Home Bio-Digesters For Cooking Gas Production

   Among my primary interests is local energy production and local reuse of organic "waste" - the leftover by-products of our lives - food preparation and landscaping and gardening to name two large contributors to what we call our "garbage".
   Large centralized trash-to-energy plants are built on a model that imitates the status quo - central plant, collection system for raw material that is reliant on truck pick-up/delivery and a distribution method by wire, pipe, truck or rail. As a management system for both "trash" pick-up and energy production, centralized systems require a large amount of energy use, with resulting pollution, for moving things around.
    Centralized energy production also is an incredibly efficient system for the redistribution of wealth. Basically, the purchase of energy never stops - we all need it.Yet it is a product that vanishes at the moment we acquire it - yes we get something, lets say cooked food, that is essential to our well being, but in a few hours, or the next morning we will need more. 
    Imagine instead a system that does not require the purchase of energy because the energy is now locally produced by the user themselves utilizing what they have previously thrown away - things that previously they had to pay to have taken away! A variety of savings appear - both to the individual user and to the larger society. Most immediately for the user is a reduction or elimination of  paying for energy. Further, if energy production is brought to the house or building level, the means of energy production - solar collector or bio-gas generator for example - increase the value of the building they are attached to. Now instead of paying out for energy, money is saved and the value of most people's biggest asset - their house - increases.
    Following is a story from The Banaglore Mirror (India) about one family and their bio-digester -

SELF HELP IS BEST HELP

Nine gas cylinders a year rule does not apply to him

By Niranjan Kaggere

Posted On Monday, July 29, 2013

It’s a problem that has generated more than a whiff of unpleasantness. While most of us ranted and suffered as the garbage kept piling up right outside our doorstep, with contractors refusing to carry out door-to-door collection, a Banashankari resident did what a true civic-minded citizen would have done.

To begin with, he complained to the BBMP commissioner. But after three complaints went unheeded, Satish Bakshi decided not to waste any more time and do it himself. And he came up trumps! Bakshi’s efforts have paid off and today, he and his family savour the sweet smell of success as their indigenously made bio-gas plant lights the kitchen fire thrice a week, and also keeps their vegetable and fruit garden verdant and bountiful.

Bakshi says he watched the garbage assume menacing proportions with every passing day, and it finally struck him that he could extract gas out of it. With the internet as his teaching aid, and a plastic water tank, a useless tyre and other ordinary devices to fuel his dream, he embarked on the project.

SURFING FOR IDEAS

An independent tax consultant, Bakshi tapped the internet for ideas. “I read that the concept of converting garbage into gas had caught on in Pune and Kochi. Since I was setting up my bio-gas plant in a residential area, I needed to avoid foul smell and ensure disposal of residue (slurry) within minimum space and with limited funds. The methods suggested on  line were for a full-fledged bio-gas plant which I couldn’t have set up. But taking a leaf out of those ideas, I thought of experimenting with a plastic water drum installed on my roof,” Bakshi told Bangalore Mirror.

Bakshi’s next step was to put the ubiquitous black water drum to ingenious use. He converted it into a digester tank to generate pure methane and installed a pipeline leading to his kitchen.

Bakshi says he had a plastic tank on the terrace of his house with a capacity of 1,000 litres. “I bought another similar tank of 750-litre capacity. After making a small partition inside the bigger tank to hold the garbage, I inverted the smaller tank upon it, covering the partition. To facilitate the insertion of garbage, a medium-sized opening was made at the centre of the inverted tank. A small hole was drilled on the periphery of the same tank and was fitted with a valve and pipeline to supply the methane gas produced,” he explained.

NEIGHBOURS GOT NO WHIFF

With a gas digester in place, Bakshi poured the garbage into it in the first week of April. Though their experiment had been flagged off, the entire family was on tenterhooks, plagued by fears of the foul smell causing a nuisance to neighbours, especially because it would be nearly 45-50 days before the gas could be produced since the garbage needs time to completely decompose before it can produce methane. “However, no one in the neighbourhood will believe it if I tell them that I have set up a gas digester atop my house. You will not be able to smell any stench unless you peep into the tank.”

He says once the gas is collected inside the inverted tank, it begins to rise — an indicator that it’s ready to be tapped. To tap gas, you need to apply pressure on top of the tank so that it pushes the gas through the pipeline. Once again, Bakshi’s innovations came into play. “To exert pressure, I used a waste tyre of my car and a small boulder. It worked, and I managed to easily pump the gas through the pipe,” he explained.

Their moment of glory could not have been better timed. On June 5, World Environment Day, Bakshi says they could smell methane in the tank. “On that day, I just turned on the valve and held a lighted matchstick to test if it would work. The first sight of the dark blue flame sparked off celebrations in our home,” says Bakshi, adding that very evening they prepared their coffee with the gas from their plant. Though the quantity was very low at first, it improved with every passing day. “Now, we get about two to three hours of constant supply thrice a week, depending on the amount of garbage,” he says.

EVEN THE RESIDUE COUNTS

The solid garbage put into the tank turns into a slurry residue after the extraction of gas. Bakshi has found good use of the residue too. An outlet flushes out the liquid that finds its way into his terrace garden. “I have been growing pineapple, mango, some vegetables, spinach and banana on the rooftop,” he says.

