New Technology Turns Garbage Into Gold

IMAGINE... Imagine a machine that can turn almost anything into oil. Imagine that it uses natural processes like heat and pressure, and produces no pollution. Imagine that waste from landfills, refuse from poultry factories, sludge from city sewage, or even infectious medical waste, are used to make the oil. Everybody says it sounds too good to be true. But now we have the science -- and two factories -- to prove it.

"This is a solution to three of the biggest problems facing mankind," Brian Appel, CEO of Changing World Technologies, Inc., told Discover magazine in a May 2003 feature article. "This process can deal with the world's waste. It can supplement our dwindling supplies of oil. And it can slow down global warming."

The process is called thermal depolymerization. Waste goes in one end and comes out the other as three products, all valuable and environmentally benign: High-quality oil, clean-burning gas, and purified minerals that can be used as fuels, fertilizers, or specialty chemicals for manufacturing. CWT established a Research & Development plant in Philadelphia in 1999 to test and refine the technology. It successfully processed about seven tons per day of different types of waste, like animal waste, tires, plastics and paper.

ConAgra Foods proposed a joint venture for the first commercial application of the technology. As a result, a $20 million plant is poised to begin operating in September on the grounds of a massive Butterball Turkey plant in Carthage, Missouri. Funded in part by a $5 million grant from the US Environmental Protection Agency, the plant will process 200 tons per day of fats, bones, feathers, and grease, turning it into oil, with the only by-product being water.

"This is tremendous!" said Paul Baskis, the inventor of the process, to the Kansas City Star. "From the tests we've run in our pilot, we know that if we took all the agricultural wastes (in America) and converted them into oil we could make billions of barrels per year." (One billion barrels could effectively eliminate the need for Persian Gulf imports.)

The conversion process emulates the earth's natural geothermal activity, whereby organic material is converted into fossil fuel under conditions of extreme heat and pressure over millions of years. By using pipes, pressure vessels, valves, and heat exchange storage tanks to control temperature and pressure, thermal depolymerization shortens the process from millions of years to mere hours. And, the process is simple enough to be completed "on the back of a flatbed truck," says Appel.

The technology is 85% energy efficient because it has very low Btu requirements. It generates its own energy, utilizes recycled water throughout, produces no uncontrollable emissions and no secondary hazardous waste streams. In addition, the process can make both the coal and petroleum industries themselves more clean and profitable by turning their waste and chemical by-products into salable resources.

Lotta problems with this. Search the web. If it sounds too good to be true...

A number of people suspect this company of being not all they're cracked up to be. For example:

http://www.mindfully.org/Technology/2005/Changing-World-Technologies-Palmer9apr05.htm

However, there may well be some promising technology on the horizon in this area...

Here's another interesting and relevant post, from http://www.thealders.net/blogs/2004/05/22/changing-world-technologies/

Here is some food for thought about Changing-world technologies. My name is Dean Gokel (randigokel @ earth link.net). I am a professional research scientist holding degrees in both chemistry and geology. The last 18 years has been spent running my state certified environmental laboratory in North Carolina. Changing World is keeping “tight lipped” for good reason, they are mostly smoke and mirrors living “high off the hog (turkey) based solely on hype. They are doing quite well at it, no need to crash the party so to speak, 60 million and climbing requires no boat rocking. I wish my laboratory could generate the millions they have, but we are professional researchers willing to validate our or anyone who boasts technical claims with our chemists and analytical equipment, no hype, no bigger than life journalism just science. I have spent millions of my own money (all of my money) on our biomass program and can report very detailed information as to what chemicals and fuels generated in our bio-reactor. We named it the “Waste Elimination Biostill.” WE DO NOT CLAIM wild things like “anything to oil” as it is not possible to convert lead into gold!

We can only bio-react organic rich materials like poultry, hog and cattle wastes, hog lagoon wastes, organic chemical wastes etc. We are more than willing to share our analytical data, including gas chromatograph mass spectroscopy. Anybody wishing to touch, taste, smell or see our clean burning fuels are welcome to come to Raleigh North Carolina to see it FIRST HAND. I have retained all test batch samples and data for ALL QUALIFIED investigators to review. I hope Stetts Stettler can read this! (his comments published 10/5/04)

