Investors Back Experimental Ethanol Plant

[FernBell]

The Mascoma Corporation, which is trying to produce ethanol from nontraditional sources, plans to announce today that it has received $30 million in financing from a group of prominent venture capital investors.

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Mascoma, which is based in Cambridge, Mass., plans to use some of the funds to begin building a pilot plant and eventually a commercial processor to produce cellulosic ethanol, which can be made from grass, wood or various agricultural or forestry waste products.

In the United States, ethanol is produced primarily from corn. Many scientists, environmentalists and investors say that cellulosic ethanol will eventually be far more attractive because it can be made from waste matter or from crops that consume less water and energy than corn. Still, several technical hurdles remain before cellulosic ethanol can be produced cheaply, and there are currently no commercial cellulosic ethanol plants in the United States.

“This is obviously a substantial commitment from the venture community to the cellulosic ethanol space,” said Colin South, Mascoma’s president.

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“I think we will have a pilot plant in the ground in 2007, and we expect we will have a commercial plant in 2008,” said Samir Kaul, a general partner at Khosla Ventures and a Mascoma board member.


http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/13/business/13ethanol.html