Though they don’t have enough garbage to generate gas on a daily basis, Bakshi says homes that produce 5-6 kg garbage every day can cook using bio-gas and cut down on LPG usage. However, since the gas doesn’t come at great pressure, the burners need to have bigger holes.

Sharing their experiences, Bakshi and his wife, K Aravindavalli, caution against putting seeds of fruits like jackfruit or mango and chicken bones. “If the substance is hard, it will take several months to decompose. Anything that does not decompose will remain at the bottom and eat up space. So, irrespective of the waste, cut it into small pieces, give it a rinse with water and pour into the tank,” Aravindavalli says.

The entire set-up has cost the Bakshis less than Rs 20,000. “It could have been lesser, but since I was doing it on a trial-and-error method, I incurred some extra expenditure,” he says, adding that if BBMP or state government helps with subsidy, a bio-gas plant would be a viable alternative for every household.

A SECRET RECIPE

Thanks to his constant innovation and experimentation, Bakshi reveals he has concocted a mixture of certain organic products which he adds into the garbage tank for speedy fermentation. While he is keeping the recipe a closely guarded secret, he is willing to supply the powder at a nominal rate.

Meanwhile, garbage collection has resumed since last month, but the Bakshi household is no longer dependent on the system. Before starting the project in April, he had approached the BBMP, assuming he needed permission for the bio-gas plant. But he was told there was no such provision, and he could go ahead with it if it did not harm neighbours.

Copyright 2009 Bennett Coleman & Co. Ltd. . All rights reserved.

http://www.bangaloremirror.com/index.aspx?page=article&sectid=1&contentid=20130729201307290117459819d2ec7b6#ftr2 

96MPG - not rocket science

  Technologies are available now that can seriously alter our use of fossil fuel. Time is now.

McLaren F1 Developer Designs New Auto Driving 100 MPH on 96 MPG

By Edward Robinson - May 29, 2012

Bloomberg Markets Magazine

May 30 (Bloomberg) --Gordon Murray’s quest to reinvent automaking started in a traffic jam.
Murray, the legendary former designer of Formula One race cars, was driving to work in the London suburbs in 1993 when he hit gridlock. Surrounded by gas-guzzling sedans, he vowed to someday make small, efficient vehicles that would ease congestion and become stylish objects of desire, Bloomberg Markets magazine reports in its July issue.
On a misty March morning 19 years later, he swings open a metal door in a gymnasium-sized workshop south of London.
“There they are,” Murray, 65, says with a fatherly smile.
Murray’s cube-shaped city cars, parked in the middle of the floor, look like oversize toys: At 8 feet (2.4 meters) in length, they are 11 inches shorter than Daimler AG’s (DAI) Smart microcar. Sporting chiseled side panels that swoosh back from the front wheels like air currents, they exude quickness and agility.
The matte-black T.25, with a 51-horsepower, three-cylinder engine, goes 100 miles (160 kilometers) per hour. It gets 96 miles to the U.K. gallon (1.2 U.S. gallons) compared with 72 mpg for the Smart Pulse coupe in Europe. The cobalt-blue T.27, propelled by a lithium-ion battery and a 25-kilowatt electric motor, can go 100 miles on about $1.06 of power.
Murray built these prototypes in an audacious bid to overturn the way automobiles have been designed, assembled and sold for the past 100 years.
As rising oil prices and tightening carbon emission rules push manufacturers to make smaller cars, they are saddled with what Murray calls an outdated and costly system of turning sheets of steel into vehicles.

Formula One Technology

Automakers (BEAUTOS) have long lost money making small cars because they have to invest just as much capital in the metalwork for a cheap compact as they do for a luxury sedan, says Eric Noble, president of The Car Lab, an Orange, California-based consulting firm.
“Essentially, we’ve been making motorcars the same way since the Model T, and that model is breaking down,” says Murray, whose swept-back mane of graying hair suggests he’s just emerged from a wind tunnel. “I want to bring Formula One technology to the everyday motorist, with all its advantages.”
Murray, who shuns computers and draws his designs by hand, makes his autos out of a lightweight composite material similar to carbon fiber used in race cars.
That allows him to jettison the robots and machinery that stamp and weld about 300 pieces of metal together in a typical car body. While automakers such as Ford Motor Co. (F) are developing models that use more lightweight materials and less steel, Murray wants manufacturers to make all of their cars with as little metal as possible.

Plastic Bottles

The designer’s breakthrough was in finding a way to make a city car in two primary steps instead of the standard five, Noble says. His iStream system forms a chassis out of composite and then installs components and attaches body panels made from recycled plastic bottles.
Three steps -- stamping the steel frame, welding the body together and rustproofing -- are eliminated. A manufacturer could build an iStream plant to make 100,000 cars annually for 85 percent less capital than a conventional one, Murray says. Since an iStream factory would be two-thirds smaller, it would consume about 60 percent less energy.
He says the process has been so simplified that retailers such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT) or electronics giants such as Apple Inc. (AAPL) could use it to jump into carmaking.
While Murray’s vision may sound quixotic, he has proven himself one of the most creative minds in the history of Formula One, the world’s premier grand prix circuit.

