Ethanol production facility processing sugar beets

In Lelystad a pilot plant is planned for producing ethanol from sugar beets. Ethanol is an alternative to gasoline. It can also be used for producing plastic.

The project is implemented by Wageningen UR, together with the company Dutch Sustainable Development in Wemeldinge.

The plant is planned in Lelystad because off an existing installation which has been trying to extract ethanol from corn. That process proved to be unprofitable. Wageningen UR expects the refining of sugar beets to be profitable. That would be good news for sugar beet cultivators because of the difficult last years due to the low sugar prices.

The innovative Betaprocess technology will be applied in this production process.

The pilot plant project in Lelystad received a half million-euro subvention made available from the European Eranet-fund.