From the Northern Echo:
Investors sought to fuel idea
A SOFT drinks entrepreneur, who has devoted his retirement to producing low-cost fuel from air and water, is looking for investors to help launch the invention.We've written about Teesside a few times, usually not positively:
Businessman and environmentalist Tony Marmont developed the process, called air fuel synthesis, which creates synthetic petrol, diesel and aviation fuel using sustainable power to extract carbon dioxide from the air and hydrogen from water.
The two gases mix to form a hydrocarbon fuel, which the Darlington firm Air Fuel Synthesis (AFS) has shown can be produced using a demonstration unit, which has so far created 15 gallons of the fuel.
The first trickle of petrol emerged from the unit, housed in three 40ft shipping containers on Darlington’s Durham Lane Industrial Estate, within minutes.
Having proved the technology works, Mr Marmont wants to build a £6m pilot commercial plant capable of producing a tonne of fuel a day.
Possible locations for the plant could include Teesside, said Mr Marmont, but he stressed the plans were at early stages and other locations were being considered....MORE
Some Drive-by Climate Biz History (Enron and Cap-and-trade)
...Pretty wonky but I had to get my two cents in:And:
As is the case with so much of this stuff, from carbon trading to wind (GE got in the biz by buying ENE’s wind ops) to nat gas to enriching the lobbyist sector of the economy to fraud on the markets Enron was there first.
- Climateer wrote:
Mr. Styles mentions, en passant, Britain’s ‘Dash for Gas” in the early ’90’s to take advantage of the North Sea natural gas finds.
One hulking big example is the 1875 MW Teesside generating plant.
Enron owned it....
Making Ethanol from Wheat is Stupid
...Last May it was two of the most politically connected investors in the world, Carlyle Group* and Riverstone Holdings** building a wheat-to-ethanol plant in the same area, Teesside, that the poster boy of political connections, Enron, built their giant co-gen plant:So here's hoping that Air Fuel Synthesis Ltd. makes more sense than ethanol from wheat and isn't run by folks in the Jeff Skilling mold.
The UK biofuels industry is to invest £250m in a new ethanol production plant on Teesside.Ensus, the concern building the facility, has secured the funds from private equity groups the Carlyle Group and Riverstone Holdings. There is also £150m of debt finance.
Building work is to commence this spring at the Wilton International site near Middlesbrough and full production should reach 400 million litres a year in 2009....