Jay Leno

A cerebral man with a taste for loud floral shirts and early Bob Dylan, Murray introduced composites and other speed- enhancing innovations to racing in the 1970s and 1980s. Hall of Fame drivers Ayrton Senna, Nelson Piquet and Alain Prost won a total of five Formula One championships in his cars.
In the 1990s, Murray created the street-legal F1 for McLaren Group Ltd., a British Formula One team and supercar manufacturer. The lithe, $1 million coupe, which hit a top speed of 241 miles per hour in a 1998 test, has been hailed as the finest high-performance automobile ever made.
“It’s a pure, singular vision of what a car should be,” says talk show host Jay Leno, who has more than 100 rare vehicles, including an F1.
Murray has worshipped automobiles ever since he tinkered with engine blocks in his garage as a kid growing up in Durban, South Africa. His father, Bill, raced motorcycles and worked as a mechanic in a local Peugeot (UG) dealership. Young Gordon built his own race car from assorted parts when he was just 20 and drove it to victory in several races.

George Harrison

After taking courses in mechanical engineering at Natal Technical College, he decamped for England in 1969 and eventually landed a junior designer’s job at Brabham, a British Formula One racing team. With little money, he slept on the floor of a London flat and worked 14-hour days.
In 1972, Brabham owner and future Formula One chieftain Bernie Ecclestone surprised rival racing executives by anointing the hungry 26-year-old his chief designer.
A huge rock-and-roll fan, Murray grew his hair long and wore Sex Pistols T-shirts at the track. He became close friends with George Harrison after meeting the late Beatles guitarist and race fan on a Concorde (AF) flight to Brazil in 1976. Years later, Murray inlaid images of Indian elephants in the dashboard of the McLaren F1 he designed for Harrison in a nod to the rock star’s spiritual beliefs.
Murray’s freewheeling sensibility was apparent in his car designs. In 1979, he was the first engineer to throw out aluminum and construct a chassis entirely of carbon fiber.

Aerodynamic Effect

And in 1981, he designed a hydro-pneumatic suspension that let his race car drop to within 1 centimeter of the track at high speed to amplify downforce, which helps tires grip the road and corner faster. Rival teams protested that the system violated a ban on driver-operated devices to maximize this aerodynamic effect.
Murray countered that physics lowered the car, and Formula One officials agreed. Brabham’s Piquet went on to win the World Drivers’ Championship that year, a first for a Murray-designed car.
“Rather than obey the rule, Murray got around it,” says Nigel Cross, professor emeritus of design studies at The Open University in Milton Keynes, England.

Iconic Urban Vehicle

By the mid-1990s, Murray had left Formula One and begun work on the McLaren F1 as well as on more-unusual projects. Intent on building his own drive-in movie theater, Murray reinforced a barn on his estate with steel girders and then dismantled a pink 1959 Cadillac (GM) convertible. In the barn’s loft, he reassembled the classic car without its engine and suspension.
Under a ceiling strewn with starlike lights, he and his friends watch movies on a 9-foot-wide screen from the Caddy’s bench seats. The topper: He re-created the Formica-and-chrome interior of the diner in American Graffiti, the 1973 hot-rod movie, next to the car.
“I just adore Americana,” he says with a shrug.
Back at the office, Murray was sketching a more practical venture: a city car. He was inspired by the Fiat 500 and the Mini Cooper, two modish compacts from the 1960s. After McLaren declined to produce Murray’s new machine, he recruited 27 of its engineers and other employees and founded his own firm in 2004.
“I wanted to create the next iconic European urban vehicle,” Murray says. “But then I discovered you couldn’t make any money making small cars.” So he set out to reinvent auto assembly to cut production costs.

Light as Cardboard

Inside the workshop of Gordon Murray Design Ltd. in Shalford, England, a few engineers are working on a prototype for a 3.5-ton composite truck for use in Africa. A mock-up of the T.25’s interior carved out of wood sits on one side of the floor. Nearby, a glistening engine rests on a rack like a piece of modern art.
Amid the whir of power tools, Murray picks up a piece of composite -- a black square of honeycombed paper and polycarbonate plastic sandwiched between two skins made of tightly woven glass strands. This 2-centimeter-thick composite feels as light as cardboard but as hard as steel. And it’s 25 times cheaper than carbon fiber.

Amused Looks

Murray used an industrial press to mold several pieces of this composite and bond them to a tubular steel frame. This structure forms a hip-high solid chassis that supports the engine, interior and other components. At 1,212 pounds (550 kilograms), the T.25 is less than half the weight of Bayerische Motoren Werke AG (BMW)’s Mini Cooper.
The T.27, which features a powertrain by U.K.-based Zytek Automotive Ltd., met the European Union’s car safety requirements in crash tests conducted last year by Mira Ltd., a firm based in Warwickshire, England.
As he did in the F1, Murray placed the driver in the center of the bubblelike cabin, and passenger seats are slotted back on both sides. Instead of side doors, the car’s top opens like a clamshell to allow entry.
On a May afternoon, Kevin Doyle, Murray’s development manager, draws amused looks from pedestrians as he punches the T.25 through heavy traffic in London’s Kensington neighborhood. Doyle is about to zoom through an opening between a bus and the curb when a Mercedes-Benz lumbers in front of the T.25.
“I could have made it through that space, but he’s too big,” Doyle chuckles. In their current forms, the T.25 would retail in Europe for 8,678 euros ($11,000) and the electric car for 19,723 euros.

