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DuPont puts funds in biofuels

With partners, the chemical firm is investing $58 million in two plants in Britain.

DuPont Co. said yesterday that it would invest $58 million in two biofuels plants in Britain with partners BP P.L.C. and British Sugar P.L.C. The total cost of the plants is $400 million.

They will be on one site owned by BP in Saltend, north of London. One plant will produce the experimental fuel biobutanol, and the second will manufacture ethanol from British wheat.

DuPont said the plant was its first investment in an ethanol plant in the world.

The company developed biobutanol as an alternative to ethanol and has backed it financially because it performs more like gasoline than ethanol. Biobutanol can be made from wheat, corn, sugar beets, cassava and other plants.

If biobutanol succeeds as a commercial product in Britain, the joint-venture partners can convert the British ethanol plant into a biobutanol plant, DuPont officials said.

"Our strategy is to selectively invest in production facilities globally to meet the demand for biofuels. Today marks the first two investments of this nature," Thomas M. Connelly, DuPont executive vice president, said in a statement. "We are on track to deliver on the milestones announced in 2006 for biobutanol, specifically market development of biobutanol by the end of this year and introduction of our second-generation technology by 2010."

DuPont shares were down 82 cents, or about 1.6 percent, at $50.63 in trading on the New York Stock Exchange.