Comstock Fuels executes international license agreement

Comstock Inc. announced in September the execution of a binding agreement between Comstock Fuels Corp. and SACL Pte. Ltd., a Singapore-based renewable fuel project developer engaged in the delivery of several biofuel production facilities and hybrid renewable energy projects.

Under the agreement, Comstock Fuels has agreed to grant SACL an exclusive marketing agreement for Comstock Fuels’ advanced lignocellulosic biomass refining processes in Australia and New Zealand.

SACL and its associated stakeholders have identified three initial sites for the construction of three refineries based on what Comstock said is its industry-leading yields and decarbonizing impacts, including:

• A 250,000-metric-ton-per-year (tpy) refinery located in southeastern Australia.

• A 250,000 tpy refinery located in northwest Australia.

• A 750,000 tpy refinery located on the east coast in northern Australia.

Under the terms of Comstock Fuels’ agreement with SACL, Comstock Fuels will contribute site-specific technology rights in exchange for a 20 percent equity stake in each refinery, plus a royalty fee equal to 6 percent of each refinery’s sales of licensed products, and engineering fees equal to 6 percent of total capital and construction costs.

At least one of the refineries will initially start with a capacity of 50,000 tpy prior to scaling up to 250,000 tpy or more, with early-adopter royalty fees of 3 percent of sales and engineering fees equal to 3 percent of construction costs until scaling up to 250,000 tpy, including initial upfront payments of $2.5 million payable upon execution of each site-specific applicable license.

The SACL facilities will have an estimated total construction cost of about $2.4 billion and produce over 160 million gallons per year of gasoline, sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) and other renewable fuels from lignocellulosic biomass on a gasoline-gallon equivalent basis (gge), and about 140 million gge from vegetable oils, with over $1.5 billion per year in sales at current market prices.

Comstock Fuels offers advanced lignocellulosic-biomass refining solutions that produce what the company said are market-leading yields of cellulosic ethanol, gasoline, renewable diesel, SAF and other renewable fuels at low carbon intensities.

According to Comstock Fuels, its process generally involves digestion and fractionation of lignocellulosic biomass; bioconversion of cellulose into cellulosic ethanol; esterification of lignin and other derivatives into Bioleum Oil; hydrodeoxygenation of Bioleum Oil into hydrodeoxygenated Bioleum Oil; refining of these low-carbon oils and fuels into ASTM-compliant renewable fuels; and gas-to-liquids emissions capture and fuel conversion.

“The first five of these processes are proven to produce up to 125 gge per dry metric ton of feedstock—depending on feedstock, lignin content, site conditions and other process parameters,” the company stated, adding that the fuels have carbon-intensity scores of 15.  

“Comstock Fuels’ breakthrough yields unlock an abundant, available and efficient feedstock source that enables extraordinary new opportunities for renewable fuels project developers, especially given the ongoing global surge in demand for sustainable aviation fuel,” said Garry Millar, SACL’s founder and director. “The Comstock Fuels process uses proven, off-the-shelf equipment and standard refining processes to convert woody biomass, such as plantation-grown eucalyptus in our case, into renewable intermediates and fuels that leverage existing supply chains. We are excited by this collaboration, and we are looking forward to working with the Comstock Fuels’ team and our local stakeholders to develop each of our projects and more.”

David Winsness, president of Comstock Fuels, added, “SACL’s team has rapidly advanced their projects, and we look forward to accelerating their objectives as we position our technologies as the leading global solution for sustainable, extremely low-carbon renewable fuels. We are concurrently executing on our own plan to build, own and operate our first four facilities in the U.S., including an initial 50,000 tpy commercial demonstration-scale facility followed rapidly by three 1 million tpy commercial-scale facilities. Collectively, our planned U.S. facilities will produce upwards of 700 million gge per year of renewable fuels, including approximately 400 million gge from woody biomass and another approximately 300 million gge from vegetable oils. Between SACL and our initial plans alone, we are pushing nearly 1 billion gge per year of initial renewable fuel production from our solutions before considering all of the other projects and licensees in our pipeline.”