While it's not unusual to find supporters of the Gillard government's carbon pricing package within Australia's clean energy industry, not many are quite as optimistic about its transformational powers as Danny Williams. The managing director of Green Power Solutions, currently a small Melbourne-based biofuel development and biodiesel generator hire outfit, is predicting exponential growth for his business, and much the same for the broader Australian biofuels sector, under Labor's Clean Energy Futures package.
Not that he's counting on government subsidies or an abundant new source of funding from the CEFC (although the latter's $10 billion in funds is open to bioenergy companies and regional communities). As Williams tells Climate Spectator, quoting a speaker at last month's Alernative Fuels Summit in Brisbane: "If your project doesn’t stand up on its own, forget about it." Rather, Williams sees this huge growth coming from the change in mentality that he attributes to the Gillard government's efforts to price carbon. "The Clean Energy Futures package has shifted people’s attitudes – the attitudes of corporations," he says. "There’s going to be a carbon price. ...The light (for some of these businesses) has only just turned on."
And he and his company have got some big ideas, too. "Our concept is a new one. Our concept is for an immediate, one-stop shop – a regional bioenergy hub," Williams says, where farmers create all of their own power and fuel in a sort of regional hub.
"There are a lot of kilometres involved in any transport for biofuel," Williams explained on ABC Radio's recently. And he would know. Williams started out in the alternative fuels business five years ago with the company ProGreen Biofuels (formerly known as Westlink Resources). Initially, the company worked in collaboration with RMIT on alternate fuel sources and renewable fuels. It then branched out on its own and started marketing biodiesel, but found the going to be very unpredictable. The solution they came up with was to create their own demand – enter Green Power Solutions and biodiesel-powered generators.
The company started off hiring their 'green' generators to Shires, rural events, concerts, festivals and the like, but Williams says they are now getting significant interest from the construction industry, as builders start to measure their carbon footprints. Williams says the company's 30 generators offer a cost competitive and clean (according to the company's website, all of the generators' engines meet and surpass current EPA emission standards, making them "the cleanest running generators the country") alternative to regular diesel generators. And, while ProGreen Biofuels currently sources its biodiesel from existing Australian refineries, he says the company has plans to start producing its own.
But of course, the plans extend well beyond this. "We’re trying to put the refineries at the source of the feedstocks and then use that same fuel to produce those feedstocks," says Williams. "The system relies on a biofuel processing group of companies: an abattoir, a biorefinery, a biodigester, which uses waste streams from these refineries producing power through a biuogas generator, and the industries or the businesseswithin that hub can use the waste heat from the power generation. Now, the source for those industries will come from the region surrounding that hub."
According to Williams' plan, farmers will contribute the energy crops, the hub will process them, and use all the waste streams internally, meaning there is no waste in the concept. The products will be biofuel, electricity (which Williams says will be pumped back into the grid, creating a commercial arm to the hub), as well as recycled water and fertilisers – which can then be used for the farming and to improve the soil in farming areas.
And it is this concept that Williams and his company have been putting to various shire councils in Australia's regional centres, like Forbes and Cowra in rural NSW. "The farming industry in Australia isn’t what it used to be," Williams told Climate Spectator in an interview. "Farmers aren’t looking to the future, they’re looking for the future." And it is this uncertainty, this shift in attitudes, that Green Power Solutions is looking to build on. And so far, says Williams, the farmers and community leaders they have spoken to are interested – "confused, but interested."
"I don’t get into the climate debate, I just look at some of the facts and at what needs to be done," Williams told CS. "To create regional energy hubs would need to be a joint venture with other companies and industries and would need funds through REBL (Renewable Energy & Biofuels Ltd, Green Power Solutions' parent company). There's a group of industries that would all get into it together – pool their resources."
But would the project be able to attract funding in the current environment? "There is money out there and it will go into projects that make financial sense. And this makes financial sense," Williams says. And he shrugs off suggestions that the Australian biofuel industry might run into the same problems as that in the US, which is caught up in the food vs fuel dilemma. Williams says this debate really only exists in the US because of corn, which would not be such a factor in Australia. And really, he says, "the debate shouldn’t exist – because you need fuel and you need food."
