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Breakthrough in Biodiesel Production
MGR writes "National Geographic is reporting that Japanese scientists have discovered a way to convert vegetable oil into biodiesel with a much less expensive catalyst (between 10 and 50 times cheaper) than what is currently used. From the article: 'Any vegetable oil can become fuel, but not until its fatty acids are converted to chemical compounds known as esters. Currently the acids used to convert the fatty acids are prohibitively expensive. Michikazu Hara, of the Tokyo Institute of Technology in Yokohama, Japan, and his colleagues have used common, inexpensive sugars to form a recyclable solid acid that does the job on the cheap.'"
I hope we can finally dump our dependence on foreign oil. If this sort of thing really comes through, the Saudis are going to be PISSED.
with a much less expensive catalyst (between 10 and 50 times cheaper) than what is currently used.
Note: the catalyst is 10 - 50 times cheaper, not biodisel fuel itself, while the breakthrough is meaningful, the headline is misleading. I'd be curious to know what percentage of the total cost of producing biodisel is related to the cost of this catalyst.
No Sigs!
Even though it is a good idea to reduce costs whenever possible, but from what I have seen, even when using lye (which is basic, not acidic), it is about 70 cents cheaper than regular fuel. Biodiesel = Used vegtable oil + lye + methanol + mixture motor, containers and filters.
Err, this seems backwards to me. Everytime I've seen bio available, it's been below standard diesel prices. Perhaps it's just a regional thing where I'm at, but I've been under the impression that the real problem with biodiesel was A) older fuel lines may be degraded more quickly by biodiesel, and B) producing enough to fuel the world's fuel needs was a big issue.
Of course, I'm no biodiesel guru, but it is of some interest to me -- I drive an older diesel (which I plan on converting to run on SVO, as soon as I get the facilities to make this feasible.)
Fill in your four or five-letter word of wisdom here _ _ _ _ _.
I was unable to tell from TFA, though I did not read it closely, whether this will make soy biodiesel as cheap or cheaper than standard diesel is now.
Not that it matters, I just bought a nice, fuel efficient gasoline powered car... It should be wearing out about the time the patent expires on this new process.
Trying to use sarcasm in text-based forums does not work.
This reminds me of an article I read a few months ago about using corn to produce ethanol on a large scale as a renewable resource. Follow-up articles pointed out that corn (maize, specifically) isn't a particularly efficient crop, which meant that the environmental impact of drilling for oil and depleting oil reserves was just being shifted to depleting topsoil. Very much a "no free lunch" reaction.
If this biodiesel process can be applied to enough different types of plants, then it should be possible to pick and choose crops based on what does well in a given area -- after all, we don't have to worry about market pressures and what people want to eat, it's just going to be converted into fuel -- which should minimize the effects of choosing hihg-impact crops.
catalysts? acids? expensive? the definition of a catalyst is that they do not get transformed in an reaction but simply speed it up. In this case it rather sounds as if the acids are a simple consumed reactant.
A recyclable solid acid was developed decades ago, but no one has been high enough to be willing to drink the piss, despite how much window pane they've been given.
The next problem will be a shortage of arable land due to land used to produce the vegetables that are then going to become diesel. This could solve one problem and lead straight into another
~HTP~ Hug that tux
Green fuel plan 'will destroy rainforests'
Forests paying the price for biofuels
Careful what you wish for.
OKAY..... so this is about Japanese scientists (note the location is in TOKYO).... and think about it: CHINK means CHINESE..... so take your raciest comments back to you parents basement and get a life....
. htm
http://kpearson.faculty.tcnj.edu/Dictionary/chink
If I were from one of those square-type states with lots of farms, I would be on this in a second. It would be the holy grail for farmers: a way to link national security with farm supports.
If the government could help farmers grow soybeans and in return reduce dependence on foreign oil, both left and right wingers would be happy. Imagine that! Good for security, good for American jobs, good for the environment, and even good for business (cars would need some retooling).
Where do I sign up? Oh, it's one of those "This technology will be really cool when it becomes available in 10-15 years" stories, huh?
What are you eating? isItVeg?.
Don't mod me into oblivion for pointing out a negative to biodiesel. I know about the benefits: http://www.thecarconnection.com/Auto_News/Green_Ma chines/Diesels_Clean_Green_Illegal.S196.A3569.html
"Weapons should be hardy rather than decorative" - Miyamoto Musashi
I think that goes for OS's too
I don't understand what the big fuss about biodiesel is... almost all diesel vehicles can be cheaply and quickly converted to use straight vegetable oil as fuel. Granted, you have to start and end on diesel/biodiesel to warm up the vegetable oil. Used vegetable oil can be found for free at most restaurants and the process of filtering it to be used as fuel is relatively painless. Instead of converting masses of perfectly useable vegetable oil to another form, why not just use it as is?
Oh... yeah, that's right... if people pushed the use of straight vegetable oil then they probably couldn't justify selling biodiesel for $4-$6 a gallon.
sig.
I have an SVO Blazer. It's a real pain in the ass getting that grease out of dumpsters. I worry about the health factor. It seemed like I was getting sick more often when I was doing it. My wife made fun of me for a year. I fought a defective system and had lots of problems. Yeah I don't listen to naysayers and neither should you. I got 15k mi. doing it, then I ran out of time for that project. If I did it again I'd start a co-op. Biodiesel looks real nice now. Diesel engines are more efficient than gas and longer lasting. Given the amount of agriculture America is capable of, I find it hard to believe we can't supplement our diesel diet with veggies.
Autonomous Retard -- Is your camp safe? UnsafeCamp.com
As a Chinese person, I am offended by your use of the word ch*nk. Please do not use this, there are many decades of a history of hate and bigotry associated with that word.
It would be really nice to find some alternatives... but I have to wonder if this, like so many other 'efficiency' discoveries and antioil research, will 'disappear' too. Really...
Get your fill here.
This isnt about ethanol. This is about biodiesel.
Minimally modified vegetable oil.
PLEASE STICK your old propaganda shit (which you already had prepared, because it would have taken you longer to write that article than the story is online) and shove it up your ass.
