Plants for fuel
There was an article this morning on DC's Fox 5 news station from Nat'l Arboretum about 'power plants' for fuel. Besides the corn for ethanol, the switchgrass seems more promising because it is a perennial plant, so do not need to be replanted each year. The scientist claims it also takes less work to develop/convert, etc, in comparison to the amount of energy it can produce. There is more info available at their website: http://www.usna.usda.gov/
Tags: plant
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Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Jean-Yves Landry on -
The only logical plant to use for fuel is Industrial Hemp.
An alternative is to better the water electrolysis process to use water as a fuel, with an external battery.
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Permalink Reply by Colt Lewis on -
HOW AND WHY?
Why is hemp better than switchgrass?
Why do people blame ethanol on the decline of the dollar?
Can't we just eat rice and potatoes instead of corn? Personally I think corn taste like shizzle.
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Permalink Reply by Colt Lewis on
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So you are saying there is not enough biological carbon to supply our energy needs. That is what that Berkeley article you are posting everywhere says.
That article is highly flawed!! There is enough biomass to grow MORE food and produce ALL of our energy domestically. I just need 100 million to get my gasification plant started. Thats like one day in Iraq!
Do I need to take a picture of all the trees that are dead from the tropical storms? The fuel is there, we are just not using it.
The EU set very high standards for energy, there is a problem supplying the biodiesel because foodcrops are used. Peanuts work great for biodiesel, but since we like to eat peanuts so much, it is not smart to make fuel from that unless there is a huge supply of peanuts. Cutting the EU mandates in half, still reduces domestic use by 5% of what it was before the mandates.
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Permalink Reply by ittybitty on -
I may have been born on a Tuesday, but it wasn't LAST Tuesday.
I think there is a separate category already established for the snake oil salespeople...... maybe you could find it and make your outlandish claims there?
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Permalink Reply by Colt Lewis on
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“Farm to Fuel” Grants Program Winner
Liberty Industries
Project Title: Low-Cost Production of Ethanol and Electricity Using Forestry Waste Products, Row Crop Residues and Municipal Solid Waste
Proposer: Liberty Industries
Contact Person: Ray Rodriquez, (850) 379-9366
Project Location: Hosford, Florida
Grant Funds Awarded: $4,000,000
Cost Share: $34,334,100
Project Description:
This $38 million project will initially produce 7 million gallons of ethanol and 5.4 Megawatts of electricity using predominantly forest waste products. That capacity is expected to be doubled in 2-3 years and subsequently expanded even more.
The technology using gasification and fermentation has been successfully used in a pilot demonstration.
The feedstock will include forestry waste, waste products from sawmills and to a lesser extent waste from nearby straw, peanut and cotton crops. In addition, the technology can use all carbon based materials and the company intends to also use discarded tires, plastics and municipal waste, reducing the amount of waste going into the landfill.
First off the size of the state of Florida is 42 million acres, let us just say thats the amount of the US we could choose to use for fuel. The earth is 37 billion acres just to put it in perspective. With a 20 year cycle at 3,000-8,000 gallons per acre of pine, 2 million acres per year * 5,000 gallons/acre is 10 billion gallons of clean ethanol per year every year.
Now we must argue that fuel is wasted transporting the trees, but we must remember that the trees are only being cut down every 20 years - 30 years. So the crop rotation requires 20 times less energy to prepare the field, 20 times less energy to plant the field, however the cultivation takes more time.
Low bulk density materials are a waste to transport, so that is why pine sounds good to me, the trees are very dense.
I used the above illustration to prove it can be done, we have more than enough land to produce 10 billion gallons of ethanol per year. The problem with my estimates is they are conservative, I believe with 42 million acres coupled with the use of our trash including paper, plastic and rubber we can produce more than twice my previous estimate of 20 billion gallons. This means up to 60 billion gallons of ethanol per year. 10% of our current supply of gasoline.
Remember that this bio-ethanol will lead to bio-diesel and bio-gasoline through the same gasification process. Do you not like the idea of reducing waste, I know I am not a flaming liberal, but you guys should realize that if we can fire up a dying timber industry and reduce the amount of trash at the dump.. It might just be a good idea.
Just think, this is a use for all of those empty water bottles!!
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Permalink Reply by Colt Lewis on
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How do you like that snake oil?
