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The Importance of Feedstock
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Cost of Finished Product
Cost of Delivered Feedstock
Production Cost
Delivered Feedstock (50-67%)
Other
Production (50-60%)
Transport
Seed (10-20%)
Other
NexSteppe Vision
Be a leading provider of scalable, reliable and
sustainable feedstock solutions for the biofuels, biopower and
bioproduct industries
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Not All Biomass Is
Created Equal
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Biobased Feedstocks
Starches
Examples Features
• Corn • Grain sorghum • Cassava
• Moderately expensive • Transportable & storable • Easily converted to sugar
Oils
• Soy • Palm • Jatropha
• Most expensive • Transportable (energy dense) • Easily refined
Sugars
• Sweet sorghum • Sugarcane • Sugar beet
• Less expensive • Direct source of fermentable sugar • Must be processed immediately
Biomass
• Biomass sorghum • Perennial grasses • SRWCs • Wastes & residues
• Cheapest feedstock • Transport limited (low bulk density) • Storable • Most difficult to process
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Yield is THE Major Economic Lever
– Reduced land cost per ton
– Reduced labor & equipment cost per ton
– Reduced harvest cost per ton
– Reduced transport cost per ton (or reduced processing cost through a larger facility and greater economies of scale)
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More gallons/BTUs/tons per acre means…
– Reduced land use footprint
– Reduced carbon footprint
Biobased Feedstocks
Starches
Examples Features
• Corn • Grain sorghum • Cassava
• Moderately expensive • Transportable & storable • Easily converted to sugar
Oils
• Soy • Palm • Jatropha
• Most expensive • Transportable (energy dense) • Easily refined
Sugars
• Sweet sorghum • Sugarcane • Sugar beet
• Less expensive • Direct source of fermentable sugar • Must be processed immediately
Biomass
• Biomass sorghum • Perennial grasses • SRWCs • Wastes & residues
• Cheapest feedstock • Transport limited (low bulk density) • Storable • Most difficult to process
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What You Want In A Feedstock
Depends on Your Perspective
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What Do You Want in a Feedstock?
• Cheap and easy to establish
• First year revenues
• Known agronomic practices
• Registered crop protection products
• Sufficient yield to generate compelling economics
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If You’re a Grower…
What Do You Want in a Feedstock?
• Low delivered cost
• Scalability
• Reliability
• Replicability
• Existing supply chain
• Process-optimized
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If You’re a Process/Project Developer…
What Do You Want in a Feedstock?
• Potential for significant and rapid improvement
• Easy and quick to scale-up
• Seed propagated hybrid
• Drop-in opportunities
• Compelling economics for grower and processor
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If You’re a Seed Company…
Why Sorghum?
• For the grower… – High-yielding – First year revenues – Established agronomic systems
• For the process/project developer… – Broad geographic adaptation – Drop-in for multiple existing supply chains – Heat and drought tolerant
• For the seed company… – Huge genetic diversity – Rapid breeding and product development cycle – Established hybrid systems – Seed propagated
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Our Products: Sweet Sorghum
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• Annual sugar crop • High sugars and juice • Range of maturities
Our Products: High Biomass Sorghum
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• Annual biomass crop
• High yield
• Low moisture at harvest
The Short Game and the Long Game
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Short
• 1st gen
• Biobased products
• Wastes, existing crops & pure streams
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vs. Long
• Existing infrastructure
• 2nd gen
• Biofuels
• Tailored crops
• Lowest cost
The Short Game for Sweet Sorghum
• 5 yr cycle means 15-20% of cane land (9M ha) available
• Increases return on capital
• Allows production during peak ethanol-price season
• Increases cane yields
Extending the Operating Season for Existing Brazilian Sugar to Ethanol Mills
Jan Dec Current cane crushing season
Apr Nov
Sweet sorghum extension
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The Short Game for High Biomass Sorghum
• Energy demand increasing
• No cheap natural gas
• Existing dedicated crop supply chains
Existing Brazilian Industrial Biomass Boilers
Jan Dec Current mill boiler operation
Apr Nov
High biomass sorghum addition
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Production level
The Long Game
Biobased Products &
Advanced Biofuels
Sweet Sorghum Fermentable Sugars
High Biomass Sorghum Biomass
Biopower &
Cellulosic Biofuels
Optimized, dedicated crops
are at scale today
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50 Ha of Sweet Sorghum at Leading Brazilian Sugar-to-Ethanol Mill
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NexSteppe Today
Country headquarters: • US – South San Francisco, CA • Brazil – Campinas, SP
Research stations: • US – Hereford, TX • US winter – Puerto Rico • Brazil – Rio Verde, GO
Seed production: • US • Puerto Rico • Bolivia
Trial locations
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