by davep » Fri 29 May 2015, 04:02:35
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', 'W')hat advantage/profit accrues to the 'corn lobby' by not selling fuel-corn? That makes no sense.
Ethanol is produced from corn as always . . . fermented by yeasts in tanks with water. There is not other way. The rest (1st, 2nd, nth gen claims to the contrary) are merely investor dog and pony shows. This will never change and the ethanol alternative is a heartless, fruitless search to continue the suburban/autocentric model forever.
In Europe we tend to use sugar beet, which is less nutrient-hungry and more efficient.
What we think, we become.
-
davep
- Senior Moderator
-
- Posts: 4579
- Joined: Wed 21 Jun 2006, 03:00:00
- Location: Europe
-
by Tanada » Fri 29 May 2015, 07:37:26
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', 'T')anada I would expect more from the site admin . . . instead of insults. I don't believe you even read your own posted link. The company's business is fermented corn ethanol. The same stuff you must have been drinking when you insulted me. Nothing to do with cellulosic alcohol. Do you know the difference?
The cellulosic business is still still-borne. Dead in the water. Or should I say, dead in its own waste products.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('wiki', 'I')n 2007, the company received a US$80 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy for the creation of a cellulosic ethanol production facility in Emmetsburg, Iowa. This facility is currently under construction and is expected to begin full operations in 2014. It is expected to produce 25 million gallons of ethanol per year from corncobs, leaves and husks provided by farmers in and around the area.[4]
Nothing has come of this. If you read the link you posted you would know that.
From the link I posted.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'C')ellulose, which provides the cellular structure for all plants, is the world's most abundant organic compound. POET has been researching and developing cellulosic ethanol technology since 2001, when we began performing bench-scale testing of our cellulosic technology at our research laboratory. In 2008, we began producing cellulosic ethanol at pilot scale at our research center. In partnership with Royal DSM of the Netherlands, POET-DSM Advanced Biofuels opened a commercial-scale ethanol plant in Emmetsburg, Iowa – dubbed “Project LIBERTY” – in September of 2014. Project LIBERTY’s feedstock is corn crop residue – cobs, leaves, husk and some stalk.
Pretending something does not exist does not make it cease to exist.
http://poetdsm.com/pr/first-commercial- ... osic-plant$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'E')MMETSBURG, IOWA (September 3, 2014) – POET-DSM Advanced Biofuels, LLC, a joint venture of Royal DSM and POET, LLC, today proved its revolutionary technology that converts agricultural residue into renewable fuel at the Grand Opening of its first commercial cellulosic ethanol plant in Emmetsburg, Iowa.
The plant, named “Project LIBERTY,” was formally opened in the presence of His Majesty Willem-Alexander, King of the Netherlands, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, Deputy Under Secretary Michael Knotek of the Department of Energy, Governor Terry Branstad and Lieutenant Governor Kim Reynolds of Iowa, other dignitaries and thousands of guests.
Project LIBERTY converts baled corn cobs, leaves, husk and stalk into renewable fuel. The plant has now officially started up, processing its first batch of biomass into cellulosic ethanol and is moving forward toward continuous operation. At full capacity, it will convert 770 tons of biomass per day to produce ethanol at a rate of 20 million gallons per year, later ramping up to 25 million gallons per year.
“Some have called cellulosic ethanol a ‘fantasy fuel,’ but today it becomes a reality,” said Jeff Broin, POET Founder and Executive Chairman. “With access now to new sources for energy, Project LIBERTY can be the first step in transforming our economy, our environment and our national security.”
by Subjectivist » Fri 29 May 2015, 11:14:41
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Pops', '[')url=http://www.nature.com/nclimate/journal/v4/n5/full/nclimate2187.html]I don't know if this has been linked[/url] but it is a study that says the same thing some of us have been saying all along, there is no crop "waste" to be used.
--
As well, I think the reason the POET process is viable is that a good portion of the "residues" it uses are leftovers from milling corn, in addition to some gratuitous corn stalks. In milling corn, the "skin" of the kernel is removed to get at the starch, from which the foods in the soft drink food group are made.
The reason POET has good results with their "cellulosic" process is that a good amount of corn starch remains on the skin of the kernels after milling, around 18% residual starch.
[p75] They say they are converting cellulose into sugar and fermenting it, but a good part of what they are fermenting is the sugar that arrives on a truck, no different than a regular ethanol plant.
Which isn't in itself terrible in the overall scheme, that residue goes into the regular ethanol process anyway I'd guess. But likely it is the thing that enables this company to be successful where other cellulosic processes have failed and I'm sure that has benefits when it comes to talking to the government. After all .gov set a cellulosic minimum and looks to have egg on it's face since cellulosic has otherwise been a fantasy, so everyone looks good if call their process cellulosic.
That is what I get anyway.
