Biofuels

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.

Codexis chief out, Ceres IPO delayed Jim Lane Ceres delays IPO (again); Codexis CEO and enzyme guru Alan Shaw resigns. In California, visionary industry leader Alan Shaw resigned as CEO of Codexis (CDXS) and the Ceres IPO, scheduled for last Thursday, did not occur and has yet to be rescheduled as of press time. The Ceres IPO remains on the NASDAQ calendar. At the same time, Ceres said that current shareholders had indicated that they would purchase up to 1 million shares in the company’s upcoming IPO, and the company warned that severe drought conditions...

Jim Lane BlueFire Renewables (BFRE.OB) low-cost sugars subsidiary, SucreSource, announces a major project in Korea backed by oil refiner GS Caltex. Who else is gaining traction in the race to provide low-cost sugars? A generation of magic bugs who turn sugars into renewable fuels, chemicals, flavors, fragrances and more await them. In California, SucreSource, a wholly owned subsidiary of BlueFire Renewables (BFRE.OB), has signed agreements with GS Caltex, a Korean petroleum company and oil refiner jointly owned by Korean conglomerate GS Group, and Chevron, to build a cellulosic sugar plant in...

Jim Lane 33 equity transactions, averaging $40M – who got what, for what, from whom – what’s hot now? In Florida, Biofuels Digest reported that advanced biofuels and biomaterials companies raised $1.374 B in equity financing in the past 12 months, based on deal flow reported in the Digest’s daily newsletter and online news service. Overall, the Digest reported 33 transactions, including five successful IPOs, in eight categories. The largest equity raise of the year was $227 million raised by Solazyme(SZYM) in its IPO. Other notable equity raises included $123M raised by Gevo(GEVO) and $150M...

Jim Lane In this two-part series, we look at the IPO market for industrial biotech stocks. Today, we look at 10 companies in the IPO queue right now. Who’s been revising their prospectus, and what does that mean? In Part II of our series, we look today at Ceres, Myriant, PetroAlgae (PALG.PK), BioAmber, Elevance, Genomatica, Enerkem, Mascoma, and Fulcrum Bioenergy. In Part I, yesterday, we looked at the performance of the six IPOs to date in the aftermarket, and at important changes in Coskata’s recent filings. Ceres: delaying its IPO Headline news from the world of...

Jim Lane  In this two-part series, we look at the IPO market for industrial biotech stocks. Who’s up, who’s down, who’s in the queue, and where might all this take us? Plus, an important update from Coskata. In Part I, today, we look at the performance of the six IPOs to date in the aftermarket, the Ceres IPO which is ready to price its IPO tonight, and look towards the IPO queue at important changes in Coskata’s recent filings. In Part II, tomorrow, we look at how Ceres performed, we’ll have an update on Amyris (AMRS), and...

Jim Lane The second technology focused on unlocking value in municipal solid waste comes to the public markets. Here’s our 10-minute version of the filing, with a translation of the risks into English. In Canada, Enerkem has filed an F-1 registration statement for a proposed $125 million initial public offering. The number of shares to be offered in the proposed offering and the price range for the offering have not yet been determined. The lead book-running managers for the offering are Goldman Sachs, Credit Suisse and BMO Capital Markets. The company is currently ranked #7...

Jim Lane Companies creating opportunities in feedstocks are getting lots of love from investors, and giant downstream partners like BP and Shell. What’s up in the new upstream? It has not escaped the attention of investors that Renewable Energy Group’s (REGI) IPO resulted in a $262 million valuation for a company actively earning $2.11 per share through the sale of 200 million+ gallons of biodiesel, while Ceres recently increased the target for its IPO to a valuation above $500 million, despite being, in essence, a pre-revenue company. What gives? The secret, it turns out, is in feedstock. In...

