Small Nukes for Rural Canada

Small nuclear reactors have proven their ability to provide reliable heat and power over several decades -- using a number of different designs. Now a venture company is forming a private corporation to provide small nuclear reactors to isolated communities across Canada.

Western Troy's CEO, Rex Loesby, commented, "As we worked through the feasibility process for our MacLeod Lake Project, we evaluated a number of electric power options. One option is a small nuclear reactor. We found there are a number of small reactor designs in operation and under development around the world and there looks to be an opportunity to work with one or more of these reactor designs to develop the technology specifically for remote communities and mine sites in Canada. Some of these small reactor designs have operated for decades without safety issues, nuclear reactors do not release carbon emissions, and there are communities and mines in remote locations throughout Canada that would benefit greatly from clean, safe, and relatively low cost electric power."

...Rex Loesby commented further, "What started out as an engineering exercise quickly grew into an idea that could be revolutionary for the development of northern communities and resources in Canada. We have begun to see this as much more than a commercial venture, but an opportunity for Canada to lead the world in clean energy development for remote sites." _Source

Small nuclear reactors are a natural fit for remote arctic and antarctic communities (as well as mid-ocean and outer space outposts). Providing ample quantities of electric power and heat, small nuclear reactor / generator installations provide the basis for local and regional development of all types -- including agriculture and mining.

Faux environmentalists oppose nuclear energy of all types, without understanding exactly what it is they are opposing -- or what they are forcing people to accept in its place. These faux enviros are in the process of completing the devastation of the US economy -- and would like to do the same thing to Canada.

So far, Canadians have been too smart to allow the faux's to gain an absolute upper hand.

Getting Down to Bio-Business in Scotland

Rural businesses are set to discover how they can benefit from using or supplying biomass fuel thanks to a free workshop later this month.

Forestry Commission Scotland is hosting the free workshop at Gartmore House near Aberfoyle, on Wednesday, August 19 from 12.45-3.20pm (lunch is provided) with a site visit following on at the end of the afternoon.

Guest speakers will give delegates an insight into the many aspects of biomass – from its potential to be a cost-effective means of generating power for business premises of all sizes to the practicalities of installing a woodfuel boiler. There will also be opportunities to find out about the grant support that is available. _StirlingObserver_via_Bioenergy

Similar seminars have been held across North America over the past two years, as rural parts of North America, the UK, and Scandinavia begin to gear up to produce bioenergy on a local and regional level.

The single region with the most bioenergy promise is SubSaharan Africa, followed by South America, and South / Southeast Asia. But infrastructure of business, technology, and economics in North America, Europe, and Oceania is far advanced over the third world. Investors who are not into gambling will be more likely to invest in a developed country.

Once it becomes obvious that farmers, foresters, ranchers, entrepreneurs, engineers, and technologists can grow their own bioenergy gold in rural parts of the first world, the gold rush will be on. Scaling up biomass energy to supply a significant part of the first world's energy needs, will take time and work.

Given the susceptibility of energy industries to the global and national economic stresses, a certain amount of risk will be involved. But growing healthy economies on the local and regional scale is how the US and Canada grew so wealthy so quickly in the 1800s. Biomass energy suits a local and regional infrastructure.

Small to medium scale distributed pyrolysis and gasification plants -- close to the biomass harvest sites -- will supply liquids, densified solids, and gaseous fuels to more central refineries and processing plants.

It is true that most of the profits of any operation will accrue to the central refiner and distributor, but the total economic activity at the local and regional levels are likely to be huge.

Taking Your Algal Oil Secondhand

Various algal oil projects are looking at feeding algae to other species -- such as fish or shrimp -- then extracting the oil from the higher animals, rather than directly from the algae. In a sense, they would be letting the animals extract the algal oil, thus perhaps making their own oil extractions easier.