I dunno Pops, around here the corn fields have so much residue left behind the farmers my area have started bailing about half the stover off each fall to clear the fields for planting the next crop. The farms around Ohio and Michigan have gone to using a very dense plant spacing for field corn. They have raised up the cutter bar on the combines so the residual stalk is closer to 24" than the old 8" stalk they used to leave. The taller stalk remnants remain in the fields as residue after they bale the upper stalk remnants and haul them off.
II Chronicles 7:14 if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land.
-
Subjectivist
- Volunteer
-
- Posts: 4705
- Joined: Sat 28 Aug 2010, 07:38:26
- Location: Northwest Ohio
-
by Subjectivist » Fri 29 May 2015, 12:17:44
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Pops', 'N')ot sure what part you dunno sub,
The removing stover increases co2 emissions pArt or the POET process is kind of a scam part.
No doubt people bale and use stover.
The POET being a scam is a difference of opinion, I understand that just fine lol. If you agreed with everything I believed one of us would be a different person from who we are.
It's the Stover causing increased CO2 part I have a problem with, around here they already remove it. How does removing it for ethanol production vs other reasons cause greater CO2 emissions? It gets removed mechanically in both cases using fossil fueled equipment. No matter if it is used for ethanol or animals it gets digested into CO2 and/or burned into CO2.
In fact in some of the versions of the process I have read the left over residue from the stover digester part of the plant is proposed to be mixed with the WDG from the regular ethanol plant to add fiber and mass to the distillers grain feed. That would make it just more cud for the cattle/sheep or slops for the hogs.
II Chronicles 7:14 if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land.
-
Subjectivist
- Volunteer
-
- Posts: 4705
- Joined: Sat 28 Aug 2010, 07:38:26
- Location: Northwest Ohio
-
by Pops » Fri 29 May 2015, 12:36:20
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Subjectivist', 'I')t's the Stover causing increased CO2 part I have a problem with, around here they already remove it. How does removing it for ethanol production vs other reasons cause greater CO2 emissions?
You're right, it doesn't matter how it is used, it is the using rather than the leaving that is the point.
The legitimate object of government, is to do for a community of people, whatever they need to have done, but can not do, at all, or can not, so well do, for themselves -- in their separate, and individual capacities.
-- Abraham Lincoln, Fragment on Government (July 1, 1854)
-
Pops
- Elite
-
- Posts: 19746
- Joined: Sat 03 Apr 2004, 04:00:00
- Location: QuikSac for a 6-Pac
-
by Tanada » Sat 30 May 2015, 10:47:11
Love it or hate it, it looks like the EPA is getting behind the E-15 standard after all.
http://peakoil.com/alternative-energy/u ... on-ethanol$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) plans to inject $100 million in funding to get more ethanol at the gas pump, according to two industry sources, the latest push to get beyond a “blend wall” that has capped demand for the biofuel.
That would mark a big push for an overhaul of fuel-blending pumps and related infrastructure to generate higher demand for the biofuel. The USDA is expected to announce the funding on Friday, the sources said.
A USDA spokesman declined to comment on the plans.
Ethanol groups have asked the USDA to continue to offer this funding amid rising calls for policy reform from policymakers, oil companies, and environmentalists. The USDA launched a program in 2011 designed to get 10,000 flex-fuel options at gas pumps nationwide that would allow use of blends as high as E85, which is 85 percent ethanol.
The United States sets use requirements for biofuels, including ethanol, through the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) program, but has delayed setting targets for the current year and 2014 amid concern from oil companies that ethanol use has hit a saturation point without major infrastructure changes.
The plans come as oil companies and biofuels producers await a proposal from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on biofuels use requirements for 2014, 2015, and 2016, widely expected to be announced on Friday.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Alfred Tennyson', 'W')e are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
by Subjectivist » Sat 30 May 2015, 19:58:58
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', 'T')anada, your post? Did somebody really suggest throwing another $100 million of taxpayer money at the ethanol boondoggle? It's crazy! (Those guys must be drunk.
)
The opposite actually occurred yesterday. It seems some common sense has entered into this debate:
Agency scales back biofuels quotas far below requirements of 2007 law.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('WSJ', '&')quot;the EPA proposed Friday (May 29) to ease annual requirements for ethanol in gasoline, citing market restraints and other challenges that are preventing the Obama administration from meeting the goals laid out in a 2007 law."
It is the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing. EPA is suggesting a scale back while USDA is spending a hundred million on promoting blender pumps all over the country to handle E-15 and up.
http://www.ethanolrfa.org/news/entry/rf ... structure/$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')ASHINGTON — Today, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced $100 million worth of funding for new blender pump installations throughout the country. Bob Dinneen, president and CEO of the Renewable Fuels Association, released the following statement praising the USDA for its investment:
“The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) announcement today of a significant investment in blender pumps stands in stark contrast to the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) earlier decision that thwarts private sector investment in infrastructure. Clearly, Secretary Vilsack and USDA understand what is necessary to move this country’s renewable energy industry forward. Consumers across this country are applauding USDA today for its efforts to encourage a choice of high-octane, low-cost, domestically produced fuel at the pump. EPA should pay close heed.”