HI O WISE PRINCE. WHT TOOK U SO DAM LONG?
Don't listen to them!
Thier just trying to get you to put sugar in your tank!
I don't want a pickle; I just want a Motor-Cycle! A four foot cop arrived with a five foot gun!
Making soybean biodiesel cheaper won't solve the problem because the limited supply will only meet so much of the required energy needs. It might even cause more problems by creating economic pressure to convert food oils into fuels.
===== Murphy's Law is recursive. =====
I understand that you can get more efficiency out of diesel than gasoline (55mpg diesel cars have been around for ever) but the particulate emissions from diesel are much worse than from gasoline. Is biodiesel any better in this regard? Or is the advantage just that you don't need to invade Iraq to get it?
The alternative is to plan on getting into space and not being limited to the resources on good old planet Earth. Unfortunately, such investments seem to be taking a back seat to things that have a more immediate payback, like making sure everyone can have an Xbox 360 for Christmas.
We have a clear choice and if we don't choose soon, the choice will be made for us. Resource consumption is either a way of life or not. Your average family in 800 AD used a lot less resources than just about anyone does today. The choice is to figure out how not to make this a problem or to roll with it and live like they did in 800 AD.
Sure, there is a third way - pretend that Kyoto will solve things and that such halfway measures are going to do something useful. If this really started in 1800 and not 1980, then reducing emissions to 1990 levels isn't even a beginning, its a joke.
The next really, really important question is how many humans can the Earth support with 800 AD levels of technology and energy use. If you don't like those answers either, I suggest you wake up and figure out what the real alternatives are. Doing nothing will absolutely result in your descendents living like their distance ancestors did.
Would you like Fries with your recycled oil?
Or better yet, upgrade your fries with your Bio Diesel at the same time for only $.39 more.
Since this is an accomplishment not by American Industry and is contrary to the current powerbrokers of Dino-fuels it won't mean shit in America.
2005: law is passed giving a tax credit for bio-diesel mixes. But this eliminates all B-100 biodesiel because it's not a mix. Tax rebates are not made available to the consumer.
2006: law goes into effect which raises the bar on small diesel engine emissions (commercial vehicles excluded) making it impossible to sell a new diesel car in the United States because the fuel used in the Unites States is too dirty to pass the emissions test. It is not the engine, it is the fuel that fails the test. There are no American automotive manufacturers selling a diesel engine in the United States.
2007: law is supposed to go into effect to introduce low sulphur dino-diesel which should permit diesel sales to go into effect. I'm a little suspicious that this law isn't currently under assault. But we won't know for another year.
Go search the internet. The technology for production of bio-diesel and the studies identifying the environmental benefits have been in publication, on the internet of all places, since 1998. And what has been done about it?
How does this process, and biodesiel, compare to E85 in terms of production costs, energy density, and impact on food supply?
Given that the H2O powered fuel cell is the holygrail of power systems, wasn't there a push awhile back to use Ethanol and its easy to break hydrogen bonds as the "fuel" for the fuel cell?
It is better to be the hammer than the anvil.
Creating biodiesel fuel uses just as much energy as it saves.
In many places biodiesel has been more expensive than regular deisel, until the recent jump in oil prices. In addition, there have been a couple of recent subsidies that have brought the price of biodiesel down at the pump. It wasn't too long ago when biodiesel was 2x the price per gallon, and not everyone has caught up to the fact that this has changed. Regardless any decrease in cost is still a great thing.
For biodiesel created with conventional crops the bottleneck is like you said, that there isn't enough enough aritable land on the planet to create as much biodiesel as we currently use in gasoline and diesel. Algae based biodiesel solves this problem but is significantly more expensive to produce than convientional biodiesel last time I checked. Honestly though, I haven't heard about any new research in that field since the DOE Algae program was put to an end back on Clinton's watch.
In reality there is no one solution to the problem. The solution will be a combination of an increase in biofuels, more efficient cars, more public transportation that runs off the grid, and even then transportation will likely be more expensive than we have become occustomed to transportation.
I've heard that assuming you can get your hands on waste oils (such as used vegetable oils) then biodiesel is pretty cheap to manufacture. The problem is, we just don't have enough waste oil to make a dent in our reliance on foreign oil.
Well, I've singlehandedly come up with a solution to this problem. Legislation must be put in place that requires all foodstuffs consumed in the United States to be fried. Meats, breads, veggies - it all needs to be fried. Once all food is fried, there will be plenty of waste oil to go around.
Are you doing your part? Step away from the grill - it's the law.
I have a customer that shops at my store and he makes his own bio diesel at home in his garage which he uses to power his gererators.
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
The acid catalyst they are talking about replacing is liquid Sulphuric Acid. Most homebrewers of biodiesel, like those using an "open source" Appleseed type reactor, are not using both an acid and base catalyst, only the base being Potassium Hydroxide or Sodium Hydroxide (along with Methanol or Ethanol).v e_eff.html= Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=1628102 6&query_hl=34 0/cid/2/research/green_chemistry__efficient_cataly st_for_making__biodiesel_.html>
With higher Free Fatty Acid feedstock, such as really used grease, the acid cataylst helps convert those FFAs. You can read a little more on the chemistry of
the news item here:
http://www.greencarcongress.com/2005/11/inexpensi
Nature abstract:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd
Another abstract:
http://www.researchsea.com/html/article.php/aid/3
Seems this process is five times more reactive than other solid catalysts, but still 50% that of the liquid acid - however sepearation afterward would be much
easier.
And someone got flamed for ranting about ethanol, but that's the other main ingredient. IIRC, transesterification goes like this:
Lye + ethanol = sodium ethoxide (catalyst)
Ethoxide + fat = glycerol + lye + ethyl ester of fatty acids (i.e. biodiesel)
"Hey fatty, don't eat that! Biodiesel Is People!"
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I think that biodiesel is great in terms of support for legacy internal combustion engines, but I suspect that the cars of the future will be moving toward electric technology more and more as time goes on. The two main forms that I can see this taking now are:
1) Hybrid engines and
2) Fuel cell engines.
