Tag Archives: javascript
Farming Investments Continue Their Bull Run
Catherine Paice Saturday 25 May 2013 Rural property delivered another year of strong growth for investors in 2012, narrowly missing out on a second year of double-digit returns, according to Carter Jonas and Smiths Gore, sponsors of the IPD Rural Property Investment Index. Total return was 9.9%, although once again almost all this came from capital growth of 8.2%. Income return was just 1.6%, remaining for the third year running at its lowest point in the index’s 32-year history. Total return beat bonds and both commercial and residential property, only just being overtaken by the rally in equity markets. Transaction activity had a strong effect on performance, driving total annual returns up to more than 12% within the portfolio. There is demand from farmers looking to expand and from individuals looking to protect their wealth as well as investment funds, said Giles Wordsworth, head of Smiths Gore’s farms and estates agency. “The main driver of growth has been from capital value increases, which was higher than residential property, which had 5.9% capital growth, and prime commercial property, which saw capital values fall 2.2% over the same period,” he said. “We will see more capital growth this year – possibly as much as 7%.” Over the past five years, rural property has returned 8.9% per annum, against 0.7% from commercial property, 4.6% from residential, 2.1% from equities and 8.8% from bonds. Richard Liddiard, head of rural agency at Carter Jonas said that rural property had continued to stand out as an attractive capital hold since the downturn. “While values for commercial property almost halved in some areas and the volatility of equities deterred risk-averse investors, rural property values only dropped 0.4% in 2008 and have risen by an average of 7% per year since the start of the recession in 2008.” For the £2.7bn of assets measured by the index around the UK, which includes the Crown Estate, better prospects for farming have underpinned this capital growth, as well as the increasing appeal to investors of the potential for alternative use such as renewable energy. Lack of investment-grade property to buy remains a hindrance, with significant activity happening off-market. For smaller private investors, there are more opportunities, although lack of supply and stronger demand remain the key drivers of capital growth, said Tim Jones, head of Carter Jonas’ rural division, at the presentation of the Index. Providing the beneficial tax status of the sector, with IHT for own-occupied land, remained in place, this was unlikely to change, he said. Equally, the “long game potential” – whereby a development opportunity such as a shopping centre or housing estate 20 years in the future – can considerably hike up returns. Richard Liddiard of Carter Jonas adds: “The continued strength of rural investment property shows that it has a serious part to play in investment portfolios that need to off-set volatility and risk with stable, solid performance.” Continue reading
South Korea May Launch World’s Most Ambitious Cap And Trade Market
With roughly 18 months until launch, South Korea appears ready to create the world’s most ambitious cap and trade market, with the highest global price on carbon. South Korea historical and forecast emissions image via BNEF These findings jump from a Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF) white paper analyzing how potential market designs could affect the nation’s carbon price and market efficiency, and are a reminder that global cap and trade could still be integral to combating climate change. South Korea’s government is finalizing system design, set to launch in January 2015 , but BNEF predicts it could ultimately cover 70% of national emissions and reach $90 per ton of carbon. Ambitious Goals Would Force Tough Cuts Criticism of the EU emissions trading scheme (ETS) centers on if it actually forces industry to cut pollution, but that won’t be the case in South Korea. “If the government implements the scheme without any changes, it will have major implications for Korean companies,” said Richard Chatterton of BNEF. Over 450 entities participate in the country’s existing greenhouse gas inventory, covering more than 60% of South Korea’s emissions. These entities are all large-scale emitters, and submit annual emissions and energy consumption data to the government, which then sets reduction targets for the subsequent year. BNEF’s projections assume the same entities would be covered by the ETS, and are based on South Korea’s emissions reductions target of 30% below current trends by 2020. This goal will require a 19% reduction from 2010 levels, and compared to Australia’s 14% and the EU’s 5% reduction target, make the Korean system without equal. South Korea emissions abatement forecast image via BNEF In order to meet its goal, BNEF predicts South Korea would need to cut its emissions by 836 million tons (Mt) of carbon relative to business-as-usual between 2015 and 2020. Demand for emission reductions would thus rise to 200 million metric tons per year (Mt/yr) by 2020 – almost double demand projected for the EU ETS, even though South Korea’s program is only 20% its size. But Reducing Those Emissions Won’t Be Easy However, BNEF expects South Korea will face challenges meeting these goals. The proposed system design restricts the use of carbon offsets to 28% of reduction requirements up to 2020, and starting in 2021 only offsets from domestic projects would be eligible for polluters. South Korea emissions abatement demand forecast image via BNEF This tight offset market means South Korea’s ETS could be painful for the country’s industrial sector as they’re forced to buy permits or cut emissions. 598Mt of emissions reductions – nearly 75% of total cuts – will need to come from the industrial and power sector, meaning the cost of electricity and manufactured goods would rise. Further complicating matters, South Korea’s industrial sector is already fairly energy efficient as a result of historically high energy prices, exposure to international fuel price shocks, and national investment in energy efficiency programs. Clean Energy Is A Clear Solution…But Not Short-Term So if offsets are going to be at a premium, and much of the country’s energy efficiency potential has already been realized, where will South Korea’s emissions reductions come from? The clearest solution, as in most cases, is cutting coal-fired electricity generation. BNEF sees the power sector offering the most abatement opportunities both short and long term. Short-term, the white paper estimates South Korea could reduce emissions in 2020 by up to 64Mt/yr by substituting natural gas for coal-fired power. This assumes natural gas generation utilization capacity rises from current projections of 27% in 2020 to 70% South Korea has traditionally relied upon