskata Inc., a biofuels start-up in west suburban Warrenville and 
auto industry giant General Motors Corp. said Sunday at the Detroit Auto Show in 
announcing a partnership to produce ethanol from just about any 
carbon-containing material by 2011.

This would produce pump prices that are 50 cents to $1 less per gallon than 
gasoline -- even before federal ethanol subsidies -- and would reduce greenhouse 
gases. An Argonne National Laboratory study has concluded that cellulosic 
ethanol produces 85 percent to 90 percent less greenhouse gas than gasoline, 
compared to 20 percent to 30 percent less from corn-based ethanol.

Coskata's secret weapons are patented bacteria and bioreactors that it says can 
produce larger amounts of cellulosic ethanol at lower cost than other methods 
from materials including farm waste, household trash and prairie grass. Oklahoma 
State and Oklahoma Universities developed the micro-organisms and granted 
exclusive license to Coskata, which developed the bioreactors and process to 
recover the ethanol.

The company says it can turn four old tires into seven gallons of ethanol and 
two bales of hay or straw into five gallons at a production cost under $1 per 
gallon. That compares with $1.40 to $1.50 for corn-based ethanol, according to 
the Renewable Fuels Association and Department of Energy, respectively.

The project has a long way to go before achieving a significant scale. Privately 
held Coskata, which was launched in 2006 and has 37 employees, will open a plant 
late this year in a location to be named that will be able to produce 40,000 
gallons annually.

GM, which has taken an undisclosed minority stake in Coskata, will test the 
ethanol at its Milford, Mich., proving grounds and provide engineering and 
research assistance plus some raw materials.

Coskata President and Chief Executive Bill Roe said the firm will seek other 
partners and expects to have a plant capable of making 100 million gallons 
annually by the end of 2010. The fuel would be mixed with gasoline to create 
E85, a blend of 85 percent ethanol and 15 percent gas.

"The technology is ready today and is a platform for other biofuels," Roe said 
in an interview. "We believe it will have impact at the pump."

Energy Act a catalyst

Unlike conventional fermentation processes that convert corn to sugar to make 
ethanol, Coskata's turns biomass into carbon monoxide and hydrogen. It then adds 
patented strains of voracious bacteria to consume those gases and transform them 
into ethanol. Coskata says its process uses less energy and water than others.

E85 is available at only about 1,400 of the nation's 170,000 gas stations but 
should become more widely available under the Energy Act recently signed by 
President Bush. The U.S. produced 6.5 billion gallons of ethanol last year, most 
of it from corn and most of it used in a 10 percent mix with gasoline to reduce 
emissions.

The Energy Act requires fuel retailers to sell 36 billion gallons of ethanol by 
2022, with 21 billion gallons from cellulosic materials, the kind created in 
Coskata's processes.

GM has bought into this technology because E85 use qualifies it for extra credit 
toward meeting federal fuel-economy requirements with flexible-fuel vehicles 
that can burn up to 85 percent ethanol, even if the owners never use the fuel. 
Besides, equipping a car to burn E85 at the factory costs less than $100. In 
contrast, gas-electric technology, in which GM lags, adds thousands.

"If you're GM, you can build a lot of these vehicles quickly if E85 is widely 
available," said David Cole, chairman of the Center for Automotive Research, in 
Ann Arbor, Mich. "The Asian [manufacturers] aren't into it nearly as much, and 
potentially that is a competitive advantage for GM."

Potential encouraging

Though lauding the concept, David Friedman, director of the clean vehicles 
program for the Union of Concerned Scientists, was skeptical. "Show me the 
money. We won't know until it's up and running."

Still, Friedman said cellulosic ethanol has the potential to become 30 percent 
to 40 percent of transportation fuel. "It's exciting news that there is more 
potential technology coming out, and it's a good sign that GM also is investing 
in a company like this. But with a lot of things introduced at auto shows it's 
hard to tell the difference between potential and products."

Coskata initially will enlist partners experienced in running ethanol plants.

"We will essentially be the technical arm of partners that will operate the 
facilities," Roe said, comparing Coskata's processes to software that runs a 
computer.

His plan is to release new, more-productive bacteria strains every two to three 
years, as well as add products, such as butanol and propanol.

"We have a head start, we have an edge now, but you have to continue to 
innovate," he said, adding that the firm could go public after its technology is 
producing ethanol.

Long term, Roe said Coskata's technology and other processes could mean that 
municipal waste will be delivered to ethanol plants instead of landfills. "Waste 
can now be seen as useful for something else. Landfills can be dramatically 
minimized if not eliminated."


-- 
Brian Atkins
Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence
http://www.singinst.org/