The main reason is that electric cars are just more energy efficient. You can do things with them to increase that efficiency that you just can't (easily) do with internal combustion engines. Things like regenerative braking.
Biodiesel is great, but I don't see it as anything more than a solution for legacy support.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Wow! So if it used to cost 1$ it now costs -9$ to -49$? I would like 10 million units please, send the money to Mr. B.Admath!
Should we really be trusting the research of someone from a place called TIT?
read the bunni comic
Has anyone ever looked at what would be the *real* solution, which would be reverse-engineering how these plants take in Sun + Co2 + minerals, and produce the oil?
If this process could be reproduced in a lab, and then commercialized, maybe you'd be abl to generate lots of biodeisel without having to grow and harvest acres upon acres of land. If you do the math (lost trees, tractor fuel, time to harvest) many feel that biodeisel en-masse is actually more harmful to the planet than it is beneficial.
But if biodeisel could be produced atrificially, without requiring fields of soy...
Catalysts are not consumed in production (by definition). So, it's just a startup cost, not a production cost.
Personally, I'm a little suspicious as to whether this is truly a catalyst or a consumeable.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
But more importantly, if this product has a chance to avoids a war over oil, its worth a lot more than more acres of land being used.
So far we've seen World War I (Ententes vs Centrals), then World War II (Allies vs Axis), then World War III (West vs Soviet Bloc), and now World War IV (West vs terrorist states). Will World War V be fought over farmland?
The question I would have is how much vegetable oil do we have to process into biodiesel? It's a great idea but if everyone started doing it would we have anywhere near the amount vegetable oil required to power the millions of vehicles on the road?
Sorry, don't see this as a solution for anything. Right now we have the tree huggers complaining about us using fossil fuels in our evil SUVs. At the same time other leftist groups complaining that farmers are growing grain to feed to cows so we can eat meat. If that food was used for direct human consumption it could help end world hunger, or something like that. With biodiesel the argument would be we are growing food to power our evil SUVs instead of feeding people. Some people would not like it.
And that's why he said "on a $/watt basis."
"I assumed blithely that there were no elves out there in the darkness"
Im glad to see they are trying new things, hopefully even small advances in different types of fuel might even cut down on fossil fuels, bio disel seems like a great idea, i just have no idea how they could ever produce enough of it for everyone.
Because that shit is hilarious, and mostly true. Asians use a lot of oil, or at least, in the States they do. The vast majority of Oriental/Asian restaurants, in the States, sell their used cooking oil to people that intend to burn it in their cars (after filtering it, of course!).
You might disagree with the parents use of "chinks" and "shitty food", but 40 year old Soviet Cars is pretty close to what they use in Mongolia and Mayanmar.
there isn't enough enough aritable land on the planet to create as much biodiesel as we currently use in gasoline and diesel.
Who says we need to put the manfacturing plants and facilities on earth? Growing algae requires what, minerals, sunlight, and water. Surely the moon or similar body up there contains enough minerals, the water might be a bit tricky but if we can divert a comet or something similar, you can put a massive orbital facility around the earth and drop the refined biodiesel into the sea for collection by tankers.
It does need a lot of effort and investment to get it going, but think what you are doing; permanently replacing the entire petrochemicals fuel industry. There is no practical limit on the amount of the stuff you can produce, given sufficient raw materials (infinite fuel anyone? might solve the energy crisis while we're at it). While you're up there, you could branch off into pharmacuticals, lower cost foodstuff, and who knows what else.
What he can't kill, he has sex on. Trent.
Why focus on biodiesel when theres hydrogen fuel cells?
Not to mention, the money isnt in production, its in laying the foundation. Just microfinance or buy stock in foreign companies. This way Americans profit along side the third world. I see it as a win win situation.
Solar, Hydrogen fuel cell, wind power, water power, even gravity power, but in general, each method is workable in certain environments. It does make sense to grow certain things in the tropics, just like it makes sense to build certain parts in China, or to buy shares in America.
Energy is profitable in general for everyone if the industry is greatly expanded.
Living in the Bay Area of San Fran., I recently went to a biodiesel conference. I was a bit disappointed at the unorganized manner of the speakers. They talked down on the idea of a large scale corporation creating biodiesel. I am in favor of this idea, as it would drive down costs. The cheapest I've seen biodiesel is $3.17 a gallon. However, gas prices are approaching that price. In fact, I've seen gas for as much as $3.50 a gallon in downtown San Fran. Regardless, this study states biodiesel requires more energy to create than it produces.
n ol.toocostly.ssl.html
http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/July05/etha
From article:
"In terms of energy output compared with energy input for ethanol production, the study found that:
* Corn requires 29% more fossil energy than the fuel produced;
* Switch grass requires 45% more fossil energy than the fuel produced;
* Wood biomass requires 57% more fossil energy than the fuel produced.
In terms of energy output compared with the energy input for biodiesel production, the study found that:
* Soybean plants requires 27% more fossil energy than the fuel produced;
* Sunflower plants requires 118% more fossil energy than the fuel produced.
In assessing inputs, the researchers considered such factors as the energy used in producing the crop (including production of pesticides and fertilizer, running farm machinery and irrigating, grinding and transporting the crop) and in fermenting/distilling the ethanol from the water mix."
Some people die at 25 and aren't buried until 75. -Benjamin Franklin
YES!!11 !! -smacks you upside the head-
Any chance the process will be patented?
Hmmmm, perhaps a little civil disobedience might be a good thing.
Lye (sodium hydroxide) is made commercially through the electrolysis of brine, as a byproduct of chlorine production (the "chloralkali process"). The process consumes massive amounts of electricity (primarily produced by burning coal), and the chlorine compounds themselves include many nasty environmental pollutants.
Methanol is produced from methane, AKA natural gas.
So the 2 chemicals needed to produce biodiesel (and reduce fossil fuel use) both depend on fossil fuels for their production.
The biodiesel production process generates as a byproduct a substantial amount of glycerin contaminated with lye and unreacted sodium methoxide. What is to be done with this stuff, and how much energy is needed to dispose of it or purify it for commercial use?
