One of the largest Ethanol producers in the United States, Broin Companies, has announced their intention to start producing cellulosic ethanol. At a press conference with Iowa governor Tom Vilsack and governor-elect Chet Culver, CEO Jeff Broin, announced the construction of a new plant in Emmetsburg, Iowa that should be running by 2009. The construction includes conversion of an existing dry mill corn ethanol facility to produce cellulosic ethanol from corn fiber and stover to produce up to 125 million gallons annually.

Read on if you're unfamiliar with cellulosic ethanol. Cellulosic ethanol production has the potential to be much more useful than conventional production. There is vastly more cellulose biomass that can be used, without taking away from food production, and many more materials (such as grasses, and all kinds of food and agricultural waste) can be used as feed stocks. The problem is the cellulose molecules need to be broken down to individual sugar molecules which is then used to produce the ethanol and this is much more difficult than conventional production. However, in recent years a lot of progress has been made on using techniques like special enzymes to break down the cellulose.

[Source: Broin Companies]