San Carlos, Calif.-based LiveFuels is hoping to develop biofuels from algae—squeezing the liquid fuel out of fish by feeding them algae for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

In fact, the fish eat more than one-third of their body weight in wet algae per day, filtering seven gallons per minute, CEO Lissa Morgenthaler-Jones said today.

The process doesn’t require electricity and has the potential to clean up ocean pollution.

While LiveFuels had previously described its business as pursuing oil extraction directly from the algae themselves, extracting it now from fish is a process the company has been exploring practically since it was founded, Morgenthaler-Jones said.

LiveFuels announced yesterday it has started a pilot facility in Brownsville, Texas. The facility—which includes 45 acres of open saltwater ponds on repurposed fish/shrimp farming land—is expected to be used to research optimizing algal productivity and increasing the rates of conversion of biomass into renewable oils.

The company had previously been operating on 150 acres in California, about an hour north of the Mexican border, but found that desert conditions weren’t optimal for growing algae. The Texas water also comes from shipping channels, so it is seawater Morgenthaler-Jones said. _Bioenergy

An interesting approach. The potential profits are certainly there. It comes down to the first alg-oil vender who can sell his product profitably. That company will be the proof of concept that should open the gates of investment to competitors even wider than at present.

Dimethyl Ether from Black Liquor Gasification

Black liquor is a waste product of pulp and paper mills. For every ton of pulp produced, about 7 tons of black liquor by-product results. Finding an economical use for this waste will change the economics of the paper / pulp industry significantly. Dimethyl ether (DME) is one of many valuable products that could be made from pulp wastes.

In Sweden, Chemrec announced that they will break ground in September on a BioDME (dimethyl ether) demonstration plant project in Piteå. The project will be completed in mid-2010, and will demonstrate the production of an advanced diesel fuel, DME, from forest biomass over the black liquor route....

DME is generally used today as a liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) substitute, but diesel truck and bus manufacturers have operated DME-fueled prototype vehicles.....Approximately 7 tons of black liquor is produced in the manufacture of a ton of pulp. _BiofuelsDigest

Learning to take a waste product and turn it into energy builds character. It is much harder than printing money on a government printing press, and spending money that doesn't exist. But not all of us can be as smart or wizardly as presidents and congresspersons.

70,000 Gallons per acre per year Algal Bio-Oil

This breakthrough biofuel yield from algae is being announced by Sun-Eco Energy, located in fragrant Chino, California.

With algae oil production yields indicated to be over 70,000 gallons/acre/year , an advanced method for producing the bio oil is being readied for commercial production.. This coincides with new reports that petroleum production is falling behind growing world demand for oil and need to restrict crop lands to food production.

Based on information provided by Hoyt Isom, chief information officer of SunEco Energy, Chino, California, the new high yield system has been proven in pilot production since 2007 and is being prepared for commercial scale oil production at a facility in Niland, California(Imperial Valley) . Production is being ramped up to 14.6 million gal/yr within 9 months.

The initial target is bio crude for refining into diesel fuel which SunEco expects can be sold at something under the current market price for petroleum fuel. It performs equally in diesel engines.at 20% to 50% blend with petroleum diesel.. Up to 82% reduced PM exhaust (particulate matter) emissions has been demonstrated with no loss in power..BiofuelsDigest

If SunEco can deliver on its high-yield promise, it will blow other bio-oil approaches out of the water. There is reason to be skeptical, based upon other failed optimists of the past. The search for investors in a recession can sometimes lead a company to overstate its prospects.

Still, all in all, it is good to see that some biofuels companies are pushing the envelope even in the darkest days of an Obama / Pelosi economic mismanagement. This may be the one to watch.

Ethanol Glut Looms on the Horizon

At the recent Fuel Ethanol Workshop, several companies, including Coskata, Dupont/Danisco, Iogen, Lignol, Poet and PureVision, announced that they already have production from their demonstration plants or will within the year. Most are processing about 1 ton of material into ethanol daily. From that ton of biomass, they are producing between 70 and 85 gallons of biofuels. Commercial production is expected to follow in a year or two.