Remember "News for Nerds, Stuff that Matters"? Help make it a reality again! http://soylentnews.org
It's happening, though you have to start with more fundamental processes and work your way up. Basically if you can make hydrogen and carbon monoxide, you can make anything.
"I assumed blithely that there were no elves out there in the darkness"
The development of other fuels will not negate the usefullness or use of traditional petroleum. Nations that are oil rich will continue to use the fuel,especially if it is their primary natural resource, even if their export market diminishes. And especially then, with no imported cash from exported oil, they would be literally forced to directly use the oil themselves to the best of their ability. And it is quite possible that as the islamic world (if we want to limit the discussion to there) matures (most are under the age of 30 right now), they will want their own manufacturing and other islamo-centrist based business, rather than purchasing products from other areas. Necessity *and* desire at that point. You have to remember, petroleum is not only a transporation medium, it is also critical -today at least- for manufacturing.
With that said, I heartily welcome more R and D and deployment of biofuels. But older fuels are still used, I am using "stored solar"-wood-as my primary residential heating source, same as humans have been doing for millenia. We have a "domestic supply" and it is quite significant enough for our needs, hence no need to "export cash" to purchase someone elses developed energy product, nor do we need to "export the raw materials" for anyone else to use. That's a micro scale, macro between nations is just "larger".
Humans will use up the available petroleum, biofuels becoming massively more available or not. The use will only drop when it gets closer to a stasis point, when it takes one "barrel of energy" to produce an identical barrel of energy. Then it will stop.
MOD PARENT DOWN TO HELL!
Not to mention that you need to cart around those hydrocarbons in a vehicle, generally, whereas electricity can be transported at significantly less cost (both in terms of efficiency and in terms of dollars).
What are you talking about? How do you propose to transport *electricity* at less cost than hydrocarbons? Batteries?
As for efficiency, it means almost nothing next to actual cost. Play around with this spreadsheet for a while if you don't believe me. It compares the cost of storing electricity from wind generators, in lead acid batteries versus converting (through "inefficient" processes) to either hydrogen or methanol, and back to electricity by burning in an internal combustion engine and generator. The "inefficiency" of all those conversions is made up for by simply using more wind generators to produce more electricity. See which one is cheaper.
"I assumed blithely that there were no elves out there in the darkness"
It irritates me when short-sighted people get distracted by this red herring.
Does it really matter if we can make enough for everyone to completely, totally, 100% convert?
So what if we can only provide for 50%? We just cut pollution by 50%. We increased our petroleum reserves by 2x. We just decreased our dependence on foreign oil by 1/2. We just provided a major boost to our farmers and other aspects of our internal economy.
Oh, but we can't convert 100%???? We'd better just throw it all away, and not do anything! I hear this same BS constantly about solar & wind & other alternate energy sources.
rho
First the rise in gas prices and then the rise in the prices of french fries and potato chips!! Well, at least that will do some good to the American health...
Not a problem if we use algae as the feedstock. We can use non-arable land, salt water, and sewage to grow the algae. And since it has a conversion efficiency several times higher than soybeans, it becomes feasible to supply *ALL* of the vehicular energy needs of the US using biodiesel.
http://www.unh.edu/p2/biodiesel/article_alge.html
Where do I sign up? Oh, it's one of those "This technology will be really cool when it becomes available in 10-15 years" stories, huh?
Biodiesel is already a good business and has seen exponential growth in the US for the past 5 years (nearly doubling in output each year).
Why aren't you growing it? I don't know. But I'm fueling up with it.
In absolute terms, the volume is still but a dent in our energy supply. But then there is also that "square state" interest resulting in Minnesota mandating a 2% minimum blend of biodiesel in all diesel sold. In Germany, nearly 5% of all diesel-type fuel sold is biodiesel. As alternative energy goes, that's one heck of a gain especially when you consider the very favorable energy balance associated w/the bioidiesel lifecycle.
What does your link have to do with biodiesel? That whole article concerns running a different fuel, petroleum diesel.
OTOH if you had even Googled "biodiesel carcinogens" you would know that one of the benefits of BD is exhaust that is 90% less carcinogenic than exhaust from petro-diesel. One of the reasons its less toxic is because BD reduces particulates and unburned hydrocarbons.
The main downfall of BD at the tailpipe is NOX, and even then only a slight increase. It can be argued that reducing unbuned hydrocarbons, even with a 5% bump in NOX output, has a net positive effect as far as ozone and smog are concerned.
Do you think ANY car manufacturer is going to sell a vehicle with as many limitations as an SVO vehicle?
This article isn't talking about small-scale single-vehicle uses. This is talking about people with the goal of replacement of diesel with an alternative in mass quantities. SVO-capable vehicles don't fall anywhere close to this category. Standard diesel engines already have enough trouble with market acceptance in the U.S. due to perceived issues with reliable starting in cold weather, let alone vehicles that have MORE trouble with cold-weather operation.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
I have a burger joint.. My old fry oil goes to my Neon Sign guy -> http://www.litebriteneon.com/ who runs his desiel car on it... I think he just runs it as is (after a good filtering..).
He gets my old oil for free... New veggie oil costs me about $3-$4 a gallon..
http://www.hawknest.com/
I guess we'll have to mulch all of our garbage and sewage to be able to grow all the fuel we need. As long as it goes to growing fuel, instead of food, there shouldn't be as big a risk for disease. Plus, it'll help deal with our trash instead of just burying it for future archeologists to uncover.
If Mr. Edison had thought smarter he wouldn't sweat as much. --Nikola Tesla
Nah, it's just an Apple Reality Distortion field. You can get those anywhere.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Well, algae ponds should be pretty good for that. Some folks from UNH are saying that you can yield biodiesel from algae at a rate that would imply, by my math, efficiencies of 13 to 26 percent.
And while it's plausible to grow algae ponds over thousands of square miles, it's less plausible to stick chips of difficult to manufacture, energy-intensive silicon over that same area. Not to mention that the energy comes out in an easy-to-use form that our current transportation infrastructure can make use of.
Although the Stirling solar looks quite promising. We'll see how the installation in California comes out.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
I can rub the stuff all over, have wild monkey-sex AND run my car??
