Aemetis awarded an engineering services contract to Worley for the Aemetis ‘Carbon Zero’ renewable jet and diesel plant in Riverbank, California. (Earlier post.) The Aemetis Carbon Zero renewable jet and diesel project is designed to hydrotreat renewable oils with hydrogen from orchard and forest wood waste.

By utilizing hydroelectric electricity and carbon sequestration along with negative carbon intensity hydrogen, the Aemetis plant is expected to produce among the lowest carbon intensity renewable jet and diesel fuel in the world.

Operations at the Aemetis Carbon Zero plant are scheduled to begin in 2023 at the rate of 45 million gallons per year, expanding to 90 million gallons by early 2025. The Carbon Zero project team includes Koch Project Solutions as the EPC, Worley for engineering and technical solutions, Axens for process engineering and technology license, and ATSI serving as owner’s representative, working with our in-house Aemetis technology, development, finance, regulatory, and Global Sales and Trading team members. The renewable jet and diesel produced at the Riverbank plant will supply the aviation and trucking industries with low carbon, low emission, renewable fuel.

—Eric McAfee, Chairman and CEO of Aemetis

Worley is providing engineering to implement the Axens North America renewable jet and diesel technology at the Riverbank site. The Axens technology produces renewable jet and renewable diesel in an integrated process.

$200-million offtake agreement. Separately, Aemetis signed a biofuels offtake agreement with international renewable fuels supplier Murex, LLC for an estimated $200 million of low carbon biofuels to be delivered during 2021 to 2023.

Founded 30 years ago and based in Plano, Texas, Murex is a renewable fuels terminal, marketing, logistics, and supply company with operations and assets throughout North America. The terms of the agreement provide that the fuel and the related Low Carbon Fuel Standard and Renewable Fuel Standard Credits will be sold at a fixed discount to the market price at the time of delivery.

As we implement significant energy efficiency upgrades to our Keyes, California biorefinery, Aemetis is excited to partner with Murex, a world-class organization with deep expertise and global reach in the renewable fuels sector. By converting our Keyes plant to utilize solar and other low- or below-zero carbon intensity energy sources instead of high carbon-intensity petroleum natural gas, we will produce lower CI renewable fuel and significantly reduce the carbon footprint of our biorefinery. The solar microgrid with battery storage will help power the Mitsubishi ZEBREX Membrane Dehydration System, a mechanical vapor recompression system, and allow additional energy efficiency upgrades.

—Andy Foster, President of Aemetis Advanced Fuels, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Aemetis, Inc.

Our goal is to eliminate the use of petroleum natural gas in our plant as these upgrade projects are completed over the next 12 months. Once our Keyes plant is converted from utilizing petroleum natural gas to renewable electricity, coupled with negative carbon intensity dairy RNG and carbon sequestration, the plant may produce the lowest carbon intensity ethanol in the world. The Murex team will play a key role in our strategy to expand market reach and diversification for our low carbon intensity ethanol

—Eric McAfee

The Aemetis plant upgrades are supported by $16.7 million of grants from the California Energy Commission and Pacific Gas & Electric Company.