Deep Spending

Murray has yet to see commercial versions of his handiwork zipping around city streets. Rather than produce cars himself, he plans to license iStream to companies in return for an upfront fee and a percentage of the sale of every unit that rolls off the line.
He’s avoided the deep spending that’s bedeviled other startups that are making their own vehicles. Palo Alto, California-based Tesla Motors Inc. (TSLA), which produces a plug-in sports car, lost $254 million on $204 million in sales last year.
Murray’s firm, which collects revenue from auto-design consulting, has spent about 30 million pounds ($51 million) since 2007. It raised $12 million from Mohr Davidow Ventures and 4.5 million pounds from the Technology Strategy Board, a U.K. government-backed research group, to help develop the prototypes.

Huge Changes

While Murray has conducted exploratory discussions with 10 car companies and five other businesses, he had yet to close a production deal as of mid-May.
“It would have been more expedient to build cars, but Gordon had a business model that was more capital efficient,” says Jon Feiber, a general partner at Mohr Davidow in Menlo Park, California. “We’ll see if this was the correct path to build a valuable company.”
Automakers will probably be loath to embrace Murray’s vision as they struggle to reap returns from their existing plants, says Maryann Keller, a Stamford, Connecticut-based independent industry consultant.
“Many automakers are on their financial knees right now, so they can’t afford to transition to something different that will involve huge changes to their capital investments,” Keller says.

New Manufacturing Setup

Murray says car companies may not have a choice as regulators clamp down on emissions. By 2015, manufacturers in Europe must ensure that 100 percent of their new cars meet new greenhouse gas emission caps or the EU will fine them for every gram of excess carbon.
The U.S. is on course to impose new carbon dioxide standards that will effectively double the average fuel economy target to 54.5 miles per gallon by 2025.
“There are limits to what the internal combustion engine can do, and we are close to that limit, so the next part of this process has to be lightweight materials,” says David King, the director of the Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment at the University of Oxford. “What is completely innovative about Gordon’s work is effectively putting these materials together with enormous financial benefits. He’s developed a completely new manufacturing setup.”
With iStream, Murray has designed a way for automakers to profitably make unique cars suited for a crowded, energy-starved world. And consumers are warming to small cars again. India’s Tata Motors Ltd. (TTMT) sold 74,527 Nano microcars in the 12 months that ended on March 31, 6 percent more than the prior year. And after a rocky introduction, Turin, Italy-based Fiat SpA (F) in April recorded its second straight month of record sales gains in the U.S. for its revamped 500.

Monster Industry

Should automakers pass on his brainchild, Murray is betting there are other players willing to try and leapfrog the status quo.
“We’re taking on this monster industry, but we know it’s going to work,” says Murray, standing in front of a mural depicting his victorious Formula One cars. “I love the idea of being a giant killer.”
Editors: Vince Bielski, Michael Serrill
To contact the reporter on this story: Edward Robinson in San Francisco at
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Laura Colby in New York at lcolby@bloomberg.net

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-05-29/mclaren-f1-developer-designs-new-auto-driving-100-mph-on-96-mpg.html

Not All Biofuels Are The Same!

From Damian Carrington's Environmental Blog at The Guardian -

Leaked data: Palm biodiesel as dirty as fuel from tar sands

There are good biofuels and bad biofuels and the worst are as filthy as the foulest fossil fuels. But the good biofuels are essential to tackling climate change

There are good biofuels and bad biofuels: the trick is telling one from the other. That's particularly difficult when trying to take account of the natural forests and wetlands that can destroyed in the drive to grow some biofuel crops. But we're getting closer, it seems, and palm oil and soy beans now appear utterly unsupportable as a source of biodiesel.

The new data comes from a leak obtained by EurActiv from the European Commission. The EC is considering what level of carbon emissions each type of biofuel causes once burned, after everything - including "indirect land-use change" - is taken into account.

It is obvious that for a biofuel to be useful in cutting the emissions driving global warming it needs to have a smaller carbon footprint than regular fuel from crude oil. So I have added the numbers for crude oil and oil from the highly-polluting tar sands for reference in the table below. The leaked biofuel numbers are, I'm told similar to several recent studies, and therefore credible.

Here's the data (the units are grams of carbon dioxide per megajoule energy of energy).

So palm oil and soy bean biodiesel is just a touch less polluting than fuel from tar sands: that's pretty damning. Maize and sugar do better than crude oil but still cause significant carbon emissions.

The better news comes from the second generation fuels (2G), particularly when the are "non-land using", i.e. when they use only waste such as straw. Factories doing this are setting up now in, for example, Italy. The "land-using" fuels are made from non-food crops, such as jatropha, but that can bring its own problems, as I saw for myself in Tanzania.

The EU's scheme for certifying biofuels as sustainable requires them to emit 35% less CO2 than regular fuel, increasing to 60% by 2018, making palm oil, soy bean, rapeseed and sunflower looking all but dead.

Palm oil biodiesel also received another blow on Friday, with the US Environmental Protection Agency suggesting it fails to meet the US requirement of emitting at least 20% less carbon than diesel from crude oil.

Robbie Blake, biofuels campaigner, at Friends of the Earth Europe, told me: "It's getting quite indisputable that the use of soy or palm oil to fuel our cars is even dirtier than conventional fossil fuels. Forests in Asia and South America are being destroyed by the expansion of plantations to meet the European market. It's a delusion for politicians to think that biodiesel will solve climate change."

The European Union's target for 10% of all transport fuels to be biofuels by 2020 has been described as "unethical" because the production of some types violates human rights and damages the environment. But the same researchers described do nothing to find alternative to the fossil fuels that currently power transport as "immoral".