*** Don't be dull.***
I swear I remember seeing this on an episode of "Dirty Jobs" (discovery channel) not too long ago. Some guy took dirty grease off of mexican restaurants and such once a week or so and turned it into fuel. Pretty cool episode.
j obs.html
http://dsc.discovery.com/fansites/dirtyjobs/dirty
Here is the most interesting thing I have seen in the area of biodiesel: algae that is about 50% oil by weight, can grow in brackish water and eats human and industrial waste...
Problem is, even if we could produce all the BioD we wanted to for nothing, we will STILL rely on foreign oil. Here's why:
Perochemical products like plastics and lubricants still have not been figured out with alternative sources. Things like plastics (the keyboard you are typing on) can not be made without dino oil.
Where do the lube oil basestocks come from that we use in cars and trucks? Natural gas and dino oil. Even synthetic oils start out as some form of foriegn energy source.
What about the chemicals required to make the tires that all these diesels will drive on? Petro based.
High dino diesel prices are not due to foreign oil, its due to limited production due to modernazation (0 ppm sulfer mandated for 2006) and due to hurricanes. It used to cost 1/2 of unleaded. NOw it's street price rivals premium.
The sick sad truth is that the highest yield oil source for BioD is not cash crops like soy and canola, but ALGAE, read = POND SCUM! 98% water, almost 1% extractable oil, 1% other stuff. Easy to produce and extract. Thing is you need 100,000 acre ponds to make the stuff to make it economically viable.
The advances announced will make it safer and cheaper to produce BioD. I have seen picures of BioD processor accidents with methanol and it looks worse than a crystal meth lab gone kerblewy due to poor methanol handling.
This is not the holy grail, but one small step towards a better environment and easier production.
As far as benefits towards the US farmer: its meaningless. Do you know an individual farmer can not sell to anyone other than the domestic grain elevators? Not even to cross the border to Mexico or Canada. He has a product that he can only sell to a limited number of buyers. As a producer, he CAN NOT sell to foreign countries. Think about what each one of you 'makes,' codes, products and think about the export controls you face. They are insignificant compared to you can ONLY sell to ADM/Cargill/Mosanto/Frito Lay!
On th otherhand, cohnsider that Venezuala, or maybe Columbia just shipped over the first tanker full of BioD derived from Palm oil to Miami. That tanker got bought and the BioD went into the pipeline. No import controls whatsoever. BioD is a product like any other comodoty. The national Soy council was PI$$ED because the Bush administration did not listen to its recomendations to protect BioD years ago. Now we are cought with our pants around our ankles.
So, yeay, it sounds like it's a great advance, but we are not totally there yet.
To the most of you who are shaking fists or pom-poms, what do you drive?
Would YOU drive a diesel? How about a diesel-electric hybrid?
Hydrogen Fuel Injection system increases efficiency of diesel engines by adding small amounts of hydrogen to the combustion chambers. Burning Hydrogen increases the temperature, burns most of the particles that are normally released into the air from the diesel engines and increases fuel efficiency by 10%.
You can't handle the truth.
Of course a lot of older diesel engines can run perfectly well on straight veg oil - I've had best results from PSA engines (found in Peugeot, Renault, Volvo and Citroën, among others) that use Bosch fuel pumps - with drastically reduced emissions, quieter running and smoother performance. And no, it doesn't smell like fried food when it's running, unless the oil is incredibly dirty.
"Any vegetable oil can become fuel, but not until its fatty acids are converted to chemical compounds known as esters"
Not exactly true, although preheating may cause that change. The original diesel engine was designed to run on plain peanut oil, and most diesels can accept plain vegetable oil either alone or in combination with normal diesel. Starting it is apparently the hard part when using PVO. Don't know about efficiency of PVO compared to diesel, but since the waste stream is diverted to further use, it would have ro be pretty bad to be implausible.
Hemp is extremely high in cellulose. It grows from the desert to the mountains. Hemp is nature's #1 photosynthesizer producing more per acre, faster than possibly anything.
LOOK IT UP. (USDA Bulletin 404)
As far as the one poster who mentioned "plastics" --you'll find through study that that is EXACTLY (at least partially) how we got into this mess of dependence on such rude resource as oil.
Hemp stems are 80% hurds (pulp byproduct after the hemp fiber is removed from the plant). Hemp hurds are 77% cellulose - a primary chemical feed stock (industrial raw material) used in the production of chemicals, plastics and fibers. Depending on which U.S. agricultural report is correct, an acre of full grown hemp plants can sustainably provide from four to 50 or even 100 times the cellulose found in cornstalks, kenaf, or sugar cane - the planet's next highest annual cellulose plants.
On plastics: look up what Henry Ford did for the war effort when the military needed all the steel --Hemp produced automobile panels are lighter and 10x the strength. Search Popular Mechanics magazine archives.
Look up the HempCar, or better yet read about in full Hemp here.
Read what Hugh Downs said before America's desert brinksmanship.
So remember the challenge:
Prove us wrong! Prove us wrong! Prove us wrong!
We hereby extend our $100,000 challenge to prove us wrong!
If all fossil fuels and their derivatives, as well as trees for paper and construction, were banned in order to save the planet, reverse the greenhouse effect and stop deforestation; then there is only one known annually renewable natural resource that is capable of providing the overall majority of the world's paper and textiles; meet all of the world's transportation, industrial and home energy needs, while simultaneously reducing pollution, rebuilding the soil and cleaning the atmosphere all at the same time... and that substance is the same one that has done it before . . . CANNABIS/HEMP/MARIJUANA!
GO BIO!
(Those laughing are probably the same ones laughing before 9 American states approved medical use.)
The estimate for US transportation fuel requirements is 400,000,000 gallons a day (from Mike Briggs's algae biomass > oil page)... how many gallons/day are used for petrochemicals?
I think it much more likely that absent a domestic market for domestic petroleum oil, that we can take care of all of the above requirements with either oil produced in the USA, or cheaply from the foriegn market, as without significant demand for petroleum as fuel, the OPEC nations are going to be desperately anxious to sell at any price the market will bear.
