Platinum to start biodiesel facility

Alternative energy company Platinum Energy Sdn Bhd, expects its 200,000 ton a year biodiesel facility and green diesel demo plant to start by July, Managing Director Jespal Deol Abdullah said. These two facilities, located at High Technology Biopark in Senawang, Negeri Sembilan, will around 60 million ringgit (US$18.54 million). The project includes cultivating more than 200,000 hectares of jatropha in South Sulawesi and Banten, Indonesia. The jatropha plantation project will start in the fourth quarter of 2008. The first commercial yield is anticipated by 2010. Platinum will collaborate with Nandan-Alphakat Pte Ltd. to commercialize the biomass-to-liquid Catalytic Depolymerisation Technology (KDV technology). (May 13, 2008)