Dyadic: a 5-Minute Guide
Jim Lane Dyadic International, Inc. is a global biotechnology company that uses its patented and proprietary technologies to conduct research, development and commercial activities for the discovery, development, manufacture and sale of products and solutions for the bioenergy, industrial enzyme and biopharmaceutical industries. Address: 140 Intracoastal Pointe Drive Suite 404 Jupiter, Florida 33477 Year founded: 1979 Stock Ticker: Pink Sheets: DYAI Type of Technology(ies) Patented and proprietary C1 platform technology based on a unique fungal microorganism which is programmable and scalable in producing enzymes and proteins in large quantities ...
Interview With Dan Oh, CEO Of Renewable Energy Group
Jim Lane Leading a series this week, “The Strategics Speak", in which we’ll look at what a number of major strategic investors see in the landscape relating to industrial, energy and agricultural investment, Biofuels Digest visited with Dan Oh, CEO of Renewable Energy Group (REGI), which has long been the US’s leading independent biodiesel producer but in recent years has steadily diversified and expanded operations. In many ways, REG is the entire industrial biotech business in a nutshelll. They’re fermentation (through REG Life Sciences), and thermocatalytic (through REG Geismar and their extensive biodiesel business). They use both...
Will Petrosun’s Algae Biodiesel Grow on Investors?
by Tom Konrad Celluslosic Ethanol is all the rage. A less noticed, but significant "Biofuel 2.0" is biofuel based on algae. Follow the Biomass As I have consistently argued (see these recent articles on John Deere, Biogas, Cellulosic Ethanol vs Biomass Electricity, and Renewable or Green Diesel) the people most likely to make money from biofuel are not the processors and distributors (who compete directly with petroleum or other fossil fuel-based products, and so have little pricing power), but the producers of feedstock, which, like oil, is in very limited supply, and so they will have pricing power....
Neste Renewable Diesel Capacity Hits 2 Million Tons But Feedstock Constraints Loom
Finland’s Neste Oil Corporation
(NEF: F)
brought its fourth renewable diesel plant on-line in September 2011,
earning bragging rights to the world’s largest facility of its
kind. Located at the Port of Rotterdam, the plant has the
capacity to produce 800,000 metric tons of renewable diesel that
Neste brands NExBTL and claims is the “cleanest and highest-quality
renewable diesel on the market today.” Along with Neste’s
three other plants already in operation in Finland and Singapore the
fourth plant in Denmark brings Neste’s total production capacity to
2.0 million metric tons per year.
Darling Ingredients: At the Margin
by Debra Fiakas CFA This week Darling Ingredients (DAR: NYSE) reported earnings of $100,000 on net sales of $874.7 million in the first quarter ending March 2015. Darling is a recycler of sorts, collecting by-products of the food production industry and recycling the left-overs and waste into proteins, fats and leathers. Nothing goes to waste. Every last chicken feather, hide, gallon of used cooking grease and cake crumb gets up-cycled to a usable material for feed, food, fuel or clothing. Its customers include pet food producers, personal care manufacturers and textile users, among others. Darling used...
Methes: The McDonald’s of Biofuel
by Debra Fiakas CFA Few would make the connection, so Methes Energies International (MEIL: Nasdaq) chief executive office explains his company’s unusual business model in McDonald’s terms. Methes, which is a contraction of ‘methyl ester,’ has developed a biodiesel system that accommodates various feedstocks that yield methyl esters. The system is a handsome, compact configuration of stainless steel tanks and piping that are all capable of automated operation. The company operates its own commercial-scale facilities in Ontario, Canada. Sales of biodiesel represent the majority of Methes revenue, which totaled $10.3 million in the twelve months ending...
The Low Sulfur Diesel Crisis of 2020 And How To Prevent It
“The global economy likely faces an economic crash of horrible proportions in 2020, not for want of a nail but want of low-sulfur diesel fuel,” writes renowned energy analyst Phil Verleger in a note this month titled “$200 Crude, the Economic Crisis of 2020, and Policies to Prevent Catastrophe”. Not good timing for a White House re-election effort if, as expected, the blame falls on lack of preparedness in the 2017-2020 run-up to the projected crisis..
It’s a dire scenario but there’s hard data behind it, and though few go as far as Verleger, almost every expert is warning of a...
Ten Solid Clean Energy Companies to Buy on the Cheap: #7 Deere & Co....
The first and last word in any discussion of biofuels should always be "Feedstock." Feedstock is the "Bio" out of which biofuels will eventually be made, whether it be corn, sugar, jatropha, algae, palm oil, switchgrass, forestry waste, or municipal solid waste. Before the era of peak oil, we lived in a world of plenty, which meant that we could squander energy, not only by driving Hummers, but by feeding energy intensive products such as corn crops to livestock, and by dumping "free" sources of energy such as garden waste and used cooking oil into landfills. The era of...