Coskata was the most aggressive and said it is so confident of the production system that the company has decided to start licensing its proprietary technology later this year. Coskata’s process is far more robust than it originally had estimated because the company can process cellulosic feed stock from agricultural sources, urban land waste, forests and even a wide variety of manufacturing wastes. The company also stated that once its process is perfected, ethanol from cellulosic sources would be price competitive with gasoline even without any federal tax credit. _NDSU

Ethanol was once the fuel of choice for internal combustion engines -- before gasoline and diesel production were revved up. But modern engine materials cannot withstand the corrosive effects of highly concentrated ethanol such as E85 or higher. Either the engines must change, or biofuels producers will need to move to less corrosive biofuels such as butanol.

Ethanol producers will soon far outrun the demand for ethanol fuels, as production continues to gear up. Tariffs against Brazilian ethanol currently protect American ethanol producers from competition, but once cellulosic ethanol hits its production stride, there will be no protection from the subsequent ethanol glut.

That is why it is critical for "ethanol" producers to quickly move to more rational fuels such as butanol -- or to promote the production of flex-fuel and E85 engine technology. Ethanol fuel cells might be another rational response to the ethanol : ICE mismatch that currently exists and will soon be exacerbated by overproduction of
EtOH.

Cellulose has marvelous potential for producing electricity, syngas, process heat and space heating, butanol, plastics, high value chemicals, etc. Focusing on ethanol is short-sighted, and will inevitably lead to more problems. It is time to begin looking beyond two carbon alcohol.

Algae Growth Spurts and Pains

Algae, algae, algae. The research that is occurring on this second generation fuel has overfloweth the petri dish as just this week there have been five major algae announcements.

1. W2 Energy, based in Canada, announced that it has completed its Sunfilter commercial scale algae bioreactor.
2. Algaeventure Systems said that it has begun receiving orders for its algae harvesting, dewatering, and drying technology. The company that has placed the order is General Atomics.
3. Energy & Environmental Research Center (EERC) at University of North Dakota was awarded a subcontract by SAIC to use its proprietary technology to produce jet fuel from algal oils.
4. Kent BioEnergy, based on California, announced that it is going to establish a division of the company in Charleston South Carolina, partnering with a Grant Know, a local entrepreneur.
5. Algenol Biofuels, a Florida based company, has threatened to leave the state and now they are working with CEO Paul Woods to entice his company to stay.

Source

Microbe energy may well take 20 years to become a world class energy competitor. Synthetic biology and systems biology will combine with improved membranes, catalytics, and materials technology to evolve a wide array of microbial energy platforms. The end effect of the bioenergy revolution should be cheaper and more abundant energy, chemicals, plastics, and food products for people and animals.

What Will Pelosi, Boxer, Obama, and Salazar do to Shut Down North Dakota Oil?

North Dakota as an oil patch state? Yes, probably in a decade or less. The state’s Three Forks-Sanish formation could rival nearby Bakken Play, a vast oil shale field. Together they could hold 200 billion barrels of oil, about four times Alaska’s entire oil cache. That’s enough black gold to provide the equivalent of 30 years’ worth of U.S. oil needs at current usage levels, without having to import one barrel from abroad. _Kiplinger_via_NewsAlert

We have heard a lot about North Dakota's Bakken Play -- particularly from Brian Wang's NextBigFuture. But larger oil fields wait to be tapped as the technology of oil discovery, exploration, and extraction is improved. Peak oil catastrophe dogma relies upon ignorance of remaining oil reserves, for credibility. As long as the profit motive is allowed to function in free societies, however, energy technologies will improve to exploit the abundant reserves of energy that wait unseen in the world around us.

Universities, the media, and the green political-industrial complex are united in the goal of energy starvation and industrial choke-off, along with population die-off. All of the policies of the Obama / Pelosi reich revolve around that underlying theme. Under the policies of the ruling reich, businesses will die, employment will plummet, home ownership will continue melting away, and power will continue to consolidate to the politically connected.