So the difficult task of distinguishing good and bad biofuels remains essential, as does the research of even more promising technologies, such as algae and seaweed.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/damian-carrington-blog/2012/jan/27/biofuels-biodiesel-ethanol-palm-oil

Net Metering On The Island In The Sun

From Jamaica - large scale net metering:

OUR drags on private use of JPS grid

BY CAMILO THAME Business co-ordinator thamec@jamaicaobserver.com

Wednesday, March 02, 2011

Read more: http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/business/OUR-drags-on-private-use-of-JPS-grid_8416797#ixzz1FSFURLte

THE Office of Utilities Regulation (OUR) has pushed back by more than a year the date to make a determination on a new regulatory mechanism that will give private entities access to Jamaica Public Service Company's (JPS') distribution lines to provide its own electricity at several sites across the island.

The delay has left at least one interested entity — Jamaica Broilers — dissatified with the pace at which government has been approaching critical changes to energy policies.

"Our energy policy and the strategies we pursue are the most important things that this country faces at this time," Jamaica Broilers Group president and CEO, Chris Levy told the Business Observer. "It is absolutely necessary to be taking the big strategic decisions now."

Also, in commenting on the slow pace of Government to introduce alternative fuel sources for electricity generation, such as coal, Levy said the country "cannot delay these decisions any longer".

Initially the OUR aimed to conduct public consultations and issue a determination on 'wheeling', by June 2010 but the new date to issue a determination is set for November 2011.

The process to reach a determination now involves cost analysis and consultancy to determine wheeling charges.

Wheeling concerns the development of terms and conditions that would allow a private entity to provide its own electricity at multiple geographical locations transiting JPS' network, a scenario that is contemplated by Condition 2 clauses 11 and 12 of the JPS All-Island Electricity Licence.

In its corporate plan for the next three years -- currently available on the regulator's website for public comment -- the OUR said it "is aware that there is some interest among private entities to self generate electricity for supplies at disparate geographical locations and that this can only be facilitated if there is in place some kind of wheeling arrangement with JPS. In view of the potential that this holds for driving incremental expansion, creating greater diversity and perhaps efficiencies, the Office is keen to facilitate this option."

Among interested entities is Jamaica Broilers, which, with its co-generation facility at Spring Village in St Catherine, would seek to provide electricity to other sites from which it operates, such as its ethanol plant and feed mills located in Old Harbour.

"We have the installed capacity at our co-generation plant... which is considerably more efficient than buying it from the grid," Levy said.

The cogeneration plant consists of three medium speed diesel engines (rated at 5 megawatts each), two Caterpillar engines for stand-by purposes, one heat recovery steam generator (HRSG) that utilises the hot gases from the engines to produce steam for the chicken processing facility, and an auxiliary boiler.

At present, Levy says the excess electricity is sold to the grid at dumped rates, which doesn't provide a "good business option" for the company.

Read more: http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/business/OUR-drags-on-private-use-of-JPS-grid_8416797#ixzz1FSFFiEtd

Fuel In Places You Never Looked Before

Affordability Is Martek's Challenge As It Looks to Turn Algae Into Fuel
Columbia Company Working With BP

By Mike Musgrove
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, August 20, 2009

Now that its flagship product is in nearly every container of infant formula sold in the United States, Martek Biosciences is looking to edge its way into the gas tank.

The Columbia firm, which develops nutritional supplements for food and beverages based on the fermentation of algae, announced this month that BP has agreed to invest $10 million over a 30-month period to fund research seeking ways to inexpensively develop vehicle fuel from organisms such as seaweed.

"We believe sugar to diesel technology has the potential to deliver economic, sustainable and scaleable biodiesel supplies," BP Biofuels chief executive Philip New said in a statement. "BP is very pleased to be entering this important partnership with Martek."

For BP, the Martek partnership represents just one of many investments to develop sustainable alternative energy forms. Since 2006, BP has announced investments of more than $1.5 billion in biofuel research, and other deep-pocketed energy giants are looking into this area as well. In July, Exxon said it would invest $600 million in a similar type of algae research.

If Martek's research yields an affordable product, there eventually could be a significant financial upside for Martek -- but that's a big if, experts say.

"This is a fairly small bet [by BP] on a fairly long-shot idea, but that doesn't mean that it's not worth doing," said Tim Ramey, an analyst with D.A. Davidson & Co. who follows Martek. Because of those long odds, Ramey dubs the BP investment as a bit of "wildcatting in the fermentation vessel."

In theory, Martek President David Abramson said this week, turning algae into the type of fuel BP could use isn't a remarkable accomplishment. The larger, more important trick would be to develop a product for a price that matches or beats the cost of fuels used by vehicles today.

"This is very doable in a lab, if you don't care about the price," he said.

If Martek develops a viable product, it would receive royalty payments from BP whenever that product was sold. Regardless of whether that happens, Martek will keep any research that may prove beneficial to its growing line of food and beverage products, under the terms of its deal with BP.

Martek's annual revenue was $352 million last year, nearly 90 percent of which came from sales to baby formula manufacturers. Using algae, Martek makes DHA, an omega 3 fatty acid that has been proven to be important for brain and eye development in babies. As the only company that makes what is regarded as a "clean" DHA product -- other manufacturers offer DHA in the form of fish oil derived from tuna and salmon -- Martek's product has cornered the U.S. market. Nearly all baby formula sold in this country contains DHA produced by Martek. Outside the United States, Martek's products can be found in nearly 50 percent of the market.

