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On Point: Let them eat ethanol
www.rockymountainnews.com ^ | 3-7-07 | Vince Carrol

Posted on 03/07/2007 8:36:15 AM PST by dynachrome

So what's more important to you: energy independence and this state's "new energy economy," or the fight against hunger?

(Excerpt) Read more at rockymountainnews.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Editorial; US: Colorado
KEYWORDS: e85; energy; ethanol; gasohol; tortillas
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To: dynachrome

If ethanol was being produced without a subsidy, I would have no problem. The new use of corn would change the dynamics of the market, but that's life. The only remedy would be to implement price controls or ban the production of ethanol. Either remedy would cause more problems than it fixes.

But the fact is that ethanol is being produced with a huge honkin' subsidy. This is a big problem. The subsidy allows ethanol producers to out-bid people who wish to consume food as food, using government money. The government will then, no doubt, turn around and subsidize the food to make sure nobody starves. This way lies madness.


21 posted on 03/07/2007 9:23:05 AM PST by gridlock (Isn't it peculiar that no matter what the problem, the government's solution is always "more taxes")
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To: Rakkasan1
Speaking of links - about ethanol

Seems not all Brazilians are happy about ethanol

http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig7/desousa1.html

Some see it as a trade issue
http://www.truthabouttrade.org/article.asp?id=5029

And still others see Corporate Welfare (Cargill is eeevvviill)

http://www.crystalsugar.com/media/news.archives/cargill.asp
For more fun look up Amazon deforestation and Cargill...

As for me, I got no choice, all gas here is at least 10% ETOH and my mileage goes to pot in the winter.
22 posted on 03/07/2007 9:29:11 AM PST by ASOC ("Once humans are exposed to excellence, mere average desirability is disappointing")
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To: gridlock
If ethanol was being produced without a subsidy

Eventually, I'm sure it will be. Right now I'm waiting to see if the corn subsidies will continue...since grain prices are fairly high right now.
23 posted on 03/07/2007 9:31:04 AM PST by P-40 (Al Qaeda was working in Iraq. They were just undocumented.)
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To: gridlock

"This way lies madness."
The Hugo Chavez model, anyway.


24 posted on 03/07/2007 9:32:03 AM PST by dynachrome ("Where am I? Where am I going? Why am I in a handbasket?")
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To: Publius6961

"I love false dichotomies..."
I hope he was making fun of the way libs set those up.


25 posted on 03/07/2007 9:33:10 AM PST by dynachrome ("Where am I? Where am I going? Why am I in a handbasket?")
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To: gridlock

Too right! If Ethanol were a viable fuel then it wouldn't need subsidy. And, as you say, subsidy distorts the market for the other uses of the ethanol-producing stock. It's demented.

Who lobbied for the USA to lock into Ethanol? Corn-growers.


26 posted on 03/07/2007 9:53:08 AM PST by agere_contra
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To: dynachrome

Does this mean less money to farmers to not grow things?


27 posted on 03/07/2007 10:09:58 AM PST by art_rocks
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To: chaos_5
The problem with biodiesel though is that per acre yields are so low. Most of it comes from soybeans and they only get about 48 gallons of biodiesel per acre on average from soybeans. That's pitiful. It would take something like 10 acres of land to supply just one average driver enough fuel for a year, provided his vehicle has good fuel economy and he doesn't drive too many miles. It would take around two acres of land to supply the same driver ethanol if he was driving a similar vehicle burning pure ethanol. Ethanol yields from corn are just so much higher than biodiesel yields from soybeans that it doesn't really matter that you can get about twice as many miles per gallon of biodiesel than you can from ethanol in a similar vehicle. Until we get new feedstocks for biodiesel that are a good four or five times or more productive than soybeans, ethanol will be the better fuel on a miles per acre basis.

