Biofuel

[Fla._Deadheader]

 Since there are a very few members that are making or experimenting with Biofuel, I would like to share some info.

  On a Forum I frequent, There is much activity on Planting an oilseed crop in India. The farmers are very poor. There is a country-wide scam taking place, where the farmers sign up for GOVT. assistance, and IF they receive compensation (Subsidy) for growing crops, the Govt. HAS the right to take it, because they funded it.   Farmers get a very small payment.

  Seems that the PETRO OIL Conglomerate has the authority, OR under the table approach, to stall any projects started by the farmers. Govt. will NOT declare a positive Energy production Bill, to help the farmers. AUTO Conglomerates will NOT accept info that Alt. Fuel WILL help the farmers and the country.

  Seems that there is so much money to be made from Alt. fuels, the Govt. and BIG CORP's are trying to divvy up the pie, so they take ALL the profit, leaving the farmers broke, still. All the while stalling any help for those that need it.

  Ethanol is a viable product in India. From what I gather, it is taken from the Farming Community and passed on to the BIG OIL CORP's to sell IN THEIR OWN STATIONS.

  My point here is, is there anyone who does not comprehend that there is BIG money in Alt. fuels

[farmerdoug]

'The big get bigger and everyelse gets??? the shaft'.

I think that states the problem, does it not?

Farmerdoug

[saddletramp]

I agree with you guys all the way. What has happened to man kind? All buisness have to make a profit to stay in business. But what about the BIG ones who have to have gross and disgusting profits? It seems like all the money isnt enough, put it on the credit card so we can have your future money too. Corprate greed really cheeses me off. Maybe as the boomers retire a few things will change. The markets follow them and thier whims very closley, I know, Im one.

[Corley5]

Most of the ethanol plants in this country WERE privately owned or were co-ops.  I heard yesterday in a switchgrass session that 80% of ethanol plants are now corporate owned with a large percentage of that 80% being energy corporations.  I'd say the cat is out of the bag.  There's money to be made but the control is more important 

[Fla._Deadheader]

 Guess my other point was, LOTS of folks don't think this is a viable option. Takes more to make less, yadda, yadda. Not energy efficient. 

  Folks seem to forget that Hitler nearly pulled aces outta his sleeve, and was about to turn the war in his favor, using Alcohol. 

[Corley5]

Biofuels are viable.  Cellulosic ethanol is going to be big.  It's just a matter of time.  It's easier to extract ethanol from grains but cellulose has the potential for much higher yeilds without affecting our food supplies.  Switchgrass prefers marginal soils.  Small generating plants fired on a mix of biofuels and coal are also in the future and mixing bio matter with coal reduces emissions.  One sticking point with me is that these companies are trying to hold down the prices they'll pay per ton to keep their profits up.  They're talking up to 40 bucks a ton for switchgrass depending on the btu content.  I getting 100 bucks for grass hay.  A guy over towards Roger City has just bought a pellet mill for making fuel pellets from switchgrass and figures on needed around 8,000 acres to keep it supplied.  I'm watching with interest    He's gonna have to come off the $40.00 though.  Granted there are lower inputs for it than corn or other annuals but.....   

[farmerdoug]

You grow what makes you the most profit.  Inputs maybe cheaper but profit per acre also comes into play too.

Farmerdoug

[Fla._Deadheader]

 Farmers are possibly the most independent people . It's time they started co-ops and pooled their resources. There is no reason fuels could not be produced and used locally. Set up your co-op so everyone gets a share OR buy the feedstock and make the fuel and SELL it back to the farmers and other locals. No need to ship all over the country. You still get feedstock for animals from the spent "cake" produced from crushing or fermenting

  Nearly every part of the USA can produce from local feedstocks. Sugar Beets can produce a LOT of ethanol per acre. Sorghum or Milo can replace Corn. LOTS of "Seed" crops, Canola-Rape, Sunflower, Soy, for example.

  One problem with Alcohol is rubber type "O" rings and such, that alcohol affects. Alcohol is DEATH in a diesel system.

  A while back, there was a question on whether you could re-use corn for oil, alcohol and feed mix. I answered maybe. Now, I can answer definitely, only you get smaller amounts of each, using it to produce more product.

  Just think how much grain is stored outside in good years, and goes bad from lack of processing   How many millions of acres are planted to wheat, alone Plant oil crops. 