In the last three years, Martek has been expanding its DHA business by striking deals with food and beverage makers such as Coca-Cola, which is offering a new type of Minute Maid juice that claims to "help nourish your brain" thanks to Martek's DHA.

As recent studies have indicated DHA may have benefits for adults as well, Martek has sought to take advantage of a larger potential market, branding its product as "Life's DHA" with a logo that all of its new partners are required to include on their packaging materials. The company is hoping that the logo will stick in the minds of consumers in the same way that computer buyers once gravitated to machines that featured "Intel Inside."

Some of Martek's patents around DHA development are set to expire next year, however, and some analysts see Martek's BP deal as a way for the company move forward into possible new businesses should fresh competition emerge on the DHA front.

"They're trying to reinvent themselves with deals like this, knowing that their main business might be changing," Ramey said.

Abramson disputes that the company has anything to worry about, patent-wise. Some patents have already expired, he said, but the process of making DHA is tricky enough that his company doesn't fear competition will descend quickly.

In any case, Martek has a library containing thousands of species of algae stored in freezers at its Columbia facility. Algae can do more than just generate DHA, and it is possible that one of the thousands of species in its collection may contain the company's next big product.

Might it be diesel fuel? Bentley Offutt, principal analyst at Offutt Securities, said investors won't know for years whether the research money was well spent.

"Things in genetic engineering take a long, long time."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/20/AR2009082001792.html

Food Scraps In Vermont = Electricity

From The Burlington Free Press (Vermont):

October 4, 2009

A new view of food scraps’ potential

There’s power on your plate

By Nancy Remsen, Free Press Staff Writer

Instead of thinking “yuck” when faced with shriveled brown apple cores, slimly spinach leaves and stinky chicken bones, Dan Hecht of Montpelier thinks “energy.”

“There is value to be derived from stuff we throw away,” he said.

In an age when finding alternative sources of energy is both a state and national priority, Hecht points to the potential in a squandered resource: food scraps.

For one thing, it’s plentiful, Hecht said: “Every city and town in America already possesses a major source of renewable energy, one that does not need to be mined, harvested, refined or transported long distances.”

Hecht is project coordinator for the Central Vermont Recovered Biomass Facility, a research project that’s assessing the feasibility of collecting food waste, mixing it with manure and letting it stew until it releases methane gas, which can be used to produce heat and power, plus environmentally safe byproducts.

“The food garbage is the big innovation here,” Hecht said of this waste-to-energy project, seeded by a $492,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Energy. “Nobody is doing post-consumer food waste.”

Once the research phase is completed in December, the food power project would move from the proof-on-paper phase to proof in practice.

The plan is to tap 14 tons a day of food scrap in the Central Vermont Solid Waste Management District, combine it with 10 tons a day of manure from area dairy farms, and feed it into a biodigester to be built on the campus of Vermont Technical College in Randolph. The methane produced would be used either to fuel the college’s heating plant or to generate electricity for the campus.

What’s left — likely a thick, dark liquid — would have several potential uses, such enriching soil on farmers’ fields.

Hecht said this project is intended to produce a roadmap that others in Vermont and across the country could follow to make better use of food scraps. Hecht tries to avoid calling food scraps “waste” because they have so much energy potential: 200 to 400 percent more energy per ton than manure.

Ponder the potential in greater Burlington, with its many eateries, educational institutions and a medical center, Hecht suggested. New data developed by consultants for the research project estimate 245 tons of food materials is produced weekly in Chittenden County.

First step: fetch the food

Start where the food scraps originate, such as the dining hall at Norwich University in Northfield.

Twice a week, a truck from Central Vermont Solid Waste Management District comes to Norwich and collects 22 totes full of food scraps, said Paul Bento, general manager of dining services at the university. Serving 716,000 meals a year, Norwich ends up with a lot of food scraps: 207 tons last year, Bento said.

The Central Vermont district began diverting food scraps from landfills in 2004, sending the material instead to two composting sites.

“We had identified organics in 2001 as a priority for diversion,” said Donna Barlow Casey, executive director of the waste district. It’s part of the district’s zero-waste commitment.

Because of the largely rural nature of the district, Barlow Casey said the food-scrap initiative has focused on commercial and institutional producers, not residential. That would remain the case even with the added demand of feeding a biodigester, she said.

To satisfy the end-users of the food scraps, the district had to provide contaminate-free material — no plastic wrap or foil, just food.

“We have one the cleanest food-scrap programs in the nation,” Barlow Casey said. “When we talk about contamination, it’s just the tiny stickers on fruit and vegetables. We work with every single business that comes on board. We train their kitchen staff. There is a feedback loop. If we see forks, plastic or paper, we reject that tote. It’s that feedback system that keeps the food clean.”

The totes aren’t small like the composting jars that homeowners may keep on their kitchen counters. They are 48-gallon rolling trash barrels with lids.

How smelly is that? Barlow Casey says putting sawdust in the bottom and layering more sawdust or coffee grounds with the food scraps buffers the odor.

“It does work,” confirmed Bento at Norwich.

Barlow Casey said there are more than enough sources of food scraps in Central Vermont to continue to provide material for the two composters and meet the 14-ton-a-day requirement of the new digester. New data estimate 98 tons of food scraps are produced weekly in the region. The district currently has 77 customers providing 18 tons of food scraps a week. In anticipation of having to ramp up collections, she said, the district just began recruiting new customers.