Williams says it's time for Australia's agriculture industry to wise up. "Let’s get used to growing energy crops alongside food crops. Let’s learn how to farm a bit smarter." He even suggests this might be a way to draw the younger generation back into the agriculture industry. "This potentially puts a bit of sex appeal back into farming," he says.
And while the concept of a rural biofuel hub might be new to Australia, Williams is not the only one who sees a potentially lucrative synergy arising between the nascent bioenergy sector and the agriculture industry. Brazilian biodiesel producer, Brasil Ecodiesel Industria & Comercio de Biocombustiveis & Oleos Vegetais last week gained shareholder approval to proceed with the takeover of agriculture company Vanguarda do Brasil. And while the move was made primarily to ensure Brasil Ecodiesel has enough feedstock for its operations, Bloombergreported that it would also potentially create Brazil's biggest agriculture business.
Bloomberg says the acquisition – in which Brasil Ecodiesel will exchange 1.1 million reals ($A626,745) of its shares for all of Vanguarda's, a company that's 40 per cent owned by Brazilian investment company Veremonte Participacoes – will create a 1.79 billion-real ($A1.02 billion) Brazilian biofuel producer, while also allowing Enrique Banuelos – owner of Veremonte and the world's 655th richest man, according to Forbes in 2010 – to repeat the strategy he used in construction, when he merged three real-estate companies to create Brazil’s biggest home builder.
“We’re bringing our financial and strategic skills that we used in real estate and bringing it to this unconsolidated sector,” Veremonte chief Marcelo Passaglia Paracchini told Bloomberg in an interview. “We want to use our shares as a magnet so other companies exchange their shares with ours, making us a bigger player” he said, adding that another acquisition might be announced within two months. Brasil Ecodiesel runs six refineries and Vanguarda owns 230,000 hectares (568,300 acres) of mainly soy, corn and cotton plantations, according to Paracchini. Brasil Ecodiesel rose 4.9 per cent in trading last Wednesday after news of the takeover aired.
While it's not unusual to find supporters of the Gillard government's carbon pricing package within Australia's clean energy industry, not many are quite as optimistic about its transformational powers as Danny Williams. The managing director of Green Power Solutions, currently a small Melbourne-based biofuel development and biodiesel generator hire outfit, is predicting exponential growth for his business, and much the same for the broader Australian biofuels sector, under Labor's Clean Energy Futures package.
Not that he's counting on government subsidies or an abundant new source of funding from the CEFC (although the latter's $10 billion in funds is open to bioenergy companies and regional communities). As Williams tells Climate Spectator, quoting a speaker at last month's Alernative Fuels Summit in Brisbane: "If your project doesn’t stand up on its own, forget about it." Rather, Williams sees this huge growth coming from the change in mentality that he attributes to the Gillard government's efforts to price carbon. "The Clean Energy Futures package has shifted people’s attitudes – the attitudes of corporations," he says. "There’s going to be a carbon price. ...The light (for some of these businesses) has only just turned on."
And he and his company have got some big ideas, too. "Our concept is a new one. Our concept is for an immediate, one-stop shop – a regional bioenergy hub," Williams says, where farmers create all of their own power and fuel in a sort of regional hub.
"There are a lot of kilometres involved in any transport for biofuel," Williams explained on ABC Radio's recently. And he would know. Williams started out in the alternative fuels business five years ago with the company ProGreen Biofuels (formerly known as Westlink Resources). Initially, the company worked in collaboration with RMIT on alternate fuel sources and renewable fuels. It then branched out on its own and started marketing biodiesel, but found the going to be very unpredictable. The solution they came up with was to create their own demand – enter Green Power Solutions and biodiesel-powered generators.
The company started off hiring their 'green' generators to Shires, rural events, concerts, festivals and the like, but Williams says they are now getting significant interest from the construction industry, as builders start to measure their carbon footprints. Williams says the company's 30 generators offer a cost competitive and clean (according to the company's website, all of the generators' engines meet and surpass current EPA emission standards, making them "the cleanest running generators the country") alternative to regular diesel generators. And, while ProGreen Biofuels currently sources its biodiesel from existing Australian refineries, he says the company has plans to start producing its own.
