Category Archives: Energy

Energy, Food, Security

BioDiesel technology leap

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Biodiesel production is typically done with refined or edible oils using methanol and an alkaline catalyst. Edible oils are usually diverted to human consumption, so people often mistakenly believe biodiesel will cause conflict with food availability. Edible oils are not a requirement of diesel, however, for two simple reasons:

  1. A large amount of oils and fats are available that are not edible or refined but still can be converted with new technology into biodiesel. This includes waste oil, as well as oil from waste.
  2. Engines can be converted with new technology to run on non-edible oils as well as petroleum diesel and biodiesel. This is how Rudolph originally envisioned things.

The second seems less likely to emerge in mass numbers because the complexity of a hardware solution and support. There are engines and conversion kits today. However, hardware solutions present a far greater task to create, deploy and support than to create a new refinement technique for the supply-chain that produces a consistent grade of fuel from waste.

With regard to the first solution, biodiesel researchers and manufacturers found that alkaline-esterification of certain oils had problems with high levels of free fatty acids (FFA). The FFA react with the alkaline catalyst and generate soaps that inhibit the separation of the ester and glycerin.

One solution is to convert high FFA oils into mono-esters. In other words, an acid esterification phase will convert some of the FFA into biodiesel. This process has been found to be successful already with rubber seeds and even tobacco:

The tobacco biodiesel obtained had the fuel properties within the limits prescribed by the latest American (ASTM D 6751-02) and European (DIN EN 14214) standards, except a somewhat higher acid value than that prescribed by the latter standard (<0.5). Thus, tobacco seeds (TS), as agricultural wastes, might be a valuable renewable raw material for the biodiesel production.

An even more interesting system has been described (somewhat exuberantly) by Gas 2.0. The author suggests that technology has finally begun to reach a reasonable level of efficiency for conversion of waste to fuel.

Basically, the process works like this:

* Raw fats and oils of any type are combined with an alcohol
* This mixture is fed through a sulfated zirconia column heated to 300 degrees Celsius
* Their Easy Fatty Acid Removal (EFAR) system recycles any unreacted raw material back through the reactor
* Excess alcohol is recycled back through the reactor
* Pure biodiesel comes out the end

The advantages of the system are:

* No waste produced; No washing or neutralizing of the biodiesel is necessary
* 100% conversion of raw materials to biodiesel
* Any raw fat or oil can be used to make biodiesel
* Very efficient due to heat recapture from the column
* Sulfated zirconia catalyst never needs replacing
* Very small footprint of the reactor system, uses an extremely small amount of area for the amount of biodiesel produced
* Essentially no emissions and no waste stream from the process; Easy permitting from the government

Sounds very steezy. I am reminded of the vehicles in the book Ring World, where the driver would toss garbage into a hopper for fuel.

A company called Ever Cat Fuels has been created to push the technology and apparently will license it to others three to five years from now.

Energy, Security

Central Plains biofuels symposium

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Good news:

Kansas State University will host a symposium on the sustainability of biofuels production and processing in the Central Plains. The symposium, scheduled for September 16 at the K-State Alumni Center in Manhattan, Kan., is being sponsored by the Kansas Center for Agricultural Resources and the Environment, K-State Research and Extension, and the K-State Center for Sustainable Energy.

A pre-symposium poster paper session is planned for September 15 from 5-7 p.m. Posters will also be on display during the symposium. Poster entries are now being accepted at http://www.dce.k-state.edu/conf/bioenergy/. Topics must be related to the program purpose. Submission deadline is September 1. Poster presenters are required to register for the symposium and to pay the $40 registration fee.

Target audience for the symposium includes university faculty and staff, state and federal agency personnel, farm groups, and industry representatives from Kansas and neighboring states.

This program is designed to disseminate technical information regarding the sustainability of biofuels production and processing, including production of feedstocks, biofuels processing, by-product utilization, implications for use of natural resources, short- and long-term economics, and social and environmental impacts. Presentations will summarize existing technical information, ongoing research, and technological challenges for the future.

Questions about poster submissions and registration should be directed to Debbie Hagenmaier, program coordinator, at debbieh AT k-state.edu. Questions about the symposium program or purpose should be directed to Bill Hargrove at bhargrov AT k-state.edu.

Amazing that there will only be two weeks between submission and the symposium. Maybe I will propose something on national security, individuality and energy policy. The link between biofuels and security management is more tangible than ever.

Energy, Security

Plug-in VW diesel-hybrid arriving in 2010

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Great news from Germany, Volkswagen has created a plug-in hybrid called the Twin-Drive that will soon be available:

A key difference between the VW approach and typical hybrids is that instead of the battery providing supplemental power to the combustion engine, the Twin-Drive will work the other way around. According to Winterkorn, “here the diesel or gasoline engine supplements the e-motor.”

Excellent. This is exactly what I want in a car. This is what most Americans could use right now to reduce emissions, reduce the dependence on foreign oil, and yet still maintain their quality of life. Hydrogen is a pipe dream compared to the here and now of biodiesel-hybrid.

Energy, Sailing, Security

Algae and China’s Olympics

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The AP reports that competitors in Beijing may face environmental challenges:

To host the Olympic sailing events, the Chinese port city of Qingdao moved a massive boat yard, relocated industries and spent about $850 million on transport links, parks, pollution controls and coastal green belts.
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But with little more than a month to go until the Games, a different challenge is cropping up: A forest of blue-green algae is choking the coastal waters, suffocating beaches and lying in thick layers along sailing routes.

The Olympic committee should bar any country from applying to host the games if they can not achieve environmental guidelines such as air and water quality.

The New York Times had an interesting look at cause:

Water quality has been a concern for the Olympic sailing events, given that many coastal Chinese cities dump untreated sewage into the sea. At the same time, rivers and tributaries emptying into coastal waters are often contaminated with high levels of nitrates from agricultural and industrial runoff. These nitrates contribute to the red tides of algae that often bloom along sections of China’s coastline.

But officials in Qingdao this week said pollution and poor water quality did not have a “substantial link” to the current outbreak, according to Xinhua. Instead, scientists blamed the bloom on increased rainfall and warmer waters in the Yellow Sea. Algae blooms now affect more than 5,000 square miles of sea water, according to Xinhua.

Regardless of cause, the real question is impact. I guess the 10,000 people who are cleaning up all the algae could be tested for ill effects, as well as all the animals fed the stuff:

Photographs in the Chinese media showed rickety wooden boats overflowing with green mounds of algae collected from the sea. One photo showed a young boy crouched on a beach beside piles of the leafy glop as a dump truck carried off a large load of algae. State media reported that 100,000 tons of the algae had already been taken out of the water. Much of it was being transported to farms as feed for pigs and other animals, according to news reports.

Maybe the Chinese could convert the Algae into biodiesel? It is great the Olympics are forcing China to clean up, but the clean up should come long before the games so these risky and questionable quick-fix solutions would not be necessary.