Category Archives: Biodiesel

Eco-Boat Powered In Part By Human Fat Attempts World Record

Hungry for Americans

By Michael d'Estries  
December 20, 2007 – 11:17 am

The United States has been sitting (literally) on a massive reserve of fuel that until now may have gone unnoticed.

The 78 foot alternative fuel powered wave-piercing trimaran called Earthrace is finding a new energy source in human fat. The ship’s captain, New Zealander Pete Bethune, underwent underwent liposuction and donated enough to produce 100ml of biofuel, while two other, larger volunteers also had the procedure, making a total of 10 litres of human fat.

All in all, that’s enough fat to help the boat travel about 15km. The remaining mix comes from 100 per cent biodiesel. The Earthrace will attempt this March to circumnavigate the globe in 65 days — breaking the previous record set in 1998 of 75 days.

Obviously, I don’t think we’re going to see Senator Stevens arguing to tap into the more than five million Americans that are considered “morbidly obese” — but it does make you consider the amazing possibilities in terms of fuel alternatives that are all around us. That, and perhaps we should go on a diet before some alien species invades looking for it’s own next generation energy source. We certainly would provide enough “umpf” for lightspeed.

via daily mail

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Biodiesel production could yield many benefits to India

By Tim Plaehn  
December 5, 2007 – 11:20 am

I read a headline today on plans in India to use satellite imagery to find land that is currently wastelands that could be used to grow jatropha curcas as a biodiesel feedstock. A little research revealed the cultivation of jatropha in India may provide some valuable additional benefits.

First up are the better known benefits of biodiesel:

  • Renewable fuel to reduce dependence on oil.
  • Cleaner burning than traditional diesel for lower emissions.
  • Biodiesel can be used at different blend levels to work best with local vehicle requirements.

Some additional benefits that could result:

  • Using land that is currently considered wasteland to grow the oil feedstocks does not displace and food crops.
  • Advanced technology can be used to locate the plantations to have optimum results in land use, refining and transportation costs.
  • The jatropha plantations could provide additional employment to to India’s large population.

An Indian government study shows 20% of the country or about 64 million hectares qualified as wasteland. This study hypothesized a 5 hectare jatropha oil plantation would provide a family a 60,000 rupee annual income at today’s prices.

To sum up the benefits I will take a quote from the study above: (NCR is the region around Delhi)

“As NCR has both urban as well as rural areas, the bio-diesel production will thus lead to growth of economy in both urban as well as rural sector. In urban sector, it will provide an environment friendly fuel, which will save the non-renewable sources of energy and would thus save the urban area from more pollution. In rural sector, it will provide employment to many people and will thus solve the problem of unemployment to a great extent. Also, the well-connected road network in this area would thus help in transportation of fuel as well as raw material in an efficient manner. “


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5 Benefits of Bioenergy

By Tim Plaehn  
December 3, 2007 – 3:26 pm

C. Scott Thomas, a consultant to bioenergy companies, recently gave a speech where he outlined what he calls: Bioenergy’s “Top Five” List. I see it as the five benefits of bioenergy. Here is Mr. Thomas’ list with links to further details of each point:

  1. Convert solar energy into liquid fuel. Points out we need liquid fuels for many of our energy uses, not available from wind and solar power. link to details
  2. Reduce greenhouse gases. link to details
  3. Remediate ecological disasters. link to details
  4. Revive depressed economies. link to details
  5. Expand energy freedom of choice. link to details

I found the discussion of the individual points interesting and though provoking. To me, point three had a different slant on excess biomass in both forests and urban areas that can be converted to liquid fuel. Also, some good information on the advanced technologies coming in the biofuel industry. Take a quick scan or read in detail. You will get some good information.

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Biodiesel a Top 10 Yahoo Search?

San Francisco's green fleet propels "biodiesel" into the mainstream

By Beth McKenna  
December 3, 2007 – 3:13 pm

Top 10 Searches

  1. Tin Man Mini Series
  2. BCS Standings
  3. Spice Girls
  4. NFL Scores
  5. Dip Recipes
  6. Christmas Music
  7. Mike Huckabee
  8. Driving Directions
  9. Fantasy Basketball
  10. BIODIESEL !!!

