Athletes 'may be unwitting participants of an advanced biofuels trial'

Athletes at this summer's Olympic Games may be the unwitting participants of an advanced buiofuels tial, Business Week has reported.

BP, the official oil and gas partner of London 2012, is set to roll out a biofuel analysis of around 100 of the 5,000-plus vehicles that will be used as part of the Olympic fleet. Two of the fuels on trial- a cellulosic ethanol product and a biobutanol biofuel- could even be commercially available by 2014.

There has been a great deal of anticipation about biofuel developments, but the big step in the UK is for them to become a commercially traded product. Some of the big oil companies are set to gain a great deal from the emergence of biofuels, with Sell and BP the two oil companies with the best positioning, according to a report by Pike Research.

BP is in the process of testing three advanced biofuels for commercial consumption: cellulosic ethanol, biobutanol and a sugar-to-diesel product. Cellulosic ethanol composes of energy grasses with unleaded fuel, and even though this form of fuel has been in the pipeline for some time, it wasn’t until BP’s $98.3 million purchase Verenium’s cellulosic biofuels business in 2010 that the company took serious steps towards commercialization.

A 36-million gallon commercial-scale plant is now under development, along with a 20,000-acre farm in Florida. The site will be used to grow energy grasses and turn them into cellulosic ethanol, much like the fuel used in the Olympic car fleet.

The biobutanol is produced by the advanced fermentation of plant sugars by a special microorganism. This fuel is still at the early stages of development and will not be ready for commercialisation for some time, although it promises to be an interesting area of research.

Biofuels will become a central part of the Olympic fleet of cars, which are provided by BMW and fuelled by BP. The vehicles have to meet stringent emissions requirements, which means they have to be 13 per cent lower than the average emissions of vehicles in the UK.

Electric vehicles and biofuel vehicles will be used to ensure the manufacturer stays compliant with the new rules.

Posted by Claire Manning