Collecting and delivering the food scraps is an expense that has to be balanced against the benefits of producing energy from it, Hecht said. In planning how to collect it, he said, “You have to do it with the shortest possible distance.”

Now the power part

There are many variables but fewer unknowns about the process that would transform rinds, bones and eggshells into power once they arrived at the biodigester, proposed for a site on the back portion of the Vermont Technical College campus, Hecht said.

Simply, he said, the food waste would go into a “blender” with some water and the manure to create the feedstock that would be put into an anaerobic digester. Some microbes would break down the organic materials into two byproducts: methane gas and a nutrient-rich liquid.

One of the questions yet to be answered is what regulations apply to this process, Hecht said.

“As of right now, we don’t have specific rules for digesters,” said David DiDomenico, environmental material engineer with the Department of Environmental Conservation. State regulators have been working on revisions to composting regulations, he said. “Our plan is to make it more of an organics rule. We’d like to put in a part for digesters.”

Other pending questions have to do with the best uses for the methane and the liquid effluent.

The methane, for example, could replace the oil that fuels the college’s central heating system and warms 15 buildings, said Frank Reed, a consultant working with Vermont Technical College on the project.

But what about in summer, when heat isn’t needed? Reed said the methane could be used to make electricity. Or maybe making electricity would be the best option year-round.

There also are options to weigh with the liquid effluent. It could be spread on fields, or perhaps used to grow algae in a process that would produce biofuels, Reed said.

Four consultants will provide models to help the college identify the options that best fit its energy goals and wallet. Hecht noted the reports from the consultants will provide others interested in food power with information about alternatives that might work under different conditions than those found at Vermont Technical College.

VTC will decide this winter whether to go ahead with planning and construction. Reed predicted that when the reports come in later this fall, “I think we will find it is feasible.”

What will Chittenden do?

The Chittenden Solid Waste District is pursuing its own research on how to divert more food and other organics from landfills. The district recently requested proposals from consultants for a comprehensive study.

“What is happening now is, we are about to head into the second era of modern solid-waste management,” said Tom Moreau, executive director of the Chittenden district. “This is the second wave of investment, and organics are going to be a big piece.”

Moreau said he is monitoring the development of the central Vermont project. He has no question about the feasibility of the biodigestion process.

“I’m confident it will work,” he said. “It will demonstrate to us in Vermont that once we collect it, we can handle it.”

For him, the challenge is food collection — whether from residents or commercial producers.

“People get lazy. They just want to throw things away,” Moreau said. “How do you collect the material in a cost-effective and energy-efficient way, and how do you get over the yuck factor?”

Contact Nancy Remsen at 651-4888 or nremsen@bfp.burlingtonfreepress.com.

Additional Facts

Key terms when discussing “food power.”

• BIODIGESTER: An airtight container in which anaerobic — meaning without air — digestion takes place over periods that range from five to 60 days. The output from biodigestion is methane gas and a nutrient-rich, liquid.

• BIOMASS: Plant materials and animal waste that can be used as fuel to produce energy.

• FOOD SCRAPS: Food that is leftover from meals plus trimmings from food preparation.

What’s so great about food power?

• Food scraps are available in significant volumes.

• Food scraps produce 200-to-400 percent more methane than cow manure.

• Biodigestion of food scraps captures methane, reducing greenhouse-gas emissions.

• Food scraps don’t go to waste. Biodigestion creates valuable byproducts.
Source: Dan Hecht

Project facts

• WHAT: The Central Vermont Recovered Biomass Facility is conducting a study of the feasibility of biodigesting food waste along with cow manure to produce electrical power and heat.

• WHO: The project is being carried out by a partnership that includes the Central Vermont Solid Waste Management District, Vermont Technical College, Vermont Environmental Consortium and Vermont Sustainable Jobs Fund.

• WHERE: The biodigester, if feasible, will be built on the campus of Vermont Technical College in Randolph. The food scraps would come from commercial and institutional sources in central Vermont.

• FUNDING: The feasibility study received a $492,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Energy, with addition funding coming from the Vermont Department of Agriculture, the Clean Energy Development Fund, the state and Seventh Generation Foundation. The U.S. Department of Energy has promised $952,000 for advanced design and construction. Total construction is estimated at $3 million.

Vegetable Oil For Vehicles

From The Gazette, Montgomery County, Maryland

Wednesday, May 6, 2009

Silver Spring man converts cars to run on veggie oil

Monday through Friday, Josh Winston sits in an office high above downtown Bethesda, crunching numbers as an accountant.

But come Saturday morning, Winston, 42, puts down the calculator, slides into a one-piece jumpsuit and tinkers with diesel engines and rounds up buckets of vegetable oil.

Winston has a hobby of converting diesel-powered vehicles to run on vegetable oil, grease that cooked chicken fingers or french fries last week.

"It's really pretty simple," the Silver Spring resident said. "Anyone with a pretty basic knowledge of cars or engines can figure it out."

Diesel engines can run on anything oil-based, even something as far-flung as sawdust, Winston said. Switching the hoses and building a new tank for the oil is more a matter of time than expertise.