The BIGGEST problem with our technology is that the local government found out about us. Less than 24 hours after our head line new story on WRAL 5 August 29, 2005 (see their web site for past stories) guess what happened? We were slapped with an injunction to STOP MAKING BIO-SYNTHETIC FUEL AND WERE ORDERED TO DISSASEMBLE our reactor. We were found GUILTY of being a “NUISENCE” THERE WERE NO SPECIFIC REGULATIONS SITED OR VIOLATED IN OUR CONDUCT OF WORK. Think about it, the government LOOSES major tax revenues when individuals can generate their own fuels instead of going to the gas station. They do not get paid road tax per gallon, they do not get land fill taxes, they do not get to fine hog lagoons for spills and generally do not want to loose control. WE ALL are being held hostage. A gas station typically makes 3 to 5 cents per gallon over what they buy it for, but the government makes 39 cents in taxes plus they get under ground tank registration fees and fines in the for leaks here in North Carolina ($10,000 or more per incident when surface water is impacted, federal clean water act). Our bio-gasoline costs less than 30 cents per gallon to produce and the state of North Carolina remembers their high school history lessons, specifically the Boston Tea party (over taxation with out representation).

We were performing a demonstration of our technology to some potential investors as I was trying to raise capital because I went broke because of this project. Biomass conversion is REAL SCIENCE, the Federal Government is spending millions in their own research labs, but just like the cure to cancer, it is better to perpetually study, than to Solve a problem. When the public finds out the truth, the government looses billions, they just will not let this happen with out a fight. I welcome ALL who are truely interested in investing or validating ONCE AND FOR ALL that biomass conversion to fuels and chemicals of economic value CAN AND DOES work, just not in the manner that Changing World has tried to develop. They have way too much energy input, both in heating and pressurizing for a truely profitable process, ever!

According to FIRST HAND information, their oil is not high quality and will never be utilizing the process they developed. I am sure none of you will ever get to the “bottom line” of their story. Please keep reading their hype then COME SEE ME, I have the real answer. I too have filed a patent and am waiting for this long process to finish. Once a patent has been filed, one can operate as if the patent has been approved, no need to hide behind it. I do fine it fascinating that the patent office replied to my patent in less than 30 days. They granted a domestic license BUT denied me the opportunity to release this information to international markets. They sited …”existing laws relating to espionage and the National Security of export of technical data.” They further stated I must read and comply with “other agencies, particularly the Office of Defense Trade Controls, Department of State (with respect to Arms, Munitions and the Implements of War (22 CFR 121-128)The office of Export Administration, Department of Commerce (15 CFR 370.10 (j)) the office of Foreign Assets Control, Department of treasury (31 CFR Parts 500 +) and the Department of Energy.” Why did they respond to my patent so quickly? Answer, details presented in my patent application PROVED we are for real and this SCARES THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT!!! I hope readers will contact me personally so I can Prove the science of biomass conversion is REAL and CWT is not as grand as the journalists claim. I ask where’s the science?

Dean Gokel — 10:27 am 12/3/2005

Here, I'll just post the text:

Cary Man Says Chickens Could Be Used To Fuel Vehicles
Some Neighboring Businesses Not Pleased With Smell Coming From Man's Idea

POSTED: 9:20 am EDT August 30, 2005
UPDATED: 12:27 pm EDT August 30, 2005

CARY, N.C. -- A Cary man said he has found the answer to our fuel problem and it involves chickens. It would cost you pennies a gallon, but does it pass the smell test?

Don't throw out those chicken scraps after you finish eating. Dean Gokel believes they could be the answer to the country's gas problems.

Dean Gokel, a scientist who works out of a lab in Cary, said he can take chicken scraps and turn it into synthetic fuel that can run your car.

"I'm making fuel for pennies a gallon," he said.

Gokel created a dark, sludge-like fuel made from chicken parts. Gokel also said his fuel burns cleaner than diesel fuel or gasoline. Eventually, he said, he could figure out how to mass-produce the stuff as a real alternative to gasoline and oil.

Gokel has already been successful at using the bio-fuel to power small engines.

"I'm making small batches five gallons at a time, but I need to make a large-scale batch so I can tell the world to put it in a car and drive away," he said.

However, some businesses in Cary are not pleased with Gokel's idea.

Officials said several neighboring businesses have complained to the city that the stench is so bad they have to go outside their offices to catch a breath. Gokel acknowledges the problem but argues it is the price of progress.

"There's an odor. Sure. There are rules about odors, but everyone's trash stinks, and I'm trying to put it to use and do something with it," said Gokel.

The city has ordered Gokel to stop making the fuel until he can figure out a way to better ventilate the odor. Gokel contends his landlord should fix the ventilation system.

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