Mossi & Ghisolfi Group (M&G), a Novozymes partner, has broken ground on a 13 million gallons/year (50 million liters) production facility for cellulosic ethanol in Crescentino in northwestern Italy. The plant will be 10 times larger than the largest demonstration facilities in operation today and is designed to operate on a multitude of cellulosic feedstocks, including wheat straw, energy crops, and other sources of biomass. It is scheduled to start production in 2012.
Novozymes has collaborated closely with M&G for the last couple of years and will supply the enzymes for the plant.
M&G’s plant in Crescentino will be self-sufficient in power. Lignin, a co-product extracted from biomass during the ethanol production process, is burned in an attached power plant that also feeds excess electricity back to the grid.
Headquartered in Tortona (Italy), M&G is a multinational company operating in the chemicals industry and specializing in the production and sale of PET resins for food packaging. It is the world’s largest producer of PET for packaging applications with a production capacity of 1.7 million tons/year. The group owns production plants in Brazil, Italy, Mexico, and the US and supports three R&D units in Rivalta Scrivia (Italy), Sharon Center (USA), and Poços de Caldas (Brazil).