Four years ago, Winston saw a television segment on diesel conversions and almost immediately ordered a conversion kit for his 1998 Volkswagen Jetta. Since then he has converted not only his own car and an old mini-school bus he owns, but also a half-dozen cars and trucks from up and down the East Coast.

"Well, I sit at a desk all day and that's not much fun," Winston said of his accounting job. "But this, this is fun."

In front of his apartment sits a 1983 Itasca RV, the vehicle of a vegetable oil enthusiast from New Jersey. The owner found Winston through his Web site, www.feedmywheels.com, a side business he has created to convert vehicles to vegetable oil. The average conversion costs a customer between $1,500 and $2,000, Winston said, but the cost is relatively cheap compared with the cost of diesel fuel.

Running a car on vegetable oil, which can often be obtained for free, could save a vehicle owner hundreds or even thousands of dollars in fuel costs per year, Winston said.

"I get my oil from a Chinese restaurant down the street," he said. "At first they were confused about why I wanted it, but we have a nice arrangement now."

Montgomery County has created an online forum for used vegetable oil givers and takers, according to Peter Karasik, section chief for the county's Division of Solid Waste Services.

The 70-member forum, launched in November 2007, puts those possessing used vegetable oil — such as restaurants, bars and other vendors — in touch with people like Winston who want it.

"There's certainly no reason why anyone needs to waste vegetable oil now," Karasik said. "There's a whole host of people who would like it, and our goal is just to hook people up directly."

Although vegetable oil proponents say grease burns cleaner than diesel or gasoline, converting and running a car on vegetable oil is technically illegal in the United States, according to Cathy Milbourn, an Environmental Protection Agency spokeswoman.

"The Clean Air Act does prohibit these sorts of homemade conversions," she said. "There are conversion kits that we have certified that we say are suitable, but just vegetable oil is not a clean fuel."

Violating the Clean Air Act carries a $32,500 fine per violation if committed by a manufacturer or dealer, and a $2,750 fine if committed by any other person.

Winston estimated that fewer than 10,000 cars nationwide have been converted. The federal government does not keep records of vegetable oil-converted cars.

Winston said despite the legal implications, he's going to keep converting cars.

"It's probably going to be illegal for a long time until people start using [vegetable oil] regularly," he said. "Even the fine probably isn't worth anybody's time. Everybody who does this knows that and isn't praying that someone from the government won't show up at their door."

http://www.gazette.net/stories/05062009/bethnew200045_32534.shtml

http://www.feedmywheels.com/

Local Maryland Biofuels

A Biofuels Bonanza in Our Back Yard

Sunday, October 5, 2008

Every major source of energy used by modern society has an environmental impact -- and all too often it's negative. Fortunately, things may be changing -- especially in the Washington region.

Indeed, those of us who live near the Chesapeake Bay have an unprecedented opportunity to take the lead in a new form of energy that can fuel our cars and heat our homes, while also protecting the environment and sustaining our farmland. The fuel would be made from plants that grow well in our region and would not compete with food sources.

These new biofuels are made from cellulosic (the flesh of plants) resources such as forest slash (the debris left after timber is cut), agricultural crop residues (such as the leaves and stalks of corn or barley), perennial grasses and even algae. The Chesapeake region is home to diverse feedstocks that could serve as sustainable crops for cellulosic biofuels throughout the year.

Because the Chesapeake region is so close to the major East Coast energy markets, our cellulosic feedstocks could be transported inexpensively. Several area universities and research institutes are already working on cellulosic biofuels, and the private sector is showing a growing interest in the industry, as shown by an increase in capital investment and the willingness of many companies to team up to develop competitive technologies.

Imagine that in the next three to 10 years, as the technology comes online, these materials could be transformed into liquid fuels to supplement our more traditional consumption of petroleum-based gasoline and home heating fuels. Given that 43 percent of the nation's home heating oil and kerosene and 13 percent of the nation's gasoline is consumed by the six states in the Chesapeake Bay's watershed, the opportunity is significant.

Each year our country has to assume more than $300 billion in additional debt just to finance our oil needs. This is jeopardizing our economy and our national security. And while corn-based ethanol has helped ease our dependence on foreign oil, some are concerned about the effect that devoting more acreage to corn will have on water quality and the impact that increased corn demand for ethanol production has had on food prices.

This year, the Chesapeake Bay Commission's Chesapeake Cellulosic Biofuels Project explored the feasibility and viability of next-generation biofuels and determined that the Chesapeake Bay region is strategically positioned to lead the nation in establishing this promising new industry. But to truly lead, we must lay down policies that favor the advancement of these technologies.

The commission has presented a road map for us to lead the nation in sustainable, homegrown, next-generation biofuels that will benefit farmers, the economy and the Chesapeake Bay. The three major areas where action is needed are the production of feedstocks; natural resource protection; and marketing and infrastructure. The public sector, particularly state government, can play a vital role in developing this industry in these areas. And while many decisions related to the development of the cellulosic biofuels industry will be made by the private sector, our goal of economic, environmental and social sustainability can be best achieved through the cooperative efforts of the public and private sectors.

We must act now to design and implement effective policy and legislation to seize the opportunity before us. The future environmental quality of our Chesapeake Bay, the strengthening of our agricultural communities and our energy future depend on our actions today.

-- James W. Hubbard

Annapolis

The writer is a Maryland state delegate, a member of the Chesapeake Bay Commission and chair of the Chesapeake Cellulosic Biofuels Project.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/03/AR2008100303408.html