Personally, I think the farmer will benefit substantially from a product that will fuel his tractors at a stable price. A secondary benefit will be that with petrochemicals out of the energy market, the price of petrochemical fertilizers and insecticides may even drop, or more likely, rise much more slowly. Given that subsidies are tilted towards soy oil, just what do those soy farmers want from the Feds? RIAA-style protection? If the Columbians can sell us palm oil for biodiesel that can make sense at current market prices, more power to them. However, the primary use of biodiesel at this point is for blending, the economics (and very probably, the ASTM biodiesel spread) will have to change to make this stuff practical at the gas pump. Algae will be an important part of making this happen. BTW, your writing style looks sort of familiar, you on any of the biofuels mailing lists?Tech Public Policy stuff
Forget about improvements to catalysts. This is the real breakthrough.
Widescale Biodiesel Production from Algae:
Growing enough biodiesel to provide all of our transportation needs on less than 3% of our cropland sounds like the holy grail of energy independence.
"I assumed blithely that there were no elves out there in the darkness"
I'm already aware of the benefits of bio-fuels over petroleum diesel. I'm even aware of the CO2 benefits of bio-fueled diesel engines over gasoline engines. It would be difficult to read slashdot without being aware of the benefits, but that's not what I was commenting on. I was pointing out a negative that is seldom mentioned on slashdot; diesel engines, even when they run on biofuels, have more soot particles in their exhaust than gasoline engines. If you google "biodiesel particulate emissions" you will see that even biodiesel advocates admit this.
Those soot particles are the main reason why the EPA gives the 2006 Jetta diesel a horrible air pollution score even though it gets over 40 mpg. The difference in particulate (soot) emissions for diesel and gasoline engines is so great that it is very difficult - perhaps impossible - to get light duty diesel vehicles (i.e. cars) Tier II certified in California.
Right now, every gasoline burning car that is replaced by a biodiesel or SVO burning car causes us to have higher levels of soot in the air. From my original link:
That was the problem I was commenting on, and you responded with something totally off topic (a comparison of biodiesel and petroleum diesel.) Now, it is actually possible to clean up the exhaust on diesels quite a bit. That same article goes on to mention a way to solve the sooty particulate emmissions:
Unfortunately, the article does NOT explain the drawbacks of this process; the extra emmissions control equipment costs a LOT, and it reduces the power and fuel efficiency of the diesel engine. That's a problem, since fuel efficiency is one of the main reasons we are considering diesels in the first place, which is probably why most of these methods are still not used on new diesel vehicles. Besides using oxidizing-type particulate filters to get rid of soot can even increase the levels of carbon monoxide:
http://www.fleetguard.com/fl
"Weapons should be hardy rather than decorative" - Miyamoto Musashi
I think that goes for OS's too
It mentions you need alcohols too to convert the oil. That doesn't come from algae. Additionally, it doesn't mention how much effort/money/space/equipment it would take this algae output to biodiesel. My understanding (this is 3rd hand) is that the investment to do this for all fuel uses would be substantial. It might still be worth it though, I dunno.
The government isn't going to lose revenue as people switch to biodiesel. Is biodiesel really cheaper to produce than diesel. I mean, if both were taxed the same, would biodiesel still be cheaper? It sure would lose a lot of its current apparent cost advantage.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
This is great. Combine biodiesel in cars that use less than 3 liters per 100km (3 liters per 100km = 78.4048614 miles per gallon) and you are using an incredibly small amount of fuel that does not come from the Middle East.
Perhaps driving cars does have a future, even if the gas guzzlers are out.
Some say he is made with ascii, others that he is eyeballed daily by millions. All we know is, he is known as the Sig
A year ago (here in Seattle) biodiesel was $3.40/gallon and diesel was like $2.30/gallon or less. Over the summer it was $3.00/gallon for biodiesel and $3.20/gallon for petrodiesel. Right now biodiesel is $3.05/gallon and diesel is around $2.90/gallon. Biodiesel is a little more expensive now, but when you take into account social/political reasons, the increase in cost is negligible. Of course, if you don't drive, it doesn't make much difference (yay for bicycles!).
Well, us biodiesel advocates have been pushing the red/blue state connection biodiesel creates for a while (especially during last election) :). Unfortunately, while many people think it is a good idea, there are only so many diesel vehicles and only some of the users are willing to change. Unfortunately, companies and fleets are usually pretty conservative about new things (and are some of the biggest users of diesel).
:), but they want their name associated with biodiesel so they'll get mores sales.
Also, please don't encourage soybean growth. Soybean groups want soy associated with biodiesel and I believe this is a bad idea. There are other plants that produce more oil per acre than soy (like canola). Also, if everyone grew soy, that means we are putting all our eggs in one basket. If one disease came along, it would wipe out a large part of the crop, but if it was diversified, a lot of oil would be preserved. Diversity and high-oil crops are what we should be encouraging. Nothing against soy, I eat it all the time
http://www.newpath4.com/WorldwideClimateEngineMsg. htm has links to 2 engines, neither of which uses any fuel.
Links on that page for the both engines, but here:
http://www.newpath4.com/millenialdawnpowerandlight secure21.htm
& http://www.newpath4.com/enginewow.htm#enginewowpag einanutshellexplainsnewtypeoffusionthefusingoftwoe lementsinatamolecularlevelsonofusion .
The 1st link is for a solenoid-based "fluid" waterwheel;
2nd link is for the sonofusion dual process engine.
Both links are on the next link:
http://www.newpath4.com/WorldwideClimateEngineMsg. htm
Technically, an equation when flipped doesn't change it.
Still the same equation. Well, mc2=E in my application
to a solenoid waterwheel expression shows how it does
mean something different in this one instance.
Yeah great, millions are starving in the world, so what do we do, lets convert FOOD into PETROL for those fat AMERICANS (and AUSTRALIANS) to burn up in their car driving to the shop to feed their fat arses.
Smart stuff.