There you have it, folks — the Top 10 Yahoo searches on Sunday, Dec. 2.

No Paris Hilton? No Justin Timberlake? No smut type stuff? Yes, I’m shocked, as well. Pleasantly, but, nonetheless shocked.

When I saw “biodiesel” on this list, I knew there was some big (ok, nix “big” — remembering Paris and JT — and replace with “fairly widely-read”) news out. I didn’t imagine that lots of people woke up on a Sunday and out-of-the-blue (or rather, green) decided that they’d like to do a little brushing up on the merits of biodiesel after making dip (#5) while Christmas tunes play in the background (#6) and before checking out some more football stuff (#4).

Seems the New York Times, San Francisco Chronicle, and several other major newspapers all had pieces which ran on Dec. 1 or 2 about San Francisco completing the conversion of its city fleet to run on biodiesel.

In a soyshell, the news:

San Fran just completed this 1-year long conversion project. Its 1500 diesel vehicle fleet (ambulances, fire engines, buses, street sweepers, etc.) is now reportedly the largest green fleet in the US.

Its fleet uses B20, which is mix of 20% soy-based biofuel and 80% petroleum diesel fuel. The soy oil is bought from producers in the Midwest. (And yes, the same “takes food out of the food supply” argument against corn-based ethanol could be used here — but that’s another topic.)

You can click on the names of the papers listed above to read each of their pieces. This specific news, while interesting, is not my point here.

My point? ‘Green’ has surely hit the mainstream when a term such as “biodiesel” appears on a top search engine’s (Yahoo, Google) Top 10 searches.

Investors should pay heed to this type of green-mainstreaming news and investigate further.

The questions that come to mind here: Are other cities — US and international — following suit (speaks to demand)? What are the investment plays here: soy producers? diesel engine manufacturers?

Stay tuned (just like San Fran’s diesel engines) – as I already have one possible investment play here, which I plan to write about within the coming week.

Hmmm…as for that Top 10 list, maybe the Tin Man left his heart in San Francisco?

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Food & Fuel Topic Debated at United Nations

Will There be Enough for All?

By Lois Zendarski  
November 26, 2007 – 9:41 am

Food vs. Fuel

Politics vs. the Environment

The United Nations is looking at these debates with concern as increasing amounts of corn is being diverted from the food chain to be processed into ethanol. The extra production of corn for ethanol use is driving up its price. The higher prices are causing concern for farmers who need the corn to feed their animals. In turn, the price of meat and poultry goes up because of it. We all lose, or do we?

This boom in corn commodities market means more famines for the United Nations and the World bank to deal with, but investors are the ones who are finding a gold mine amidst human misery. Farmers are switching their production from wheat for human foods to corn for ethanol. Governments are having to make the choice of feeding their people or helping the environment. In countries where famines are not looming, politicians are making the choice.

Investors are searching for places to grow more and more of the gasoline-like producing crop. One problem they are finding is that infrastructures are not available in remote areas to transport the products. Add to the that, the fact that sprawling cities are gobbling up good farmland and the recipe spells disaster for the poorest of the world’s poor. Where will the needed crops be farmed? How will farmers be able to produce enough to satisfy hungry people and greedy gas guzzlers?

Who WILL the winners of the new gas wars be?

Will our governments be there to save us all or just be there for those with the largest campaign contributions or lobbyists? Or will it end up being people vs. commodities and money?

via: forbes.com

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Synergy in the farm belt for biofuels

By Tim Plaehn  
November 21, 2007 – 1:52 pm

This is a combination of news about a couple of biofuel companies and expounding on what I think is a really good idea. Let’s start with the news and then I will attempt to expound. GS Agrifuels and Global Ethanol have announced a joint venture to built a biodiesel refinery in Iowa. The feedstock of the 30 million gallon-per-year plant will be crude corn oil produced at Global Ethanol’s two ethanol plants at Lakota, Iowa and Riga, Michigan.

GS Agrifuels has developed technology for extraction of oil from corn and Global Ethanol certainly uses a lot of corn. GS Agrifuels will be responsible for the financing of the corn oil extraction technology at the two ethanol plants as well as the financing of the new biodiesel plant in Lakota. Global Ethanol will manage the plant and market all of the product produced.

