Biodiesel is a renewable fuel that can be an alternative or an addition to petroleum diesel, which significantly reduces carbon emissions.

LONDON (Dow Jones)--U.K. biofuel company D1 Oils is hoping to raise GBP20 million when it floats its shares on London's junior stock market, the company said Sunday.

The public offering will go live on the London Stock Exchange's Alternative Investment Market for smaller, growth companies, in about two weeks, a spokesman said Monday.

Biodiesel is a renewable fuel that can be an alternative or an addition to petroleum diesel, which significantly reduces carbon emissions.

European regulations clamping down on the output of climate changing gases have been encouraging the introduction of biodiesel into their transport fuel mixes.

Demand for biodiesel in Europe is growing at about 14.5% a year. Sector experts predict E.U. demand for biodiesel to reach 10.5 billion litres by 2010, at which point European production will satisfy less than half of market's requirements.

D1 Oils reckons it has tapped into a preferred source of the fuel - a durable, bushy tree called Jatropha that grows in tropical and subtropical countries and isn't eaten by animals.

The company has already begun planting on some of its 37,000 hectares of land in Africa, India, and South East Asia. Each hectare is expected to yield 3,000 litres of the crude vegetable oil fuel.

Rival Australian-owned Biofuels Corporation also announced plans to list on AIM in June.