_
\\/ are accustomed' - First Lensman
Acid catalysed esterification of triglycerides can also be carried out at low temperature and pressure, but it is so slow that it is not feasible to produce BD by that route. The esterification in "esterification followed by transesterication" route converts almost all of FFA and negligable amount triglycerides. The esterification in direct conversion process converts both FFAs and triglycerides with higher than 95% conversion. That is the second case requires higher pressures and temperatures even though the chemistry of the reaction is exactly the same.
As far as biodiesel costing more energy to produce than it gives, is that not true of all forms of energy? for example how much does gasoline cost if you factor in the cost of production in Saudia Arabia, shipping by tanker half way across the world and local distribution? does this 'complete life cycle analysis' change the balance?
Also regardless of this what about the use of waste vegetable oils? In the UK there is a lot of attention on small scale recycling of catering industry oils that are otherwise poured away into municipal dump sites. Surely by recycling already used oil, giving it twice the use, you reduce its energy production-to-use cost? ( I say small scale but I am guessing in a country of 50 million people efficient collection and reuse of commercial waste vegetable oils actually adds up to quite a large volume).
Diesel engines were designed to run on vegitable oil in the first place, so that farmers could make their own fuel for their tractors, just as they had done for their steam traction engines previously.
If you rotate crops between nitrogen-fixing soybeans (biodiesel) and corn (ethanol), you don't need to use fertilizer to up your yields.
Speaking to the local biodiesel group a few months ago, down here in Florida, they never mentioned this. What they told me is that they use lye (like, Drano, or, cheap industrial grade), then filter.
Got to be very precise with the amounts (or you get soap); however, no acids required.
mark
The whole BD process, from fertilizer production to waste disposal, produces higher than 3 liters of BD per liter of oil consumed. The same value for petrodiesel is about 0.8 liters.
As a disclaimer, I'm a Mechanical Engineer working in the area of biodiesel and energy recovery through dynamic breaking.
Besides all the technical errors in your post about biodiesel (including the totally incorrect idea that diesel injectors need to be specially coated to run biodiesel, and not knowing that the only significant by-product of making biodiesel is glycerin), something about the way you spell your "dynamic breaking" engineering project makes me think bullshit.
"Yesterday I couldn't spell engineer, today I are one".
What about Hemp Plants??? What effiency do they have?
Photosynthesis is 3-6% efficient.
Why do you call it dino-oil when it isn't from dinsaurs?
o rigin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abiogenic_petroleum_
Libertas in infinitum
Good inventions will not be concealed in a free market to protect an inferior product. This is simply demonstrated in just about every basic econ textbook.
So for your absurd conspiracy theory to be true, not only must every government in the world be in on the scam, but also every company. Just one defector could bring the whole deck of cards down.
Pigs will fly before such a crazy plan could happen.
There is some oil behind the donut and burger joints. However most of it is already claimed, so taking it is stealing! You can often get permission to take it, but be careful, many managers are not the owner, and thus not aware that someone else has already bought the oil!
Used oil processors know about biodiesel, and they have been collecting oil from behind those restaurants for years. (10 years ago they paid about $.05/gallon for it) They will no look kindly on your stealing of their oil.
The other problem is there isn't that much. There is enough oil for one or two people in each community. There isn't enough oil for everyone though, and in fact with the recent interest in biodiesel, there is generally more demand than supply already.
Still, if you can find a place to get it, there is a lot of used oil behind these places - on a personal scale.
This is the worst case of misinformation I've ever seen on slashdot. The only part where you are correct is compression ratios and air-fuel ratios.
Ethanol burns BETTER in a "gasoline" engine than gasoline - if the engine is designed for ethanol. (Mess up the air/fuel or compression ratio and you can have problems) It is cleaner, burning, and higher octane.
Ethanol contains about 2/3rds of the energy as the same volume of gasoline. However because ethanol burns better (in an ethanol engine, a gas engine conversion will not see this efficiency) it will get the same fuel milage, and/or more power. Saab has already demonstraited such a car.
A car designed to run on ethanol or gas will generally see about a 10% loss of fuel economy when running on ethanol, despite the significantly greater loss of energy in the fuel.
The evil puppet masters are controlling the world. Hemp is being held down so they can market their inferior crap. Prisons are full because the puppet masters own the prisons! I see their master plan now! Thanks for clearing it up for me.
Hemp is just another plant. It probably has some uses but not all the miraculous sillyness posted in some of these articles. You should learn to detect snake-oil...because that link was soaked in it.
... they just displace the problem. Bio derived energy will not come from First-world waste, it will come from the Third world who will deplete their forests with yet another profit making crop.
Better put here at Forests paying the price for biofuels.
"Consensus" in science is _always_ a political construct.
Plastics do not have to be made from oil. Oil is just cheap, so that is what they use. Farmers are promoting plastics made from corn. I've heard of soy based plastics too, but can't find a link. Pot fans like to point out that Hemp can be turned into plastic.
Corn based plastics are generally bio-degradable, which is often an advantage.
Growing huge amounts of algae in sewerage treatment plants makes sense. Others who know more about this will hopefully have better ideas or more detail.
Interested parties really ought to check out the LATOC primer. The guy's sources are not crackpots or psuedo-prophets predicting the end of the world here, they are investors, scientists, politicians, oil analysts, etc. He builds a strong case as to why hitting the peak of world oil production will return incredible economic and social changes if we aren't ready for it. One way or another, we have to do something--a concentrated effort nationally, even globally if we expect life to continue as we know (and enjoy) it.
It probably would not have a huge impact on folks who already live at the subsistance level (the utterly impoverished), but as oil energy drives everything in our modern economy, even a small drop in production over a sustained period would be highly problematic for industrialized economies--for us. I quote from my own write up on this scenario:
Even if the odds favor us in that this won't happen in our lifetimes, I feel a concentrated effort now to replace oil should be a national mandate of highest priority. For our kids and grandkids sakes. There are a lot of great ideas floating around for replacing oil with renewables. Let's get them implemented and our infrastucture converted to use them while we have oil energy available for us to do so. It will be extremely difficult to manage such a massive scale transition if we wait until the world oil production starts to decline. It takes energy to make energy after all...I really don't know where the oil companies are on this. Obviously even an admission of the problem such as Chervon and others have made are at the least an acknowledgement that we're not going to get to continue the course we are on very much longer.