Peak oil catastrophe and climate catastrophe are two useful facades to facilitate the agenda. North Dakota is an awkward counterpoint to the talking points. There will be more -- many more. This is a time for those persons who have escaped the academic and media camps with their intellectual curiosity intact, to start paying attention. Things are soon to become interesting.

Cross-posted at Al Fin

Using the Full Range of Aquatic Plants for Energy

PetroAlgae is now reporting that, in its 5000-hectare system, it can produce 9-10 metric tons of purified high-value proteins per acre per year, plus 4700-6000 gallons of biofuels (plus biochar) per acre per year. This pencils out to up to 125,000 tons of protein per year, plus 75 Mgy of renewable fuels, for the full system.

“The future is not years away but here today,” noted Executive VP Business development Harold Gubnitsky at the Florida Farm to Fuel Summit last week in Orlando. The PetroAlgae system costs, “several hundred million dollars,” according to the company, but has payback within three years, making the investment not for the faint of heart, but potentially lucrative. _BiofuelsDigest

We know about the promise of energy from algae and diatoms. But the full range of aquatic plants that could be used to produce abundant energy is far wider than most of us realise. Besides producing biofuels, aquatic systems can produce high value proteins and other nutrients and high value chemicals. The additional high value products provide for higher profits and more rapid payback of investment.

The first public hint that new breakthroughs were on the horizon arrived in early April, when a research team at North Carolina State University reported that it has realized up to six times the average corn starch yield by growing duckweed, a microscopic aquatic plant, using hog farm waste water. The researchers concluded that the process cleans up waste water and produces a high-yield biofuel, and the duckweed starch can be converted to ethanol at existing corn ethanol processors.

One of the advantages of the tiny aquatic plants is that so little of their biomass is needed to support their structure, since they float on water instead of standing freely in the air. As little as five percent of some species is fiber - with the rest an attractive mix of proteins, carbs and lipids.

The researchers said at the time that their process will work on any type of nutrient-rich wastewater, including municipal wastewater. However, the team was not far advanced in developing a large-scale system, indicating that they were in the process of establishing a pilot-scale demonstration of their system for growing, harvesting and drying duckweed.

Later in the spring, PetroAlgae was evolving its message to emphasize “microcrops” over “microalgae”, signaling that it was working on several different aquatic plant platforms.

Last week, Joule Biotechnologies made a cryptic announcement of a novel biofuel production system using a modified and otherwise mysterious aquatic, photosynthetic microorganism that, housed in a closed photobioreactor replete with brackish water, would use CO2 and sunlight as sources of reproductive energy. Lipids and fuels would be continuously harvested without destroying the micro-organisms. _BiofuelsDigest

These aquatic systems can be genetically tweaked and selected for optimal growth and targeted production, using high speed genetic screening and modification techniques as described by Brian Westenhaus.

The world of biological production of fuels, chemicals, and other high value products is just beginning. Stay tuned.

Biological Approaches to Liquid Fuels Make Gains

Synthetic biology is making great progress in programming microbial cells for energy production. Harvard's George Church, cofounder of LS9, has developed the MAGE platform for rapid cell programming.

Joule Biotechnologies has developed its Helioculture technology for using sunlight for conversion of CO2 to fuels.

Bioscience firm Target Growth has devised a way to cause algae to produce 400% more oil.

Origin Oil has improved its method of extracting oil from algae without destroying the organism.

According to US oil giant ExxonMobil, which recently launched a $600 million research and development project on the issue, algae could yield more than 2,000 gallons of fuel per acre per year of production (7,580 litres). Approximate yields for other fuel sources are far lower, it pointed out:

* Palm — 650 gallons per acre per year (2,463 litres).
* Sugar cane — 450 gallons per acre per year (1,705 litres).
* Corn — 250 gallons per acre per year (947 litres).
* Soy — 50 gallons per acre per year (190 litres).

