Jun 24, 2012

Malaysia sets up Asia's largest biorefinery site

An official from the government of Malaysia's biotechnology investment agency BiotechCorp sent the blog an email today regarding their Malaysian ringgit (M$)170m (€42.3m, $53.3m) investment for a biorefinery complex in Kertih, in the Terengganu State, which is expected to attract foreign companies to set up shop for their cellulosic-based manufacturing facilities.

The site will reportedly be Asia's largest biorefinery complex, which will sit on a 1,000 hectare land located at Kertih Biopolymer Park (developed by the East Coast Economic Region Development Council or ECERDC or Malaysia).

The site will also have a 30,000 hectares of land dedicated for feedstock plantations that will produce 10.5m tonnes/year of woodchips from Acacia mangium and Leucaena leucocephala -- I have no idea how to pronounce this -- but it is also locally known as "Petai Belalang."

...The agencies expect to get a total of M$6.8bn investment from foreign companies. Operation of the complex is expected to start by early 2014. The site will also use renewable energy coming from cellulosic feedstock instead of natural gas.

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