The Big Picture Sweet Sorghum Fermentable Sugars Biobased
The Big Picture Sweet Sorghum Fermentable Sugars Biobased Products & Advanced Biofuels High Biomass Sorghum Biomass Biopower & Cellulosic Biofuels
Sorghum Is a Diverse Crop Grain Yield Bred for animal feed Forage sorghum Grain sorghum Biomass Yield & Low Moisture Biomass sorghum Nutrition & Palatability Bred for biopower, biofuels, biobased products Juice & Sugars Sweet sorghum 3
Why Sorghum? • For the grower… – High-yielding – First year revenues – Established agronomic systems • For the process/project developer… – – Fast scale-up Drop-in for multiple existing supply chains Broad geographic adaptation Heat and drought tolerant • For the seed company… – – Huge genetic diversity Rapid breeding and product development cycle Established hybrid systems Seed propagated 4
Why a Dedicated Crop? • Reliable supply • Production cost, not volatile market price • Reduced acreage requirement Collection Radius for 500 K tons 1. 5 tons/acre 10 tons/ acre 9 mi 24 mi • Better biomass quality 5
Nex. Steppe Vision Be a leading provider of scalable, reliable and sustainable feedstock solutions for the biofuels, biopower and biobased product industries 6
Our Technology Platform Industry leading diversity and quality of germplasm collection Agronomy Germplasm & Breeding Proprietary data management system linking information and providing insight to breeding program Nex. Sys Unique knowledge of impact of composition on downstream processing and resulting ability to develop processoptimized products Chemistry & Composition Focus on developing optimized crop management practices Genetic Markers World-class markerassisted breeding program to enhance product improvement efficiency 7
Nex. Steppe Today Country headquarters: US - South San Francisco, CA Brazil – Campinas, SP Singapore Research stations: US – Hereford, TX US winter – Puerto Rico Brazil – Rio Verde, GO Seed production: US Puerto Rico Bolivia Trial locations 8
Our Products: Palo Alto High Biomass Sorghum Ø Annual biomass crop Ø Reaches maturity in ~120 days Ø High yield Ø Low moisture at harvest 9
Our First High Biomass Sorghum Market: Brazilian Industrial Biomass Boilers High biomass sorghum addition Production level Jan • • Apr Current mill boiler operation Nov Dec 10 GW installed biomass power capacity >10% of mills now connected to the grid At grid-connected mills, electricity is providing a large share of profits Biomass prices rising with increasing demand 10
Brazil Experiencing Energy Shortage Due to Drought Spot Price per MWh (BRL) Energy Mix 6% 3% 1000 7% 800 600 400 200 82% 0 Hydro Biomass Fossil Nuclear Historical Average Current Consumer prices set to increase by 11 -19% next month 11
Our Products: Malibu Sweet Sorghum Ø Annual sugar crop Ø High sugars and juice Ø Range of maturities 12
Our First Sweet Sorghum Market: Extending the Operating Season for Existing Brazilian Sugar to Ethanol Mills Sweet sorghum extension Jan • • Apr Current cane crushing season Nov Dec 5 yr cycle means up to 20% of cane land (9 M ha) available Increases return on capital Allows production during peak ethanol-price season Increases cane yields 13
Demand from Around the World
Commercial Seed Shipping to Customers 15
Palo Alto in Texas
Palo Alto in Sao Paulo 17
2014 Field Day
Commercial Harvest 19
Commercial Harvest 20
Commercial Harvest 21
- Slides: 22