Crop technology firm Casterra plans to sell seeds of a proprietary castor variety to a major oil and gas company for the production of biofuels feedstock, its parent company Evogene said.
The seeds will be grown in a so far unspecified part of Africa and will be delivered during this year as part of a deal worth $9.1mn, the company said. The buyer of the seeds was not listed.
Casterra, a subsidiary of Israel-based biological research and development company Evogene, is focused on producing high oil-yield varieties of castor seed suitable for the biofuels industry.
In terms of development of alternative biofuel feedstocks, Italy's Eni has projects in Africa including in Kenya where it is growing croton, cotton seeds and castor beans, with an eventual aim of converting the Mombasa Mombasa oil refinery into a biorefinery for production of hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) and sustainable aviation fuel (SAF).
The first shipment of castor oil produced by Eni is expected from the port of Mombasa at the end of the month, shipbrokers told Argus. Eni took delivery of its first non-specific vegetable oil shipment from Mombasa last October, for eventual processing at its biorefinery in Gela, Italy.
The EU is yet to publish a revised Renewable Energy Directive (RED II) annex IX Part A and B lists — outlining key waste and advanced biofuel feedstocks that can also be eligible for certain provisions such as double counting in some states — a provisional revision included recommendations to list certain types of crop in both lists. This included the listing of "non-food crops grown on severely degraded land, not suitable for food and feed crops" to list A and catch-and-cover crops to list B.
List A, the so-called advanced feedstocks ,–are not subject to a cap, but list B products are subject to a 1.7pc cap under the terms of RED II.
