Évaluation et certification de la zone BDO

Counties, municipalities, cities, towns, and industrial parks that want to attract new markets that use local abundant biomass and create clean energy jobs should consider a BDO Zone rating.

Regions that achieve ‘AAA’, ‘AA’, ‘A, or  ‘BBB’ ratings are awarded a BDO Zone rating, which marks them as one of the optimal areas in the country for biobased development. Regions have the right to use the BDO Zone rating in economic development activities.

The rating process consists of two phases: Analysis and Promotion.

The Rating Analysis Phase typically takes four to sixteen weeks, but it may vary based on the level of complexity. It includes risk analysis of up to 100 biomass supply chain and infrastructure risk indicators in the zone based on internationally recognized national standards. The rating score is assigned, issued, and published as part of this phase.
The Rating Analysis work is followed by a 24-36 month Rating Promotion Phase to support and promote the BDO Zone rating worldwide to thousands of project developers, investors, and industry stakeholders and drive new bio-based development to the issuer.

BDO Zones are closely examined and scored using the most rigorous standardized framework devised to date for accurately rating feedstock risk for investors and capital markets.

The industry Biomass Supply Chain Risk (BSCR) Standards are a recognized, validated, standardized, and transparent protocol for evaluating feedstock risk. This framework was developed by the USDOE’s Idaho National Lab (INL), Los Alamos National Lab (LANL) and Ecostrat, together with a stakeholder group of several hundred major bioeconomy investors, plant operators, feedstock and equipment suppliers, government and academia, with funding from the US Department of Energy’s Bioenergy Technologies Office (BETO), the Canadian federal government (NRCan/CFS) and the Standards Council of Canada (SCC).

In 2021, the CSA used the BSCR standard as the seed document to produce a National Standard of Canada (CSA W209:21). Harmonization as a U.S. ASTM standard is forecast for 2024.

Certification and issue of BDO Zone ratings are governed by an Independent Review Committee (IRC) made up of  8-15 members who provide technical feedback, support, and promote, the rating. IRC participants are typically made up of economic development bodies, academia, political offices, departments of agriculture/forestry, tribes and First Nations, local biomass suppliers, clean energy associations, etc.

Issue of BDO Zone ratings requires approval from two-thirds of the IRC.

A BDO Zone rating is a trusted award that helps developers and investors recognize regions that are “bio-manufacturing ready”.

New project deal-flow is driven to BDO Zones recipients by worldwide exposure to developers and capital markets:

BDO ZoneCONNECT Webinars provide BDO Zones with access to >5 million online bioeconomy sector readers, 140,000 streaming and 45,000 daily newsletter subscriptions.

BDO Zone ‘Rapid Accelerator’ Meetings provide BDO Zones with private Zoom meetings with 50-100 pre-qualified bio-project developers, investors and strategic partner companies actively looking to build new bio-based plants in BDO Zones.

The BDO Zone Investment Coalition is a group of leading capital markets^¹ including Citibank and Goldman Sachs with a collective goal of investing in BDO Zones to build new biofuel, renewable chemical, biogas manufacturing plants. On April 22, 2021, the coalition announced $1 Billion for deployment into bio-based investment in BDO Zones.

See all members of the BDO Zone Investment Coalition.