For investors: GS Agrifuels is a subsidiary of Greenshift, stock symbol: GSHF. In my opinion, after a brief cruise around the investor info on their website, this company has some serious issues financially, so do your homework if this is an investment that interests you. The “good” news is you can buy 100,000 shares for $400, but my online brokerage adds a penny a share for stocks under $2 so an investment would need a 50% rise to break even.

Back to the biodiesel from corn oil idea: Last week VeraSun Energy VSE announced during their third quarter conference call that they will start producing corn oil in 2009. After reading about the deal outlined here, I realized this could be a great thing for ethanol producers. Ethanol companies have had a very rough six months as ethanol prices have fallen and corn prices risen. If these companies become sources of biodiesel or biodiesel feedstock as well as ethanol producers they will generate additional renewable energy from the same raw material; corn.

Quite a few analysts have decided other feed stocks are more appropriate for ethanol production, however, corn is what Midwest farmers grow and they are good at it. The ability to generate additional fuel in the form of biodiesel from corn will give it an advantage over single product feed stocks. I grew up in the Midwest and come from a farming family, so I am for something that will be good news for corn farmers.

Source: Cleantech.com

Photo: Iowa Farmer Today Corn Cam

This article is not a recommendation to buy or sell any securities.

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Tyson and Syntroleum to build biofuel plant for B-52 fuel

Or: How I stopped worrying and learned to love the eco-friendly bomb!

By Tim Plaehn  
November 20, 2007 – 12:17 pm

Tyson Foods has big plans to get into the biofuel business. In June, Tyson and Syntroleum formed a joint venture called Dynamic Fuels, to produce renewable fuels for diesel, jet and military markets. The venture has announced plans to build a 75 million gallon production facility in Louisiana.

Tyson has 2.3 billion pounds of fat to use as feed stock. The Air Force’s B-52 bomber is the first military jet certified for synthetic fuels. What a match! Seriously, Tyson has contracted with the Air Force for continued testing of the new fuel. Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana has three squadrons of B-52s, so there will be a ready market for the fuel. The biodiesel refinery will start construction in 2008, with fuel production expected to start in 2010.

The company claims the new fuel has higher energy content, better cold flow properties and less carbon emissions than the jet fuel currently available. The fuel will also be compatible with existing pipelines, storage and other infrastructure.

This is the second biofuel joint venture for Tyson. They have previously formed a strategic alliance with Conoco Phillips to produce biodiesel at one of Conoco’s existing refineries in Texas. Production there is expected to start up next month and ramp up to 175 million gallons of biodiesel a year. As another way to invest in biofuels Tyson, stock symbol TSN, is on its way to becoming a significant player. A ready source of feed stock and strong alliances show a strong future for Tyson.

If you are looking for a more aggressive way to invest, Syntroleum, stock SYNM, is a very small company with some interesting technologies.

Source: Cleantech.com

Article is not advice to buy or sell any securities.

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Ford Chairman Frustrated About Pace of Alternative Fuel Development

By Bill Hobbs  
November 15, 2007 – 9:13 am

Ford Motor Co. Chairman William Clay Ford Jr., expressed frustration Tuesday night at the slow pace of alternative fuel development, specifically in the area of cellulosic ethanol, during a lecture at the School of Natural Resources and Environment at the University of Michigan. Last year, Ford joined other American carmaker pledging that half of their vehicles would be flex-fuel models by 2012 if such fuels were available. The New York Times reports…

The pledge followed incentives from the Bush administration for the development of E85, an ethanol-gasoline mixture that causes less carbon dioxide emissions than gasoline. Mr. Ford said, however, that he supported the move on the expectation that fuel producers would move quickly from E85, which is derived from corn, to cellulosic ethanol, which is made from wood chips and other fibers. Critics have said E85 is too costly to the environment to be a long-term alternative. A gallon of E85 often costs more than a gallon of gasoline, though a car does not go as far on it.

“It certainly appeared a year ago that we were going to have a national push on ethanol, and we wanted to have the vehicles ready,” Mr. Ford said. “But we always knew that food-based ethanol would not be the answer. The shift to cellulosic ethanol has been slower than we were led to believe.” He added: “If we don’t end up with cellulosic ethanol quickly, we are going to hit the wall on ethanol.”

