Posted on 04/08/2006 3:51:10 PM PDT by ckilmer
Unless they can find ways to either (1) reduce production costs, or (2) get the raw material suppliers to PAY THEM for disposing of their waste products, then the venture will not likely be profitable. They can't count on $80 per barrel oil in the long term to make them competitive. A business model could possibly be developed to make them viable, but they've got to find a way to make their net cost of production much lower.
Considering it's not just animal byproducts that can be polymerized, I would think there have to be cheaper sources of raw materials. Any organic garbage would do, although I suspect the yields would drop. Or maybe a catalyst could be found that would shorten the polymerization process itself. I think this bears further research, but I don't think it's quite viable yet.
To RightWhale:
If you read the article closely, you will see that ALL fuel sources receive subsidies (in fact, the article points out that if fossil fuel were NOT subsidized, it would cost about $15 per gallon!). The subsidy for this oil IS leveling the playing field.
Ultimately, with the economics of scale, as more plants are built, the cost will likely decline, particularly if the highly questionable process of making livestock feed from these wastes is banned, as it has been in much of Europe. This would remove a large fraction of the competition for offal, which keeps the price high. Also, this process, which produces the oil right here at home, would sidestep the high cost of transporting crude oil from the sources in the middle east (it has been said that a supertanker burns almost as much fuel as it delivers). This can only help.
Been there, got the degree. This is an old, dead thread, but perhaps it is time for a new biotrash thread.
This is my biggest concern with the technology. Unless they can develop some means to have automatic controls over the system settings that react to the contents, there's no way to make this system more generalizable to other types of waste.
As for the $80/barrel costs, the real kicker is that a good portion of that comes from the fact that they actually have to PAY for the turkey waste (because it would otherwise be converted back into animal feed). The article says that works out to $22/barrel, so we're really seeing under $60/barrel, which does make the price competitive (and slightly lower) than worldwide crude.
Each variable—temperature, pressure, volume, tank-residence time—needs to precisely match the feedstock, which proves to be no mean feat on an industrial scale. “The really difficult thing has been finding the sweet spot in the process parameters,” says Appel. “This isn’t a laboratory. We have to respond to the real world of varying supply.”
This is my biggest concern with the technology. Unless they can develop some means to have automatic controls over the system settings that react to the contents, there’s no way to make this system more generalizable to other types of waste.
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They have another plant in Philadelphia that uses the city sewage system as feedstock. a lot of trial & error went into that system as well. I agree the system won’t be perfected until automatic controls adjust for feedstock. In the meantime what they’ll do is look for large relatively consistant feedstocks that they can set the controls for once — after much trial & error. still current testing I’ve heard about is for auto tires. a number of plants are already slated to go up in europe where mad cow has made slaughterhouse offals free. which is what they originally thought would happen in the usa if mad cow spread. it didn’t.
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