As a consequence, algae need much less land to grow than conventional biofuels, ending the potential for conflict with food production which comes with increased energy crop cultivation. _Bioenergy

Overview of algae's near term future

Bioenergy Brief

Biofuels Digest has an interesting look at the top 20 biofuels ventures, and who is investing in them.

Brian Westenhaus points to a US company in Brazil that intends to peg the price ceiling of oil at $60 a barrel.

Check Biotech looks at an algal research lab in Spain to learn how soon we can expect commercial production of algal biodiesel.

Beer breweries are beginning to produce 50% of their own energy needs by gasifying waste products of fermentation. via Ecofriend

Bioenergy is not a green fad. It is where a significant part of tomorrow's energy and fuel will come from.

Brown Coal to Oil Direct Conversion

Image SourceLow quality brown coal can not be used under the air quality and carbon emissions regulations of many advanced countries. Yet low quality coal represents a huge stockpile of energy wealth waiting to be used, from Australia to North America, to Asia. Clever engineers and technologists are devising multiple ways of getting at the energy inside low quality coal, without emitting the pollutants. The following article describes only one approach.

Ignite Energy Resources (IER), developer of a supercritical water technology, and TRUenergy have entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to develop a commercial demonstration plant that will apply IER’s direct coal-to-oil and upgraded dry coal process to the brown coal at TRUenergy’s Yallourn mine in Australia.

IER’s proprietary supercritical water technology (SCW) transforms low-ranked coals, including lignite, directly into higher-valued oils and cleaner coal products. IER’s Hydrothermal Reactor (HTR) technology depolymerizes lignite and biomass by using SCW to cut it directly into oils and upgraded cleaner coal products—i.e., not via an indirect pathway (gasification) as in Fischer-Tropsch processes. IER claims that its process generates 60% less CO2 than the most widely available coal-to-liquids technology and can generate clean fuels from biomass that are carbon negative.

Supercritical water is water above its critical point—the temperature and pressure under which phase boundaries (between solids, liquids and gases) cease to exist. Supercritical water dissociates into OH- (base) and H+ (acid) molecules, creating a substance that is simultaneously a strong acid and a strong base. Although normally acids and bases neutralize each other, they can’t at supercritical temperatures and pressures, IER says. The strong acids and bases attack weak links in organic polymers, which are broken directly into valuable oils and solid products. _GCC

Other viable approaches for cleanly extracting energy from low quality coals involve gasification of coal and catalytic synthesis of fuels.

Gasification can be applied to almost all forms of carbon, including black liquor from paper / pulp works.

The ability to take a dirty and worthless waste product and turn it into something quite clean and valuable is the mark of a civilisation that is beginning to find its way -- at least in this narrow area of cleaning up after itself.

Algae Oil A Promising Contender

Image: Green Car CongressScientists at Colorado State University and the NREL have calculated the theoretical maximum oil yield of algae growing in sunlight as 38,000 gallons per acre. That is a much better yield than maize, rape, soy -- even palm.

Biofuels Digest provides an update look at various algae biofuels projects, including:

Solazyme
Algenol
Petro Algae
Sapphire Energy
Aurora Biofuels
Solix Biofuels

and more . . .

This Chilean algae biofuel project is on schedule for commercial production of micro-algal biofuels within 5 years.

Algae and its diatomaceous cousins have the potential to take the lead in biofuels production from the bio-alcohols by 2020. By 2030, developed nations may be consuming greater amounds of biofuels than petrofuels. It is unlikely that fossil fuels will be completely replaced by biological alternatives until the end of the century, and there will never be "peak oil" in the sense of more fossil fuels having been extracted than still remain in extractable form in the rock and sand.

Choren's Freiberg BTL to Come On Line in 2010

Choren's BTL technology achieving wood chip to fuels using gasification plus Fischer Tropsch, will begin producing fuels commercially in 2010, at the Freiberg Germany location.