None of these fuels made from plants we grow are really going to work out well until we can come up with one that we can produce enough of it from each acre to supply several drivers. With ethanol from corn it takes maybe slightly more than two acres of land to supply one average driver. With twenty million acres of corn devoted to ethanol we would only be able to supply somewhere around 10 million average drivers. If we could produce enough of some biofuel concoction to supply four drivers per acre, 20 million acres would be enough to supply 80 million drivers, which would really be something. I don't think that's impossible at all. There are 43,560 square feet in an acre. It's taking a little more than 100 square feet of farmland on average to produce enough feedstock for just one gallon of ethanol, and closer to a 1000 square feet to produce enough feedstock for just one gallon of biodiesel. Surely we can do a lot better than that.
28 posted on 03/07/2007 11:41:50 AM PST by TKDietz (")
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To: TKDietz
Thanks for the info on biodiesel, I dint realize the per acer yield was so low. Given that soy is such a good source of protein I would speculate that we would be better off eating it and using the land that would otherwise grow cattle feed for the production of a higher yield fuel crop.

Just an idea, again thanks for the info.
29 posted on 03/07/2007 12:32:39 PM PST by chaos_5
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To: TKDietz; chaos_5

How about algae as a solution for your miles-per-acre problem ? By pairing a high-oil content algae with CO2 enhancement from smokestack output:

"One key is selecting an algae with a high oil density — about 50% of its weight. Because this kind of algae also grows so fast, it can produce 15,000 gallons of biodiesel per acre.

For his part, Berzin calculates that just one 1,000 megawatt power plant using his system could produce more than 40 million gallons of biodiesel and 50 million gallons of ethanol a year. That would require a 2,000-acre "farm" of algae-filled tubes near the power plant. There are nearly 1,000 power plants nationwide with enough space nearby for a few hundred to a few thousand acres to grow algae and make a good profit, he says."

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/2006-01-10-algae-powerplants_x.htm


30 posted on 03/07/2007 4:07:09 PM PST by Kellis91789
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To: Kellis91789
Algae sounds promising. Yields could theoretically be very high. The problem is that no one has figured out how to consistently produce really high yields or how to do it cheaply. In the past there was a lot of research done on open pond algae growing systems. A lot of money was spent, but no one figured out how to produce cheap fuel from algae. Now they are focusing on closed systems (plastic covered ponds, giant test tubes, etc.) where they can control the amount of sunlight the algae gets, control the temperature and nutrient levels, and keep wild algae and other contaminants out. These systems are obviously a lot more expensive to operate than open ponds (which weren't even close to being profitable in producing algae as a biodiesel feedstock), so they'll really have to get some fantastic yields to justify the high up front and continuing costs of closed systems. I hope they succeed, but they still have a lot of hurdles to overcome before biodiesel from algae will ever be commercially viable. They might figure it out in the next couple of years, or maybe it will be twenty years, or maybe it will never work. We'll see.
31 posted on 03/08/2007 7:31:04 AM PST by TKDietz (")
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To: Kellis91789
I had to leave and couldn't finish my thoughts on the last post I made. I wanted to address a couple of claims made in the article you linked me to. This Berzin guy makes some very optimistic claims. Read what he says and pull out your calculator and the things he says do not add up though.

First off, he says that you can get 15,000 gallons of biodiesel per acre from algae. That's never been done, but most researchers in this field seem theorize that yields that high are obtainable. They hope to do this with high oil content varieties of algae, which as Berzin states can be about 50% oil. Anyway, Berzin says that with a 2000 acre algae farm we could produce 40 million gallons of biodiesel and 50 million gallons of ethanol. That's where his math falls apart. First off, he assumes like many others that we could possibly get 15,000 gallons of biodiesel per acre from algae (even though it's never been done), yet he claims we'd got 40 million gallons from 2000 acres from the his system. Even if we could hit that Holy Grail 15,000 gallon per acre mark, 2000 acres would only be enough land for 30 million gallons, not 40 million (if every square foot of this acreage is covered by his giant algae test tubes). Folks trying to raise money for projects like this sometimes exaggerate a little I guess. What's 10 million gallons anyway?.

