Companies wanting to produce ethanol from citrus waste in Florida are scrambling to obtain patents and secure sites for pilot projects, evidence that the national craze for the fuel is branching out from the more traditional grain-based feedstock.

Dow Jones reports that the material used in the process is what is left after processors have squeezed the juice from the orange, which equals nearly one-half of the fruit‘‘s original mass.

"Obviously, this is science at this point as we‘‘re taking it from the laboratory to a pilot plant," said Tom Endres, senior vice president of operations at New York-based Xethanol , which also operates two ethanol facilities in Iowa.

The company has three patents pending related to the process of converting citrus waste into ethanol and is also consulting with about 20 orange processors to try and secure a location for an ethanol facility, Endres said.

Ideally, the plants would be located near current orange processing facilities for easy access to the waste product. The plants would ferment and distill the alcohol to 150 proof, after which the product would be sent to a centralized final distillation plant to complete the ethanol-making process.

A pilot ethanol facility could be up and running this summer or possibly in the fourth quarter of 2007. If successful, a similar business model could be reproduced in California, Endres said.

The U. S. Agriculture Department has been researching the science of converting citrus waste to ethanol since 1992. While Florida is the nation‘‘s No. 1 orange producer, it is growing much smaller crops in the last two years because of damage from hurricanes, citrus disease and valuable citrus acreage lost to commercial development. Florida‘‘s orange production this year is expected to total 132 million 90-pound boxes, the Sunshine State‘‘s smallest crop in 17 years. Just a few years ago, the state routinely grew crops that exceeded 200 million boxes.

Fewer oranges mean less citrus waste, causing researchers to scale back the potential for ethanol production.

Dr. Bill Widmer, research chemist with the Agricultural Research Service‘‘s Citrus and Subtropical Products Research Laboratory in Winter Haven, Fla., said if every bit of citrus waste in the state was utilized there would be enough to produce 40 million to 50 million gallons of ethanol annually.

While that is a small amount compared to the 3 billion gallons of new ethanol production expected to come online in 2007, data from the Renewable Fuels Association showed, it is a large step for Florida, which currently has no local ethanol production.

The ARS in 2004 signed a research and development agreement with Renewable Spirits LLC, based in Delray Beach. Renewable Spirits has recently moved into a joint venture with Xethanol called Southeast Biofuels and plans to continue working with the ARS under an amended agreement, according to Widmer.

Another company, Citrus Energy, based in Boca Raton, Fla., plans to begin construction on a facility in the Clewiston area that is expected to produce 4 million gallons of ethanol per year, according to Dave Stewart, president of the company.

The plant will use 85% orange peels and 15% grapefruit peels as its feedstock.

Citrus waste is readily available in Florida and most processors are happy to get rid of the waste product, Stewart said.

The waste is currently dried and used as a supplement in animal feed that is popular with dairy farmers. But turning the peels into ethanol is a much more lucrative business, he explained.

Expensive enzymes are used to actually release the sugar, but Stewart said the process uses 1/10 of the enzymes that would be used for converting other cellulosic material into ethanol.

The effort to make the process commercially via