[Faron]

One problem with producing biomass products, switchgrass,etc, is you are removing about all the growing mass from the soil. Nothing is going back. The more marginal the soil, the bigger the problem.  Probably require crop rotations and /or application of animal manure.

[SwampDonkey]

Yeah there's like a million acres of wheat planted up on the Peace and that's way up beyond the border.

In 1925 4,000,000 bushels of wheat were shipped from the Peace, that was on the Alberta side.

[Gary_C]

I now have two ethanol plants nearby. The first one is about 20 miles northeast of me and the other is 20 miles due south. The one to the north, Al-Corn is a coop and was built and financed by local farmers who bought shares based on the bushels of corn they pledged to deliver every year. You can see their web site here: Al-Corn

The new one to the south is also a coop. I have purchased the distillers dried grains that is left after the ethanol is made ever since Al-Corn opened. It is a great protein source and feed for livestock plus it smells good enough to eat. Smells just like gram crackers. Also Al-Corn has some of the fattest sparrows I have ever seen. 

Most all of the first ethanol plants were built and financed partly by farmers in coops. The primary reason they were started like that is because the economics of ethanol were iffy without government assistance in the form of tax breaks, I think on the road tax when it is used as fuel. These coop ethanol plants are still thriving and the stock prices with delivery quotas have become very valuable.

Now some of the larger players in the corn milling business like Archer Daniels Midland or ADM have been jumping on the bandwagon because of the sucesses of these coops. To the best of my knowledge none of these ethanol coops have been taken over nor bought out.

Ironically, the sucess of ethanol production from corn will also work against these plants without government support. Things were great when gas prices were high and corn prices were hovering around $2.00. Now with gasoline prices dropping and corn at $4.00 per bushel, the economics may become iffy again. That is why our government must stand behind ethanol as a first step in becoming self reliant again on energy consumption regardless of the economics right now. I have no doubt that ethanol will be made with other feedstocks like switchgrass or corn stalks in the future, but for right now corn is our best bet because it is here and now, not some future hope.

One of the problems we have in this country is people that do not really know the facts nor understand the problems this country faces. This past Tuesday I was sitting in a waiting room and overheard a conversation with a man and I believe his sister. They were probably in their 50's. It was already on the news about Pres. Bush's impending support for alternative fuels like ethanol. The man told his sister that it took more gasoline to make ethanol than was produced but those "lying, cheating farmers were going to keep pushing ethanol anyway and the government was going to keep giving them millions of dollars." Unfortunately many people do not understand that some things must be supported by the government because it is in our long term interests to do so.

Biodiesel is a similiar story. There are many biodiesel plants running and more being built. The economics are also some what iffy and will become more so as the price of the feedstocks, namely soyoil becomes more expensive as production increases. However, I can guarantee that farmers are going to use all the biodiesel they can regardless of the cost. All of my local fuel suppliers now have biodiesel available and I blend as much as 50 % in all my summer fuel tanks and would also use it in the winter just as soon as they solve the cold flow problems.

I do not ever plan to start producing biodiesel nor ethanol. I do not believe I could ever compete for price with those commercial operations. However I will buy and use all the alternative fuels that I can, regardless of the price. For me that is far better than sending my money to some one that hates me and wants to destroy this country.

Enough of the soapbox.

[Bill]

Gary_C

Much of what you said I agree with. I'm not sure that in the long run we'd have to pay more for biofuels but I don't know so . . . .

For biodiesel there was a story a little while back about a scientist at MIT. ( background is simple - we exhale co2 which plants use and give off o2 ) So this guy runs the exhaust from the MIT powerstation through the aerator of a fish tank to grow algae. DanG if the algae doesn't love all the co2 and to put the icing on the cake the algae produces 100 times more biodiesel than soy  for the resources used ( his numbers not mine ). He does his thing with his calculator and figures that if utilities in the US would do this for a year we'd have enough biodiesel to run all our ( the US of A's ) diesel equipment/trucks/etc for a year. So maybe either our electric bill could ( might ? ) come down or the utilities get into biodiesel - but not big oil !

So if the farmer's coops could keep ethanol, utilities get biodiesel just maybe the prices would give us a choice and put big oil in its place. 

Anyway - just another $ 0.02

[Gary_C]

Bill

Yes, I am sure there are many ideas and processes that can be developed, EVENTIALLY. The problem is we need an awfully lot of alternatives NOW, TODAY or we will lose this battle.