Jim Lane Obama unveils an “all-out, all of the above” energy strategy. But is it really “all of the below”? Just election talk? Is ginning up a bioeconomy shelved for a year, or just a week? Meanwhile, hopeful news from Novozymes (NVZMY.PK) and the World Economic Forum. In Washington, President Barack Obama gave his State of the Union speech, and dashed hopes and expectations of a revival strategy for US industry through encouraging growth of the bioeconomy. His annual presidential address became the first in a number of years to avoid any mention of biofuels, ethanol,...

Jim Lane In Iowa, the Renewable Energy Group IPO priced last night, and the company’s shares began trading Thursday on NASDAQ under the REGI symbol. The company sold 7.2 million shares at $10 per share, well below its midpoint target of $14 per share announced last week, with total proceeds of up to $82.8 million if all over-allotments are covered by underwriters. Without over-allotment sales, the offering will raise $72 million. UBS Securities LLC and Piper Jaffray & Co. are acting as joint book-running managers for the offering. Stifel, Nicolaus & Company, Incorporated and Canaccord...

Jim Lane Rewind to 2011 with a “best of” New Year’s story? Bah, humbug! Today, Biofuels Digest looks forward to the sunny possibilities of 2012 in bioenergy. As the sunset of 2011 gives way to the dawn of 2012, here at the Digest we resist the holiday temptation to look back over the challenges and highlights of the year gone by, and instead once again roll out our crystal ball as we list the Digest’s 10 Biofuels Predictions for 2012. Top 10 Biofuels Predictions for 2012 10. Advanced biofuels capacity surges to 1 billion gallons, globally. We...

Jim Lane The first gas fermentation technology to come to the public markets: Coskata files its $100 million IPO. Here’s our 10-minute version of the filing, with a translation of the risks into English. In Illinois, Coskata has filed an S-1 registration statement for a proposed $100 million initial public offering. The number of shares to be offered in the proposed offering and the price range for the offering have not yet been determined. The lead book-running managers for the offering are Citigroup, Barclays and Piper Jaffray. The company is currently ranked #17 in the world...

Jim Lane Following a stinging WSJ editorial board critique on cellulosic biofuels, we leave a fact-filled voice mail for News Corp to hack. Meanwhile, Mascoma lands $80M and heads for scale. The Wall Street Journal editorial page writers recently published a stinging indictment of cellulosic biofuels. Bottom line: the Journal is offering the shortfall in the cellulosic biofuels pool (around 2% of the overall US Renewable Fuel Standard this year), as evidence that government mandates and subsidies do not work, and that the US government has shoveled a lot of money into advanced biofuels for nothing....

Jim Lane Codexis (CDXS) and Mascoma show that low-cost sugar is the key, as advanced biofuels moves from R&D into industrial era. There used to be a restaurant in lower Manhattan called Exterminator Chili. Decorated in Elvis garb, it served world-class chili for the enlightened chow hound, in three grades of heat: residential (hot), commercial (blistering), and industrial (melt steel in your mouth). The proprietors would have understood little about advanced biofuels and nothing about the importance therein of low-cost sugars. But they did understand that the bigger the scale, the hotter you were. And that the highest...

Jim Lane Should biofuels have its own reserve accounting system and accompanying balance sheet booster, just as the oil & gas industry has? Ceres CEO Richard Hamilton says “yes”, and explains why, and how. At the Advanced Biofuels Markets conference earlier this month in San Francisco. Richard Hamilton, CEO of Ceres, advanced the remarkable proposition that biofuels companies – on the “level playing field” theory advanced by opponents of government mandates and subsidies, should   have the right to book their reserves of crude renewable oil production, in a parallel to the reserve accounting system which forms the bulk...

Jim Lane 13 companies knocking on the door of greatness – will they make the grade? 13 companies. 5 already public – eight filing for IPOs. In the first category, Codexis, Amyris, Gevo, Solazyme and KiOR. In the second category, PetroAlgae, Myriant, Ceres, Mascoma, Genomatica, Elevance Renewable Sciences, Fulcrum Bioenergy and OriginOil. They’ve shown what it takes to get to the threshold of great things – do they have the Right Stuff to succeed at scale? The public companies It’s been a good October for the newly public companies, after a miserable summer. Amyris...