Manure & Garbage Cut Biofuels Costs

Producing bio-ethanol takes a lot of energy. And energy is expensive--especially natural gas and oil. Bio-ethanol manufacturers are substituting manure, plastics, paper, rice hulls, and other garbage for natural gas--saving many millions of dollars in production costs!

The world's first manure fired ethanol plant is expected to go online in the next two months. Not only will it be environmentally friendly but it will also save Panda Ethanol about $30M a year. ___Source (good video)__via__QiBioenergy

A wider array of garbage and waste can be used to fire bio-ethanol plants using a new flex-fuel boiler developed by EPI.

Substantial savings are realized by using in-plant waste streams as fuel. Paper mills produce a paper sludge waste that is typically land filled but can be utilized as a fuel to produce steam for the paper making operations. Other industries may have plastics, paper, cardboard, oat hulls, rice hulls, distiller’s grains, syrup, glycerin or other byproducts that could be converted into usable energy utilizing EPI’s flexible fuel fluidized bed system. ___Source (PDF)__via__QiBioenergy

This move away from natural gas and oil-fired boilers for bio-ethanol production helps reduce costs of production for bio-ethanol--making it more competitive economically--and it makes more natural gas available to the parts of thegeneral market which may have more difficulty making the same type of substitution.

Such flex-fuel boilers will be equally as useful when cellulosic alcohol processing is more common in 5 to 10 years. The same technology will be useful as well for various biomass to liquid fuel thermochemical processes which are expected to take over most of the biofuels industry within 20 years--unless Craig Venter and his merry band of synthesists can create a new life-form that makes a better, cheaper biofuel from CO2 and sunlight.

Most analysts of bio-energy seem to be lost in a haze of misinformation. Blaming biofuels for high food costs is one clear sign of confusion on an analyst's part. But these things have a way of sorting themselves out.

Oil costs between now and the November US Presidential elections are likely to be kept high, by various machinations. Behind the scenes currency manipulation is only one tactic that seems to be working for now. US government budgetary and Federal Reserve Bank monetary policies have made such manipulation fairly easy. Other reasons for high oil costs--high demand, temporary short supplies due to manpower and infrastructure shortages etc.--are simply part of doing business in any industry. Oil is not just any business, however, and its price has repercussions that propagate throughout the geopolitical globe.