The numbers are staggering. If I remember right, about 1 1/2 years ago I heard a comment by the Chairman of Exxon. They have ten per cent (10 %) of the gasoline market in the US (2005) and they sell one BILLION gallons of gasoline every three days.

Can you even imagine how many aquariums growing algae that would take to replace that ten percent of just the gasoline consumption?

If we are to accomplish these goals of reducing our dependence on imported oil, we need to stop squabling over who is going to profit from this and "JUST DO IT!" 

[Fla._Deadheader]

 I been following this stuff for about a year. Found some VERY interesting Chemists and Entrepreneurs that ARE doing it.

  When this monement started to REALLY gain momentum, the price of Methanol went up OVER 100%. Methanol is used for transesterification, to remove Glycerol (soaps) from Veg Oil.

  GUESS who controls Methanol production   BIG OIL. NOW, Big OIL has their foot in the door. Foreign OIL lets the output fluctuate and holds Alt Energy at bay.

  I know that LOTS of BioDiesel is poorly made, and it clogs filters and ruins Injector Pumps. Problem is, too many BIG outfits grabbing what they can, NOW.  The little guy is very diligent making fuel, and they have run over 100,000 miles on homebrew, with NO problems.

  How does the truth get out to the masses   I think THIS is the big problem with Alt. Energy.   Gary's mention of the guy bad mouthing the Farmers, is an excellent example.

  There is also STRAIGHT Veg Oil, that needs only to be de-gummed and filtered very well, and used directly.

[bugmeist]

I just "found" this Alternative Methods section of the FF?  I love it.

I have been interested in alternative energy for a while and actually lived off grid for the first 8 yrs in my present location ('74-'82).  My ex brow beat me into hooking up to the grid but that is another story!

I just read about a Canadain company that will be marketing a "home" biodeisel plant capable of around 100 liters/wk.  They are now in the process of getting CSA (Canadian Standards Asso.) approval.  I must apologise for not being able to remember  the name of the company and I recycled the newspaper the article was in.  But 100 liters of  homemade bio would sure power some farm equip, generators, etc and if one was a farmer and grew oil seed crops i guess you could be in a very self sufficient position.

[Corley5]

Interesting little tidbit on where we may be going 
 
"USDA Proposes $1.6 Billion Investment In Renewable Fuels
Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns announced plans last week to propose $1.6 billion in new funding for renewable energy, with a focus on cellulosic energy research and production, as part of the Administration's 2007 farm bill proposals. This funding will support President Bush's goal of reducing gasoline usage by 20% in the next 10 years and will compliment an array of renewable energy-related efforts underway at the USDA.

In his State of the Union Address last week, President Bush announced his vision for the nation's energy independence, including $2 billion in cellulosic production loan guarantees. The President's proposals also include a new Alternative Fuels Standard, which contains a requirement for sources produced by American farmers and ranchers as well as an automatic "safety valve" to protect against unforeseen increases in the prices of alternative fuels or their feedstocks.

"It remains a priority across USDA to support the development of biofuels. We will continue to build on current programs and turn the corner on renewable energy," says Johanns. "With biofuels coming to the forefront, American agriculture faces the greatest opportunity of a generation to lead a future in which we get our energy by the bushel and not by the barrel."

For more information about renewable fuels and the President's mention of it in his State of the Union Address, visit the following Web links:
NCGA: www.ncga.com/news/notd/2007/january/012407.asp
RFA: www.ethanolrfa.org


Source: USDA"

[Dana]

Greg, I tried to view your second link and was blocked by a "you are not authorized to view this site" notice. Any idea what is going on?

[Corley5]

Try it now 

[Dana]

Link works now.

[Quartlow]

You know the minute the government gets in involved it gets screwed up 

I know that LOTS of BioDiesel is poorly made, and it clogs filters and ruins Injector Pumps. Problem is, too many BIG outfits grabbing what they can, NOW.  The little guy is very diligent making fuel, and they have run over 100,000 miles on homebrew, with NO problems

.

The wifes cousin has been making it for about 5 months  now. He makes 10 gallon batches. We have had absolutely no problems with it. The 2940 JD gets run everyday feeding the cows, and his 93 Ford is running on it. We haven't changed a fuel filter yet.