Green Fuels Research Ltd, a subsidiary of UK biofuel technology developer Green Fuels Ltd has announced that it in partnership with the School of Chemical Engineering, Hà Nội University of Science and Technology (HUST) in Vietnam has been awarded grant funding by Innovate UK, the UK’s innovation agency, under Energy Catalyst 8 to conduct a feasibility study into the conversion of Pangasius (catfish) mortalities and processing waste into a sustainable biofuel for distributed power generation.
According to a statement, the PoWGEN project aims to address all three areas of the energy trilemma – affordable and available, green and clean, secure and reliable – through the design of a process and facility for converting fishery waste to sustainable, low cost, net-zero carbon diesel generator fuel which can be used within the existing infrastructure to provide secure energy supply to fish farms.
Although grid connectivity in Vietnam is relatively high, the country’s aquaculture sector, with farms frequently located in remote areas, is heavily reliant on fossil diesel generators. Among the project’s expected outcomes will be the assembly of a demonstration plant, the development of a commercially viable business plan and value chain for future commercialization, and opportunities for industry and community engagement.
A further outcome will be a detailed life-cycle analysis (LCA) to demonstrate clearly the overall carbon dioxide equivalents (CO2eq) savings in comparison with the current state-of-the-art.
We are genuinely excited that PoWGEN will focus on Vietnam, the world’s fourth-largest aquaculture producer at 6.4 million tonnes per annum. The sector there has grown exponentially at 20 percent annually over the last decade. Based on a 20 percent average fish mortality rate, some 400 000 tonnes of energy-rich pangasius waste material is potentially available every year, itself increasing at an annual rate of 20 percent. As feedstock is the lifeblood of any biofuels operation, we are confident that this project can have a dramatic impact on the decarbonization of power generation in the region, said Paul Hilditch, Chief Strategy Officer, Green Fuels.