imported liquefied natural gas (LNG), but tight supply and volatile price swings lead BNEF to predict electricity generation will shift toward higher-efficiency fossil fuel or renewable generation , and overall energy efficiency measures will rise outside of the industrial sector. In fact, BNEF predicts the ETS will feed into South Korea’s renewable portfolio standard to expand demand and boost renewable generation to 55 gigawatt-hours (GWh) in 2020 – a 700% increase from 2010. Toward A Global Carbon Market Via South Korea But the best way for South Korean polluters to comply with the ambitious reduction goals may not be within its borders – BNEF recommends linking to other functional carbon markets with an abundance of low-cost abatement options. Two other mature markets will be operating in 2015 when South Korea’s system launches: the EU-Australian, and California-Quebec linked programs. BNEF predicts EU-Australian allowance prices will be below $40 per ton, and California-Quebec around $50 per ton in 2020. Global cap and trade allocation demand forecast image via BNEF Linking to these two systems would benefit all parties. South Korea’s ETS will create demand four times greater than California’s system , and 60% higher than the EU-Australia scheme. Thus, South Korea reduces abatement prices by accessing cheaper permits from other systems, while boosting demand and whittling away surplus permit supply in other carbon markets. Perhaps most promising in this equation, BNEF’s estimates don’t even consider China’s fledgling market. Seven regional pilot programs began rolling out this year, and they will cover up to 1 billion tons of emissions by 2015 before the country launches its own national system in 2020. Remember China is by far the planet’s biggest emitter of carbon. Oh Wait, Industry May Have Its Day Of course, these rosy scenarios hinge on the ETS unfolding as originally proposed, and that’s far from a certainty. South Korea’s government is consulting with large emitters this month, and they have called for many revisions to loosen the strict allowance, offset, and reduction policies. South Korea cap and trade timeline image via BNEF The ETS “Master Plan” is due to be published in December 2013, and it will provide the legal basis for emissions reductions until 2018. So South Korea, it’s decision time. Stay on your ambitious path, and cut emissions 30% while helping create a truly global carbon market . Or, water down the system proposal, and watch your national emissions climb 28% by 2020, according to BNEF – no pressure. Continue reading
Promising Technique Improves Production of Biofuels from Lignocellulosic Biomass
Published on May 16, 2013 at 5:01 AM The production of biofuels from lignocellulosic biomass would benefit on several levels if carried out at temperatures between 65 and 70 degrees Celsius. Researchers with the Energy Biosciences Institute (EBI) have employed a promising technique for improving the ability of enzymes that break cellulose down into fermentable sugars to operate in this temperature range. Energy Biosciences Institute researchers substantially improved the thermal stability of Trichoderma reesei EGI, an enzyme that catalyzes the hydrolysis of cellulose, through a technique called “B-factor guided mutagenesis.” Using this technique, they successfully engineered a high-temperature enzyme variant with greater activity and stability over the desired temperature range, and have shown that not all microbes are alike when it comes to making enzymes with improved properties. The EBI research team, which includes Douglas Clark and Harvey Blanch, who hold joint appointments with Berkeley Lab’s Physical Biosciences Division and UC Berkeley’s Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering Department, and postdoctoral researcher Harshal Chokhawala, used a strategy they call “B-factor guided mutagenesis.” They used it to enhance the thermal stability of TrEGI, an endoglucanase enzyme produced by Trichoderma reesei, a fungus considered to be the gold standard for secreting cellulase enzymes. “Lignocellulose hydrolysis using cellulases at high temperatures offers several potential advantages, including higher solid loadings due to reduced viscosity, lower risk of microbial contamination, greater compatibility with high temperature pretreatments, enhanced mass transfer and faster rates of hydrolysis,” Clark says. “However, T.reesei cellulases are not very stable at temperatures above 50 degrees Celsius. We’ve shown that we can improve the thermal stability of T.reesei cellulases with the B-factor approach.” Like all proteins, cellulase enzymes are comprised of chains of individual amino acids that are linked together into uniquely shaped structures. Every amino acid in a given enzyme has a “B-factor” value that corresponds to the flexibility of that amino acid. The higher the B-factor value, the greater the amino acid’s flexibility. “Just like the loosest knots in a rope will unravel first, the most flexible amino acids in an enzyme are the most likely to fall out of place when the protein is thermally stressed,” Clark says. “Tightening up these portions of the enzyme by mutating the amino acids and decreasing their B factor values represents one way to shore up the structure and increase the thermal stability of the protein.” In a presentation at the recent American Chemical Society national meeting in New Orleans, Clark described how he and his colleagues screened some 11,000 mutant versions of TrEGI then used a heat treatment at 50 degrees Celsius to identify some 500 variant candidates. Applying the B-factor guided mutagenesis, they engineered a TrEGI that was up to twice as active on insoluble lignocellulosic substrates as the native enzyme at temperatures ranging from 50-65 degrees Celsius. Engineered TrEGI expressed in the model fungus Neurospora crassa was able to hydrolyze lignocellulosic biomass at 60 degrees Celsius as efficiently as the native TrEGI at 50 degrees Celsius. By comparison, TrEGI mutants expressed in extracts of Escherichia coli or in the model yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae had much lower activity at the higher temperatures. “Our results demonstrate that the host used for recombinant cellulase production can have a profound impact on the activity and stability of the expressed enzyme, which means favorable mutagenesis results observed for one host may not carry over to another,” Clark says. “So far the mutants we’ve produced in N. crassa exhibit very favorable properties and the results we’re getting will help guide further efforts in engineering optimal enzyme performance for biofuels applications.” The EBI, which provided the funding for this research, is a collaborative partnership between BP, the funding agency, UC Berkeley, Berkeley Lab and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Source: http://www.lbl.gov/ Continue reading
