UGI Corporation (UGI), one of the world’s largest Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) distributors has announced that it has entered into a 15-year agreement with California-based technology developer, Vertimass LLC, to utilize its catalytic technology to produce renewable propane and sustainable aviation fuels (SAF) from renewable ethanol. UGI expects to invest to build and operate multiple production facilities in the US and Europe.
The agreement centers on the development of production facilities using Vertimass’ catalytic technology to convert renewable ethanol into renewable propane and sustainable aviation fuel (SAF).
The technology enables the flexible production of renewable fuels to align with regional market demand. Up to 50 percent of the total production capacity from the facilities can be renewable-propane that will support UGI’s ongoing efforts to provide innovative, low-carbon, sustainable energy solutions to its customers.
Vertimass is extremely excited to work with UGI to commercialize our breakthrough technology. UGI and Vertimass have built strong relationships over the last year, which we believe will cement success, said Charles Wyman, President, and CEO of Vertimass.
Targeting 1 billion gallons
UGI expects to invest either solely, jointly with Vertimass, or in partnership with third parties to build and operate multiple production facilities over the next 15 years in locations across the US and Europe, significantly increasing the supply of renewable propane and SAF.
UGI anticipates a total investment of roughly US$500 million for the bolt-on production facilities over a 15-year period, including potential third-party investment, with a total production target from these aggregated facilities of approximately 1 US billion gallons (≈ 3.785 billion litres) of combined renewable fuels per annum.
This is another significant milestone in our commitment to providing renewable fuels to our customers. Our business development team continues to seek out innovative opportunities and I am delighted with our newly established partnership with Vertimass. We believe this partnership will deliver significant renewable LPG for our customers as well as bring investment opportunities to interested stakeholders, said Roger Perreault, President, and CEO of UGI Corporation.
The introduction of such ethanol-based “biorefineries” is an attractive proposition for skilled job development and the opportunity to further drive energy independence using local resources.
The goal is to have the first production facility onstream in fiscal year 2024 with an annual production target of approximately 50 million gallons (≈ 189 million litres) of combined renewable fuels.
Together we will take advantage of this unique low-cost technology to transform ethanol facilities and produce renewable fuels that will cover UGI’s global footprint, as well as enable the production of SAF, said Bill Shopoff, Vertimass Chair.
Bolt-on technology
Vertimass is developing a unique Consolidated Alcohol Deoxygenation and Oligomerization (CADO) technology to allow ethanol producers to produce SAF and diesel blendstocks that are compatible with the current transportation fuel infrastructure as well as LPG, mainly propane and butane.
This catalytic technology can be bolted on to existing ethanol production facilities, optimizing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reduction, and bringing further end product diversification to the existing ethanol producer as it completely converts wet ethanol, and other alcohols, into targeted hydrocarbons in a simple reactor system at moderate temperatures and near atmospheric pressure without adding hydrogen.
Thus CADO eliminates the ethanol “blend wall” by converting ethanol into fungible gasoline components for powering light-duty vehicles, producing intermediates used to make plastics and other higher-value products, and possibly debottleneck processes to increase throughput with little additional costs other than for feedstock.
Other benefits include the ability to lower plant water usage, reduce overall energy consumption, and drop GHG emissions to levels required for the US Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) Advanced Biofuel category.