Fo0d-based ethanol currently gets much more government help, in the form of subsidies and tax breaks, than the cellulosic ethanol sector gets government help in the form of research-and-development funding.

Chairman Ford also had some interesting comments about the need to encourage more usage of bicycles, mopeds and mass transit.

Pictured: Ford Escape Hybrid SUV that can run on gasoline or E-85 fuel.

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Liquid Coal Called “A Loser No Matter How You Look At It” in Alternative Fuels Race

By Bill Hobbs  
November 14, 2007 – 10:00 am

Some alternative vehicle fuels such as liquid coal can cause more harmful greenhouse gas emissions than polluters such as petrol or diesel, the Union of Concerned Scientists warned in a study released Tuesday. The organization’s press release stressed the need for “life cycle analysis” of various alternative fuel sources to determine which are the best in terms of lowering overall carbon emissions.

“We need to wean ourselves off oil, but we should replace it with the cleanest alternatives possible,” said Patrician Monahan, author of the report and deputy director of UCS’s Clean Vehicles Program. “Let’s not trade one bad habit for another.”

Liquid coal, for example, can release 80 percent more global warming pollution than gasoline, the report found. Corn ethanol, conversely, could be either more polluting or less than gasoline, depending on how the corn is grown and the ethanol is produced. On average, corn ethanol can reduce emissions about 20 percent, though there is uncertainty due to differing land use practices. The cleanest alternative, cellulosic ethanol from grasses or wood chips, could reduce emissions by more than 85 percent.

“Biofuels have a Jekyll and Hyde reputation depending on what study you read and what assumptions you make,” Monahan said. “But liquid coal is a loser no matter how you look at it. We need to set standards so farmers know the right way to produce cleaner fuels.” She also cautioned that we must ensure that biofuels and other alternative fuels do not threaten the environment or limit food production.

You can read the UCS press release here and download the complete study here.

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Hydrogen Fuel Cell-Powered UAV Sets Distance Flight Record

By Bill Hobbs  
November 14, 2007 – 9:49 am

A hydrogen fuel cell-powered “micro UAV” - a small unmanned aerial vehicle called Pterosoar - has set a new distance record, flying 78 miles. The Pterosoar was developed jointly by Horizon Fuel Cell Technologies of Singapore and Millennium Cell of New Jersey. Horizon described the event in a news release:

The fuel cell integrated micro UAV, which was designed by two leading U.S. aerospace research laboratories and supported by NASA, the Dryden Flight Research Center, the U.S. Air Force Office of scientific Research and the National Science Foundation, set a new micro-UAV flight distance record of 78 miles (128 km) in Lancaster, California, exceeding by 28 miles (40 km) the previous record set in 2006 in Estonia. Even more significant is that this flight record was achieved using only 25% of the hydrogen tank capacity stored on‐board the aircraft. On a full tank of fuel, the aircraft’s flying range is 500 km (310 miles), enabling flights that are several times longer than previously recorded.

There’s amateur video on YouTube documenting the flight, and Horizon Fuel Cell Technologies has more info on its fuel-cell UAV program on its website here. Horizon also recentlyshowed off a jet wing-style UAV also powered by a hydrogen fuel cell.

Horizon CEO George Gu says that while the UAVs have performed well and set records using on-board pre-filled pressurized hydrogen tanks, but is looking to employ “more advanced forms of hydrogen storage based on Millennium Cell’s Hydrogen on Demand technology.”

The company says using that technology will significantly reduce the size of Horizon’s current power system, while allowing best in class flight times for fuel cell powered small UAV’s. Horizon and Millennium Cell recently announced a joint venture to develop, manufacture and market a number of new products combining Millennium’s ready-to-use Hydrogen on Demand® cartridges and Horizon’s compact fuel cells.

In 2006, the Teal Group, an aerospace and defense market analysis firm based in Fairfax, Virginia, forecast the annual global market for UAVs would triple to $8.3 billion over the next 10 years, with the U.S. military accounting for about two thirds of that spending on UAVs. The Teal Group also anticipates that a civil UAV market will slowly emerge over the next decade, starting with government organizations requiring surveillance systems similar to military UAVs such as coast guards, border patrol organizations and similar national security organizations.

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