But of course, the plans extend well beyond this. "We’re trying to put the refineries at the source of the feedstocks and then use that same fuel to produce those feedstocks," says Williams. "The system relies on a biofuel processing group of companies: an abattoir, a biorefinery, a biodigester, which uses waste streams from these refineries producing power through a biuogas generator, and the industries or the businesseswithin that hub can use the waste heat from the power generation. Now, the source for those industries will come from the region surrounding that hub."
According to Williams' plan, farmers will contribute the energy crops, the hub will process them, and use all the waste streams internally, meaning there is no waste in the concept. The products will be biofuel, electricity (which Williams says will be pumped back into the grid, creating a commercial arm to the hub), as well as recycled water and fertilisers – which can then be used for the farming and to improve the soil in farming areas.
And it is this concept that Williams and his company have been putting to various shire councils in Australia's regional centres, like Forbes and Cowra in rural NSW. "The farming industry in Australia isn’t what it used to be," Williams told Climate Spectator in an interview. "Farmers aren’t looking to the future, they’re looking for the future." And it is this uncertainty, this shift in attitudes, that Green Power Solutions is looking to build on. And so far, says Williams, the farmers and community leaders they have spoken to are interested – "confused, but interested."
"I don’t get into the climate debate, I just look at some of the facts and at what needs to be done," Williams told CS. "To create regional energy hubs would need to be a joint venture with other companies and industries and would need funds through REBL (Renewable Energy & Biofuels Ltd, Green Power Solutions' parent company). There's a group of industries that would all get into it together – pool their resources."
But would the project be able to attract funding in the current environment? "There is money out there and it will go into projects that make financial sense. And this makes financial sense," Williams says. And he shrugs off suggestions that the Australian biofuel industry might run into the same problems as that in the US, which is caught up in the food vs fuel dilemma. Williams says this debate really only exists in the US because of corn, which would not be such a factor in Australia. And really, he says, "the debate shouldn’t exist – because you need fuel and you need food."
Williams says it's time for Australia's agriculture industry to wise up. "Let’s get used to growing energy crops alongside food crops. Let’s learn how to farm a bit smarter." He even suggests this might be a way to draw the younger generation back into the agriculture industry. "This potentially puts a bit of sex appeal back into farming," he says.
And while the concept of a rural biofuel hub might be new to Australia, Williams is not the only one who sees a potentially lucrative synergy arising between the nascent bioenergy sector and the agriculture industry. Brazilian biodiesel producer, Brasil Ecodiesel Industria & Comercio de Biocombustiveis & Oleos Vegetais last week gained shareholder approval to proceed with the takeover of agriculture company Vanguarda do Brasil. And while the move was made primarily to ensure Brasil Ecodiesel has enough feedstock for its operations, Bloomberg reported that it would also potentially create Brazil's biggest agriculture business.
Bloomberg says the acquisition – in which Brasil Ecodiesel will exchange 1.1 million reals ($A626,745) of its shares for all of Vanguarda's, a company that's 40 per cent owned by Brazilian investment company Veremonte Participacoes – will create a 1.79 billion-real ($A1.02 billion) Brazilian biofuel producer, while also allowing Enrique Banuelos – owner of Veremonte and the world's 655th richest man, according to Forbes in 2010 – to repeat the strategy he used in construction, when he merged three real-estate companies to create Brazil’s biggest home builder.
“We’re bringing our financial and strategic skills that we used in real estate and bringing it to this unconsolidated sector,” Veremonte chief Marcelo Passaglia Paracchini told Bloomberg in an interview. “We want to use our shares as a magnet so other companies exchange their shares with ours, making us a bigger player” he said, adding that another acquisition might be announced within two months. Brasil Ecodiesel runs six refineries and Vanguarda owns 230,000 hectares (568,300 acres) of mainly soy, corn and cotton plantations, according to Paracchini. Brasil Ecodiesel rose 4.9 per cent in trading last Wednesday after news of the takeover aired.