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Canada’s green fuel leaders: four companies that will shake up the way we fuel up
Enerkem: speeding to market
Ensyn: the joiner
Dynamotive: Adapting to a changing market
Nexterra: Seeing the forest through the trees
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Nexterra: Seeing the forest through the trees
This West Coast company initially developed their small gasification units for large pulp and paper or lumber facilities to take leftover wood and make heat and/or power to replace fossil fuel used in the plant or sell electricity to the grid. But when the forest industry took another turn for the worse, Nexterra turned to urban markets. It has sold its gasification systems not only to pulp and plywood mills but to environmentally-minded universities, communities, and municipalities that want to provide clean, low-cost renewable energy to their constituents. Soon Nexterra’s technology will heat and power the centre of energy research in America, the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee.

The $89 million project is being led by Nexterra’s partner Johnson Controls — the two formed a “strategic alliance” to develop biomass gasification projects after working together on a similar project at the University of South Carolina.

By tapping into new markets Nexterra has been able to continually win new rounds of investment by Calgary private equity firm ARC Financial, which holds a majority stake in the company, to pursue an aggressive development path. What’s the next step for Nexterra? Using its gasification systems to generate heat and power from small-scale plants (2-10 MWe) by direct firing syngas into high efficiency gas engines.

Douglas Bradley, president of the Canadian Bioenergy Association, says Canada’s advanced bioenergy technologies are still unknown in some sectors—and that needs to  change. If these companies want to win the race, they need to find strong investment or form strategic partnerships like Ensyn’s deal with Honeywell, he says. And with more promising advanced biofuel technologies from Canadian companies like Lignol and Iogen nearing commercialization, the Canadian Bioenergy Association is focusing on promoting these technologies to potential investors worldwide.

Partner with Canadian biofuel and biomass leaders
This year CanBio is leading a series of trade missions and study tours to promote Canada as an innovative leader in advanced biofuel, and as an ideal site to implement biomass heat, power and pellet technologies. CanBio is planning a Financing & Technology Mission to China in collaboration with Australia and the World Bioenergy Association from May 25-27, 2010 and a Bioenergy Study Tour to Italy and Austria from May 10-14, 2010. 

To network with the Canadian bioenergy industry, don’t miss the industry's Annual Conference in Vancouver this September. Visit canbio.ca for details.

Crystal Luxmore is a Toronto-based freelance writer and the public relations manager for the Canadian Bioenergy Association. 

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