auto fuel with alcohol

[180Marty]

Glad to see my post was read. Ethanol is too valuable to be used for boiler fuel. The mash is excellent feed and part of the reason for putting the extra centrifuge in is to separate corn oil. With about half the oil extracted a bigger percentage of the distillers grain can go into the feed ration for cattle,pigs,and poultry.
Marty

 

[Christina Young]

Ethanol is too valuable to be used for boiler fuel.

Yes, that's the point! People don't want to use expensive ("valuable"?) fuels like ethanol -- they're uneconomical! They want to use cheap fuels! You will never catch me using a "valuable" fuel in my car or plane.... I will always use the cheapest one that can do the job. And so will the rest of the market, unless forced to by the govt.

 

[StewartB]

A long time ago, the original sucessful controlled nuclear power experiment was conducted in a room that measured nearly 40'x40'x21' and used thousands of pounds of uranium. The net result was a few watts of power, enough to dimly light a flashlight for a few seconds. I'm sure people scoffed at the experiments and said they were a waste of time. This technology would never work. Too expensive. A waste of effort.

The Wright brothers were crazy, too. Yet we're flying the refined products of their craziness.

Wanna talk about computer advancements in our lifetimes? The fact that NASA now has a vehicle sitting on one of Saturn's moons? Technology is developed, not discovered.

SB

 

[Cubus Maximus]

Marty - we use the distillers grains from ethanol production as a carrier in our lick blocks and TMR additive for cattle and horses (and swine). It's an AWESOME feed base and a whole lot cheaper than molasses. We then add chelated minerals, live yeast, enzymes, pro and prebiotics, stabilized flax and an alcoholic blend of the small grains, wheat, oats, barley malt and flax. The results have been astounding in animal health and feed efficiencies are better by 20-25% across the board. Ethanol has other applications as well. Such as being a good source to crack hydrogen out of.
Brad

 

[fobjob]

Marty, what do you do with the corn oil recovered?? Christina was right, in that our airplanes don't necessarily run on fuel, they run on $$$MONEY!$$$....and any recovered wealth or value just adds to the efficiency and ultimately to the reduced cost/BTU of the fuel...government subsidies can enable a running start to a new technology that is important and can/will be self sustaining once it's gone through some development...it's just that the history of government subs give one a bad taste in the mouth...but I digress...the corn oil could be sold to reduce costs, burned to reduce costs, or sold as bio diesel or somesuch to reduce costs...all good stuff for us, as that technology gets optimized...

 

[Christina Young]

Well, the whole point is that we want cheap energy, not expensive energy! The fact that even ethanol producers don't use ethanol in the production process is very telling... and means it takes more energy to produce it than what it delivers!

If it took less energy to produce than fossil fuels, than the reverse would be true (they would be using ethanol)!

Until that equation changes, there is no hope for ethanol without the force of government - the free market will not pick ethanol.

Sure, maybe technology may make it cheaper to make, but there are some huge physical / scientific barriers to overcome to make it cheaper than fossil fuels. There is simply just not that much energy in an acre of corn.

 

[180Marty]

Hi fobjob, The corn oil will either be sold for human consumption or go to a biodiesel plant depending on economics.There's a 30 million gal a year biodiesel plant just starting construction about 45 miles away that will use 70% soybean oil and 30% animal fats from the local packing plants. Biodiesel uses very little energy for the process and just about any triglyceride will work---even waste fryer grease from the restaurant. Oh, there are already several biodiesel plants in Iowa but this will be the first to use animal fats. In 2006 sulfur content in diesel will be lowered to, I think, 15 ppm and and just 2% biodiesel will bring back the lubricity lost.
Thanks for asking, Marty

 

[fobjob]

Christina, you're just making my point. As the cost of fossil fuels goes up, alternative fuels become more acceptable.....and who says you've gotta stay with corn? Other choices may become available as more people are motivated to start thinking about the problem....on the dark side, Marty, using rendered animal fats in biodiesel may be an extraordinarily BAD idea...go to Google, and enter: Yale autopsy study CJD ....we may already be killing 400,000 people in the US every year from CJD and Mad Cow related strains now extant in our pigs and cows......now they want to make prions airborne?????????????????????????????
I'll have to move very far away from any highway and shoot anyone approaching in a diesel truck......sounds like Alaska, mmmmm........
ps...I notice you're just down the road from Hartley; put down there and spent the night coming back from Oshkosh a few years back...nice folks...is the J5 or whatever it was still in the hanger there?

 

[180Marty]

Hi Christina, You talked about nuclear to make hydrogen in a previous thread. Did you know that they are thinking nuclear up where the oil sands of northern Alberta are? It takes way more energy to produce a barrel than what's in that barrel and the natural gas there're using now has a lot of value if it is piped south.
Marty