He also says we could get 50 million gallons of ethanol from 2000 acres using his system, in addition to the 40 million gallons of biodiesel. Wow. That sounds a little fishy to me. Biodiesel weighs in the neighborhood of 7 pounds a gallon. If the algae is 50% oil, and they get a pound of biodiesel for each pound of oil (they wouldn't get quite that because they have to remove the glycerine from the oil), they'd have 7 pounds of spent algae left for each gallon of biodiesel they produce. Now, it takes about 14 pounds of sugar to make a gallon of pure alcohol, or roughly the same amount of starch. A bushel of corn weighs 56 pounds and it's about 70% starch. That's why they can get 2.8 gallons of ethanol from each bushel. There is about 39.2 pounds of starch in a bushel of corn, 70% of 56 lbs., divide that by 14 (how many pounds of sugar or starch it takes to make a gallon of pure alcohol), and you get 2.8. Anyway, if this guy is able to do what no one has ever done and produce 15,000 gallons of biodiesel per acre from algae, and then do even better than that and somehow produce 40 million gallons from only 2000 acres, and if he's able to somehow turn each gallon of algae oil into a whole gallon of biodiesel and not have waste any in the process, he's going to end up with about 280 million pounds of spent algae to turn into ethanol. Now, if this 100% of what remains of the algae after extracting all this oil with no waste is starch or sugar, which it couldn't possibly be, he'd have enough starch or sugar there to make 20 million gallons of ethanol, not 50 million. He'd get a good bit less if he was using cellulosic ethanol processes to produce the ethanol, and it would cost a lot more.

There is a lot of excitement around alternative energy right now and a lot of money being invested. That's good thing overall because it increases the likelihood that we'll have some major breakthroughs. Investors need to be careful though because so much of what we are hearing about alternative fuels is b.s. This Berzin guy may be on to something, but his numbers do not add up. We need to take everything he says with a grain of salt, and should do the same on all of these wild claims made about unproven technology. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. A lot of these people appear to be making stuff up as they go along to get people to invest in their projects. This is dangerous for investors and not particularly helpful in the overall energy debate because too many people tend to believe the fluff they read in the news and act on their beliefs without having first checked out the wild claims they've heard with a healthy dose of skepticism.

I think there is a very good chance we'll come up with some type of biofuel concoction someday that we can produce at a reasonable cost and we'll be able to provide enough fuel for several people from each acre we use to produce feedstocks. There are 43,560 square feet in an acre. That's a lot of room to work with, and there are a lot of very bright minds working on this problem. We aren't there yet though, and anyone who says he knows how to do it right now needs to be taken with a healthy dose of skepticism because many before him have said the same and been unable to come even close to delivering on their promises.
32 posted on 03/08/2007 9:51:10 AM PST by TKDietz (")
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To: TKDietz

Yes, I noticed the math error on the acreage vs. the total gallons from 2,00 acres. I doubt that was Berzin's error -- more likely the USA Today reporter combined several unrelated statements and incorrectly attributed them to Berzin. Scientists must love it when reporters make them look that stupid.

On GreenCarCongress I came across a diagram of the tube-type algae growth system Berzin/GreenFuels has come up with. It is much more complicated than simply laying cellophane tubing out on the ground and maintaining an overpressure of CO2 while the algae grows. It is actually a triangular vertical structure and pumps both CO2 and Algae in a circular flow through it. Not cheap, I'm sure. I had something in mind that was a much simpler system and lower capital cost for the growth environment.


33 posted on 03/09/2007 12:02:40 PM PST by Kellis91789
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To: dynachrome

So we're going to starve to death if we make ethanol? Just how stupid is this author?


