WSJ Biodiesel article: both +s & -s

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07-05-2005, 08:40 AM

RichC

Ohio BIODZL Driver

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Join Date: May 2005

Location: Cincinnati, OH

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WSJ Biodiesel article: both +s & -s

In a Wall Street Journal front page article (copywritten subscription article) this morning was an article talking about biodiesel. Its human interest, Willie Nelson and Biowillie, approach made for interesting reading and tickled my VW TDI cohorts.

As for Mr. Nelson, he's a longtime supporter of U.S. farmers, and he figures they would benefit from a biodiesel boom. A couple of years ago, his wife heard about biodiesel and bought a diesel-powered VW Jetta, which she keeps at their house on Maui and runs on 100% biodiesel.

"I thought it was some kind of little toy," Mr. Nelson recalled last week, speaking by phone from his biodiesel-powered bus in Nashville, where he was preparing for a concert that night with Bob Dylan. But he soon joined the bandwagon. He bought himself a diesel-powered Mercedes, which he fills with biodiesel. And he told his bus drivers to fill up with biodiesel whenever possible.

I found the comments accurate as far as media articles go. Jeffery Ball did not confuse the Grease Fuel conversions with Biodiesel.

Biodiesel is made from vegetable oils or animal fats -- sometimes from used cooking oil retrieved from restaurants. Typically, it is blended into regular diesel fuel at concentrations up to 20%. It can't be used in the gasoline engines that power most U.S. cars and light trucks. But it can be used in diesel engines, which in the U.S. now power some Volkswagen and Mercedes-Benz cars, a sizable chunk of heavy-duty pickups from Detroit, and the majority of commercial trucks, including 18-wheelers.

He also had his fact correct when looking at number of production facilities and today's production capacities that can only meet about 4% of our diesel requirments. (although that is a growing number)

About 35 plants across the country make nothing but biodiesel. The process, more like winemaking than oil refining, typically occurs in vats. Vegetable oil or animal fat is dumped in, a chemical catalyst and an alcohol such as methanol is added, and the mixture is heated until a layer of glycerin forms. The glycerin is removed, and what's left is fuel.

Some biodiesel plants consist of not much more than a tank inside a rural shed. Last month, Cargill Inc., the big agricultural company, announced it plans to build a particularly big biodiesel plant. The facility, to be placed beside a Cargill soybean-processing plant in Iowa Falls, Iowa, is expected to turn out 37.5 million gallons of biodiesel annually -- more than the U.S. produced last year.

I think the point many could come away with is that using 'any percentage' of cleaner, renewable "American grown and produced" biodiesel in place of finite imported petroleum is a positive move. Its nice to see the fuel embraced by Texas diehards and Washington politicians as well as the environmental crowd.

07-06-2005, 02:58 AM

stoner

Diesel Driver

Join Date: Apr 2005

Location: UK

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Re: WSJ Biodiesel article: both +s & -s

Quote:

Originally Posted by RichC

I wish such plants would start appearing in the UK, all we can get at the moment is a 5% blend from a very few and far between number of filling stations, I am keen to start using a higher percentage biodiesel blend once my warrantee expires - if it proves cost effective.

I have filled up with Rix Biodiesel before, but I ended up paying a considerable extra premium for a 5% blend that achieved around 5 mpg less than my usual fuel - I'm not sure why.

07-06-2005, 08:40 AM

MGBGT

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Join Date: Apr 2005

Location: too far south (TX)

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Re: WSJ Biodiesel article: both +s & -s

Maybe I should have placed my post in this forum, rather than journalism and media (oops), but here:
https://www.greenhybrid.com/discuss/...ires.2752.html
I just posted about a new research paper stating that bio-fuels contain less usable energy than their production requires.
I'm not sure where I stand on the issue, but the article is very interesting reading.
M

07-06-2005, 04:17 PM

Schwa

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Re: WSJ Biodiesel article: both +s & -s

Biofuels are a bit like hydrogen at this time, they use more energy to produce them, but are cleaner and there's a lot of room for improvement in the efficiency of their production. More research and development will improve the process, but I think biofuels are a holdover, whereas hydrogen has the potential to be a really clean future fuel, although far from perfect, especially as it stands.

07-06-2005, 10:29 PM

EricGo

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Re: WSJ Biodiesel article: both +s & -s

I'm partial to electricity, myself. Straight from the battery to the motor, and not used to heat a vat to fractionate oils that then burn dirty.

07-07-2005, 06:22 PM

AZCivic

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Join Date: Feb 2005

Location: Phoenix, AZ

Posts: 878

Re: WSJ Biodiesel article: both +s & -s

Quote:

Originally Posted by EricGo

I'm partial to electricity, myself. Straight from the battery to the motor, and not used to heat a vat to fractionate oils that then burn dirty.

Electricity is great, but the whole point of liquid fuels is to use it as a storage mechanism. Batteries don't do you much good without range and rapid refueling. If you go through the gyrations of converting units, you'd come up with the following table:

200 pounds diesel fuel = 1123 kw/h
200 pounds of gasoline = 1112 kw/h
200 pounds of E85 = 737 kw/h
200 pounds of lead-acid batteries = 3.2 kw/h
200 pounds of NiMH batteries = 6.3 kw/h
200 pounds of LiIon batteries = 13.6 kw/h

I'll also produce a second chart here that accounts for thermal efficiency. Diesel is at least 40% thermally efficient these days, and gasoline/ethanol with port fuel injection can be up to 35% thermally efficient with technology such as the Prius engine. Corrected numbers then become:

200 pounds diesel fuel = 449 kw/h
200 pounds of gasoline = 389 kw/h
200 pounds of E85 = 258 kw/h

Even if you don't count how much faster you can refuel a liquid fuel car, liquid fuels still win by a large margin over batteries, which honestly aren't 100% efficient anyway, but they are darn close, so I'll leave it at that.

For those wondering how the numbers were generated, diesel is 6.75 lb/gal, 128,000 BTU, gasoline is 6 lb/gal, 114,000 BTU, E85 is 6.5 lb/gal, 81,800 BTU. The battery efficiency per pound came from this page.