Gruppo Mossi & Ghisolfi began building the world’s first commercial-scale cellulosic ethanol plant in northwestern Italy, the company said on 13 April. The first stone for the 110 million-euro ($159 million) factory was laid on 13 April, Tortona, Italy-based Mossi & Ghisolfi said on the Bio Crescentino website. The refinery will produce 40,000 to 45,000 tons of ethanol a year from about 10 times that weight of a bamboo-like grass called Arundo Donax, it said. The Crescentino project is a step toward commercializing second-generation biofuels, which aren’t made from food crops, unlike conventional bio-ethanol. The plant, scheduled to open in 2012, will be 10 times the size of the largest trial facilities operating now, Novozymes A/S said in a statement.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-04-12/construction-begins-on-first-commercial-cellulosic-ethanol-plant-in-italy.html