34 posted on 03/09/2007 12:08:56 PM PST by ozzymandus
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To: Kellis91789
Reading over the article again, Berzin didn't say the max was 15,000 gallons. Apparently he believes it's 20,000, which is a good bit higher than most researchers think we'd be able to get if everything works out as well as they think it could. Even if his extremely optimistic algae yield estimates prove to be obtainable, his ethanol numbers wouldn't add up though, it would not be possible to get anywhere close to the amount of ethanol he claims he could make with what remains of the algae after the oil is extracted. His numbers just don't add up, and they are based on what are in all likelihood unobtainable yields estimates in the first place. Yields would have to be high though to justify the costs of such an elaborate system for growing algae. They'd have to get something like at least six or seven pounds of dried algae per square foot to get the per acre yields he says he'll be able to get. Sunlight will penetrate just the top few inches of the algae, so they've devised methods for keeping the algae moving, folding over, so it all gets enough sunlight. It might be possible to get huge yields that way, especially since they continually harvest it and they plan to keep it well fed with waste CO2. Algae is a very simple and efficient plant that grows quickly, and almost every bit of the strains they are looking at can be used to produce either biodiesel or ethanol. There wouldn't be a lot of waste. But again, no one has ever been able to get these super high yields consistently on a large scale. It just hasn't been done. Researchers in this field haven't even settled yet on which types of algae they'll use to get the really high yields. I hope it works out for them, but I wouldn't count on that happening anytime soon. They have a lot of work ahead of them, a lot of problems to solve before we'll ever see wide scale production of algae as a biodisel feedstock. But maybe someday we'll all be driving around in algae-diesel powered vehicles and guys like Berzin will be zillionaires.
35 posted on 03/09/2007 1:34:39 PM PST by TKDietz (")
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To: TKDietz

"Sunlight will penetrate just the top few inches of the algae, so they've devised methods for keeping the algae moving, folding over, so it all gets enough sunlight."

That was my take. Each tube is holding probably 20x the algae soup that the same surface area of a pond would grow. There is actually quite a lot of walking around room between the tubes -- not 'wall-to-wall', so to speak, coverage of the acreage used. Very elaborate recirculation might be cost effective if everything has to be placed in close proxity to the powerplant providing the waste CO2, but that also argues against scaling up to 2,000 acres. I like the idea of plastic tubes because it has the potential to eliminate water wasted to evaporation and COULD be dirt cheap as a 'greenhouse' -- possible with algae, where other crops would need more atmospheric volume per plant. Doing it the GreenFuel way seems like an awful lot of capital cost to build what are essentially permanent tubular greenhouse structures.

I had more of a 'farming' approach in mind -- cheap celophane 12" tubing with no structure, but just inflated by an overpressure of gases and lying on otherwise useless desert ground in sections a few hundred feet long. When the algae has expanded to fill as much of the tubing as it will, reel in the whole string of tubing and crush the whole thing to extract the oil and recycle the celophane and water. Always laying down new celophane tubing and starting a new batch in the spot just harvested. Activities manageable by farmers, not mad chemists.

Seems like it would be a lot easier to convince power plants to crop-share the adjacent land and provide the smokestack CO2 than it would be to get them to invest tens of millions in infrastructure for what GreenFuel is attempting.


36 posted on 03/09/2007 2:38:50 PM PST by Kellis91789
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To: dynachrome
You got that right dynachrome.

Ethanol is based upon artifical economices. It takes approximately 25% more energy to create a gallon of ethanol that is produced. Secondly, when used in automobiles, ethanol gets only about 75% the mileage of gasoline. So, when one factors all this, the net net energy cost of ethanol is about twice as expensive as gasoline. Lastly, the "unintended consequence of all this ethanol activity is that the price of grain based food products is starting to climb dramatically. When the price of Cheerios and Corn Flakes doubles in the grocery stores, listen to those greenie soccer mom's squeal....
37 posted on 03/09/2007 2:52:02 PM PST by snoringbear
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