Mitsui Engineering and Sime Darby collaborate for bioethanol

The demo plant will convert empty oil palm fruit branches into bioethanol
Mitsui Engineering and Shipbuilding Co. is to partner with Sime Darby Plantation Sdn., a unit of Malaysia’s Sime Darby Bhd, for a bioethanol plant in the state of Selangor, Malaysia.

Together Mitsui and Sime Darby will build and operate the demonstration facility, which will manufacture 1.25 million tonnes a day of bioethanol from empty oil palm fruit branches.

Speaking about the project Franki Anthony Dass, executive VP of Sime Darby Plantations, said: ‘The empty fruit branch can now move further up the value chain as a source of biofuel. Successful commercialisation will also help in managing solid waste produced in oil palm estates.’

Operations at the demo scale plant will begin in 2011 when test production of the biofuel will commence. This will be sold in Malaysia as a raw material for plastics, and may be exported to Japan at a later date.