Wednesday, March 29, 2006 • 1:00 p.m. – 5:00 p.m.

Risk Management for Biomass and Bioenergy Deals - Working the "Crush Spread"
Instructor
Peter Nessler, Director, Renewable Fuels, FC STONE

One of the most important but least-understood aspects of putting together a profitable bioenergy deal is to establish and maintain risk mitigation measures for both the agricultural market inputs and the energy market outputs - traditionally two of the most volatile commodity markets, which are usually considered to have no connection. Failure to do this effectively has harpooned many projects in the past, and is almost certain to do the same in the future.

This workshop, presented by one of the leading risk managers in the bioenergy field, will address the following critical issues:

• Managing fuel and feedstock price risks
• Input feedstock price discovery and crush margin management
• Strategies for managing price volatility for grain and other agricultural products
• How to secure supply of feedstock for plants
• Biofuels futures, options and hedging strategies
• Specific hedging approaches available to ethanol producers
• Working capital requirements for mitigating Ag market inputs and energy market outputs