My real frustration in this is, how is it that I have only recently come to a knowledge of this issue when research shows it has been discussed and debated for a loooong time now. Where is the media? They are always so gloomy, you would think this would be something they would love to dwell on...
Actually, it is nothing of the sort.
All I would ask is that you do the math. In order to replace 20% of current oil usage, you would have to (as an example) chop down all of the remaining African rainforests to make the land; you are talking about a 10 fold worldwide increase in plant oil production. That is what I would term 'An environmental catastrophie'. No realistic environmantalist would advocate biodiesel as currently produced (Desert-farm-algal-biodiesel may have a part to play in that it is the only solution I've seen that actually does scale.
Basing your hopes on solutions that don't scale is a very bad idea indeed, unless you are acting as a spokesman for Exxon. Now, were I spokesman for the fossil fuel lobby, I'd be pressing for more wind, solar, biodiesel and the 'hydrogen economy' right now, as I would look green, attract government subsidies AND sleep easy in the knowledge that my core businesses would be completely unaffected. Nuclear power combined with electric cars would give me nightmares.. but I think we can count on the environmentalists to stop the nuclear industry and GM/Ford to stop electric cars.
"Biodiesal *IS* solar power. Where do you think the energy present in the plant matter comes from?"
Solar power *is* nuclear fusion. Where do you think the energy in the sun comes from?
So, you're all for nuclear fusion, are you? So am I...
I came in late due to the holiday. Yes, I ramble. So here's the home heating point first: /slightly/. Most other emissions drop dramatically. European elite boiler makers are producing low NOx boilers and biodiesel compatible boilers that meet low NOx EPA requirements -- other mfrs are stepping up to the plate. /morning/ of delivery to the pumps due to the rapid vaporization of the alcohol. Correct me here. I have always wondered why we don't see gasahol sold in New England, and I think it's because of the problems inherent in moving large quantities of alcohol over long distances. Am I right? As an exercise, contrast the characteristics of alcohol and biodiesel (methyl or ethyl esters) when applied to moving large quantities of the stuff. Biodiesel wins in my mind simply because of the "invisible sheet of flame" factor. Alcohol scares the hell out of me from a safety standpoint.
Home heaters can burn biodiesel in place of #2 heating oil. New Englanders burn on average approximately 900 gallons of #2 heating oil per year. The EPA is starting to crack down on home heating equipment emissions, low NOx being a priority. You'd better know your stuff if you want to burn biodiesel in your home furnace, but LLBean and many state governments are quietly using biodiesel for space heating. National Parks are obliged to burn biodiesel appropriately where biodiesel is "readily available".
Fact: The combustion of biodiesel in vehicles or home heaters increases NOx emissions
Regarding this topic, the story shows how there's almost always a technical solution to every technical problem. But politics and economy often cause technical innovations to be dropped, forgotten, avoided, or bribed into the ether. Fortunately, I think there's enough momentum behind US biodiesel sentiment to make it a profitable and worthwhile product on the open market for many a year. But then again, potpourri is a profitable product. As Eddie Izzard remarks, you couldn't give potpourri away to practical folks but for those with a disposable income, potpourri is the dog's bollocks.
As long as potpourri sells in the USA, biodiesel will sell. Quote me on that. Even if biodiesel jumps to 4 times the price of petro-diesel or #2, there will always be those who are willing to take the financial hit for whatever practical reason they latch on to. And with biodiesel, there's plenty of good reasons if you can afford to burn it, even if the price is higher than a petroleum based alternative. Even a blend of B5 is a good thing from a renewability, sustainability, and closed-carbon-cycle POV.
Right now, however, biodiesel is slightly more expensive than petro diesel or #2. I figure if a family wants to burn B20 for home heating, the yearly hit will be around $400. Tax time incentives help. Regardless of the Willie Nelson "Oh Christ, there he goes again" wingnut factor, which Car and Driver loves to pooper-scoop and feed the masses, biodiesel remains and will continue to slip into existing petroleum infrastructure and retail markets.
What other energy alternative permits you to vacillate between solar energy and petroleum with your existing vehicles and/or heating equipment?
That's right: ethanol, at least in vehicles. I'm under the impression that ethanol is popular in the MidWest primarily because it is so close to the source of distillation: it's mixed with gasoline the
I can't even light a biodiesel (B100) soaked rag with a butane lighter.
I'm in the biodiesel distribution business, so I professionally opine that ASTM certified biodiesel is a very a good thing for you because I need to sell fuel to make money. Federal subsidies make biodiesel distribution a profitable thing, and though the distribution subsidy for blends is not available to the retail customer, there exists another strong April 15th incentive for businesses to use biodiesel on-road, so if you're running diesel onroad in the course of doing business it makes good sense for you to look to biodiesel
Horses ARE really inefficient, compared to cars (depending on what you mean by efficiency). Horses must maintain a high body temperature 24/7, while cars need only maintain a temperature while being driven. Horses (at least mares) have high energy needs for reproduction, while new car construction is handled offboard. Horses need to digest their food, whereas cars get fuel delivered ready-to-use. Horses must repair their own tissue, while car repairs are handled with offboard energy resources.
No doubt you can think of other differences.
Sean
Granted, I poured an entire 5-lb sack in there and the blockage was most likely mechanical, but still...
Man, you really need that seminar!
Problem is, even if we could produce all the BioD we wanted to for nothing, we will STILL rely on foreign oil. Here's why:
Perochemical [sic] products like plastics and lubricants still have not been figured out with alternative sources. Things like plastics (the keyboard you are typing on) can not be made without dino oil.
Where do the lube oil basestocks come from that we use in cars and trucks? Natural gas and dino oil. Even synthetic oils start out as some form of foriegn [sic] energy source.
You do realize that we produce something like 40% of the oil we use? If we could replace all our fuel needs (heating, electricity, transportation, etc.) with biological sources, we might very well be able to satisfy all our other petrochemical needs (plastics, fertilizer, etc.) from domestic oil sources.
Downmodding is the refuge of the weak. Don't downmod, make a better argument!