The Cluster of Lignocellulosic Biofuels for the Autotransport Sector (known as well as the Bioalcohols Cluster) was part of the Mexican Innovation Centre in Bioenergy.

The Bioalcohols Cluster started operations in August 2015 to scale up the biorefining technologies developed in the Nerixis Project to produce bioethanol, biobutanol and biohydrogen with competitive production costs. Agricultural residues such as wheat and barley straws, corn stover as well as agave and sugarcane bagasse were employed as lignocellulosic feedstock. Other forestry residues such as olive tree pruning were also tested.

The Cluster terminated prematurely in February 2019 due to changes in government policies regarding renewable energies.

Proof-of -concept processes were developed for the pretreatment, saccharification and fermentation stages with a capacity of up to one ton of biomass (dry basis) per day. The bioethanol production capacity was 50 litres per day. The environmental and economic sustainability of the proposed technologies were analysed, and technology transfer mechanisms were established. The availability of the agricultural residues mentioned above was measured along the Mexican territory.