Rapidly Growing Alternative Energy Companies
The last post highlighted several companies in the alternative energy, conservation and environment technology fields that have delivered exceptional price performance over the last year. Prospects for growth in sales or earnings appeared to be key drivers of the price movement. It makes sense to seek indicators of growth as cues for those companies that may become tomorrow’s price movers.
Crystal Equity Research’s novel alternative energy indices were a good place to go on a ‘quest for growth.’
Beach Boys Index - Biodiesel
The two analysts who publish estimates for Renewable Energy Group (REGI: Nasdaq)apparently expect a surge in growth in the current year followed by a leveling...
REG Buying European Biodiesel From Used Cooking Oil Producer
Jim Lane US biodiesel leader heads for the EU – what’s up with used cooking oil, and what is REG’s path forward with the German-based biodiesel producer? In Iowa, Renewable Energy Group and IC Green Energy announced that REG will acquire ICG’s majority equity ownership position in German biodiesel producer Petrotec AG (XETRA: PT8). Closing of the transaction is expected before year end. REG CEO Dan Oh Last month, REG CEO Dan Oh told The Digest, “We’re not done growing, that’s for sure! We’ve done something of...
REG Sells More Biodiesel, Earnings Drop, Acquisitions Are Future Wild Cards
Jim Lane Biodiesel giant Renewable Energy Group (REGI) is up on gallons, down on dollars as market prices weigh on results. In Iowa, REG announced net income of $10.8 million for the second quarter on revenues of $332.9M, a drop from its Q2 2013 net income of $19.6 million, and a 13% drop in revenue despite an 11% lift in gallons produced. The company noted that net income was boosted by a tax benefit of $11.9 million, recognized primarily from the release of a valuation allowance resulting from recording deferred tax liabilities related to the...
A (nearly) Pure-play Biodiesel Stock
On January 29th, M~Wave and private vertically integrated Biodiesel distributor Blue Sun Biodiesel announced a merger between the two, with Blue Sun becoming a division of M~Wave, and the merged company being renamed Blue Sun Holdings. Managerial control will also pass to "certain directors and the officers of SunFuels." If this merger goes through as planned in the second quarter of 2007, US investors will have their first opportunity to invest in a stock focused on a biofuel which is much less controversial among environmentalists than corn-based ethanol. Estimates of the well-to-wheels Energy Return on Energy Invested...
Biodiesel Tax Credit Back In US Budget Deal
by Jim Lane
In Washington, the US Congress passed its budget deal, and among the items in the deal was a retroactive restoration of the $1 per gallon biodiesel tax credit for 2017. The bill did not include a provision for 2018 and future years.
The budget compromise had run into headwinds in the Senate, in the form of a voting delay imposed by Rand Paul of Kentucky, while opposition in the House from a group of Democrats and hardline conservatives had put the bill into some degree of jeopardy.Renewable Energy Group CEO Randy Howard said “We are pleased that Congress recognized...
Oh, No! Renewable Energy Group CEO Departs
Oh, No! Renewable Energy Group CEO Departs
Intirim CEO plans no strategy change
Jim Lane
In Iowa, Renewable Energy Group (REGI) announced that Dan Oh has resigned as President and Chief Executive Officer and as a member of the Company’s Board of Directors. The resignation was effective July 3, 2017. The Board of Directors appointed long-time director Randolph (Randy) L. Howard as Interim President and Chief Executive Officer.
Howard is a 33-year veteran of Unocal, has been on the REG board since 2007 so, a familiar face at 67, may not be in the job for the long-haul, but a strong interim pick.
Oh...
Current Structure of the US Ethanol Industry “Problematic”, Says the IMF
The International Monetary Fund released its Spring 2007 World Economic Forecast today. Fuel Vs. Food There is a short sub-section in Appendix 1.1 ("Recent Developments in Commodity Markets") that I thought might be worth sharing with you. If you download the PDF version of the report and scroll down to page 44, you will find the said sub-section under the heading "Food and Biofuels". In it, the IMF notes that food prices (as measured by its own food price index) rose by 10% in 2006, driven partly by a poor wheat crop in certain countries but...
North American Outlook on Biofuels Challenges and Opportunities
Challenges and Opportunities in Biofuels
By Steve Hartig, Former VP of Technology Development at ICM
The North American biofuels market can be split into three main segments all of which have major dynamics. What I would like to do is give a high-level overview of what I see as some of both the challenges and opportunities across these.
Ethanol which is a produced from corn and sorghum in about 200 plants mainly across the Midwest and blended at about 10% with gas. Majors such as POET, Green Plains, Flint Hills, Valero, ADM and Cargill do a bit more than half of the 16...