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Permalink Reply by Debbie on -
Thanks for the article. I have mixed feelings on this. I have to agree with the Friends of the Earth Europe group in that the use of food plants would only worsen the current problems being faced around the world with exorbitant food prices and hunger. That's why I've tried to stress the use of non-food related plants as an alternative energy source. And I, too, am concerned that countries may fail to consider the environmental damage that can result in implementing any alternative fuel/energy actions if the conversion entails burning (contributing to global warming), deforestation, etc. I've heard good reports on the use of electric and hydrogen-powered vehicles, but how does that address the need for fuel/energy to warm our homes this winter?
Hopefully some of the individual parliaments will lobby the EU to revise its proposal to limit the use of crops for biofuels to only non-food related plants and establish restrictions against the use of environmentally harmful techniques which, as a result, may convince the EU to increase the target goal.
Also I agree with previous comments made in this forum that any new planting of non-food related plants must be balanced with the need to plant food crops for feeding the hungry and reducing global food prices. Logically it would seem that countries should use existing non-food related plants first before converting fields that have previously produced food crops over to non-food crops. But admittedly I may be over-simplifying the issue and not have a clear grasp of the global situation.
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Permalink Reply by ittybitty on
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You have a well-grounded grasp of the issue.
The fact is the fresh-plant bio-fuel production has a horrible net energy gain of between 1.2 and 1.6. It is also a fact that because they are so inefficient, it is practically impossible to ramp up product to produce any meaningful volume of liquid fuel.
Another fact is that single-occupant internal combustion powered automobiles are a horribly inefficient means of transportation.
So if you try to power an already inefficient machine with a liquid fuel that is inefficiently produced, you have compounded your error.
Regardless of weather people chose to move to smaller electric vehicles now when petroleum fuel is on the wane, or in 10 to 20 years when natural gas is on the wane, the fact remains that in the near future, transportation as we have come to know it in this country will be fundamentally altered.
In the future mass transit will be the norm and personal auto trips will be shorter, less frequent and much cleaner.
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Permalink Reply by Debbie on
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I guess this is where I get really confused because the USDA (per the website posted in my opening discussion) states the amount of bioenergy generated from some non-food plants, like switchgrass, "can greatly exceed the amount used in its production, resulting in a favorable net energy production. Researchers calculate yields of up to 1,000 gallons of cellulosic ethanol per acre." So obviously I have a lot more research to do before I continue any support of non-food plants as an efficient alternative source for energy/fuel.
I gave up my car when I moved to DC two years ago from TX, and I rely entirely on public transportation now except for the occasional rental car to haul large items for an hour or so as needed. In fact I've become so dependent on using the Metro system here, that I'm not sure I'll ever be able to go back to Texas until, and unless, they get around to implementing a mass transit system.
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Permalink Reply by Auntie Tutu on -
I stopped raising cattle 18 months ago because I saw what using corn for fuel had done to the feed supply for livestoack ( and thus the food supply for people, worldwide). That move was almost as stupid as attacking Iraq which had nothing at all to do with the twin towers attack.
The latest news---out last night in Hawaii is that the very last sugar plantation here, on Kauai, has been leased to a biomass producer who will continue to raise canae, but just use it for biomass. We also found out at a community meedting inHamakua last night that the state house of reps in HI has passed a llaw that allows biomass prduction in any area of agricultureal land. Without involving the comminty in the decision.
BIomass is SOOOOOO innefficient, and especially using food crops. Duuuunnnhhh.
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Permalink Reply by Mark Feagins on -
Biofuels, as a gasoline additive, means we are going in a direction that keeps us dependent on gasoline. Biofuels put out our energy supply subjective to weather. In flood or in drought, we could be left in a real mess. Since biofuels are mixed and distributed with gasoline, it keeps Big Oil in control of our economy.
The United States consumes 23 million barrels per day and we only produce 5 Million barrels per day. Therefore, we have an 18 million barrel per day deficit. At 20 gallons of gasoline per barrel equates to a deficit of 36 million gallons of gasoline per day.
RE: Weather: Once again, the Houston Area is getting hit by a major hurricane and the largest concentration of our nation's gasoline refining. Hurricanes Rita and Katrina destroyed over 100 oil drilling platforms. Who knows how many Ike is about to destroy? 20 refineries are currently shutting down in preparation for Hurrican Ike. Gasoline is bad. Refineries are bad.
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