The plant is being built in Freiberg in south Germany by Choren Industries to produce about 15,000 tonnes of biomass-to-liquid (BTL) fuels largely using wood products and wood-based waste.

Initial output of gas could start in October this year leading to output of BTL liquid fuels in early 2010, said Michael Deutmeyer, chief executive of Choren's biomass supply subsidiary Choren Biomass.

Germany is among the first European countries building test plants to produce commercial volumes of second generation biofuels from a wide range of biomass materials ranging from wood chips and other forest products to straw, hay, grass, vegetable waste and low grade crops. _Bioenergy

Choren's plant puts together many of the next generation biofuels components, which must be thoroughly tested to pave the way for a large scale to biomass biofuels over the next few decades.

If Choren's venture is successful on its own merits -- without depending upon economically destructive carbon regulations for its profitability -- it will open the door to both its own expansion and the entry of other similar ventures worldwide.

Cap n Trade? It's Gonna Cost Ya Big Time

If you believe anything the US government has told you about the costs of Obama / Pelosi's grand carbon capping scheme, you really should be reading something else other than this blog. Anyone as gullible as that should be reading Salon or Huff n Puff, or one of the Green Party publications.

Robert Zubrin, promoter of outer space development and clean energy, has a few thoughts on the topic:

The United States emits about 9 billion tons of CO2 per year. Therefore, at a rate of $15/ton fee for emission indulgences, the bill would impose a tax of $135 billion per year on the nation. Divided by the U.S. population of 300 million, that works out to a cost of $450 per year levied on every American man, woman or child, or $1,800 for a family of four. While for wealthy individuals like Al Gore such an impost might represent a mere pittance, for working families struggling hard to make ends meet it would be a very significant burden.

But that is not even the worst part of it. As a result of the markup of carbon costs, a lot of those working families will be out of work and unable to pay their existing bills, let alone new ones. Consider: Burning one ton of coal produces about three tons of CO2. So a tax of $15 per ton of CO2 emitted is equivalent to a tax of $45/ton on coal. The price of Eastern anthracite coal runs in the neighborhood of $45/ton, so under the proposed system, such coal would be taxed at a rate of about 100 percent. The price of Western bituminous coal is currently about $12/ton. This coal would therefore be taxed at a rate of almost 400 percent. Coal provides half of America’s electricity, so such extraordinary imposts could easily double the electric bills paid by consumers and businesses across half the nation. In addition, many businesses, such as the metals and chemical industries, use a great deal of coal directly. By doubling or potentially even quadrupling the cost of their most basic feedstock, the cap-and-trade system’s indulgence fees could make many such businesses uncompetitive and ultimately throw millions of working men and women onto the unemployment lines.

A gallon of petroleum-derived liquid fuel produces about 20 pounds, or 1 percent of a ton, of CO2 when burned. But it takes about 1.5 gallons of oil to produce one gallon of refined liquid fuel. So a $15/ton tax on CO2 emissions will also cause an increase in the price of gasoline, diesel and jet fuel on the order of $0.22/gallon. This will not only hit consumers’ pockets, but increase transport costs throughout the economy, thereby disabling businesses and increasing unemployment levels still more. While harming the economy, such a gas tax will do nothing material toward the truly essential goal of decreasing America’s dependence on foreign oil. Indeed, the bill’s dramatic hikes in electricity costs will have the opposite effect, since only 3 percent of America’s electricity is derived from oil, and by forcefully increasing electric power costs, the bill will actually discourage adoption of electric means of transport, including mass-transit systems today and potentially plug-in hybrid cars in the future. America’s dependence on foreign oil could be substantially relieved by legislation requiring that new cars sold in the United States be flex-fueled and thus able to run equally well on alcohol fuels derived from a multitude of nonpetroleum sources, but the bill’s provisions in this area are so weak as to be worthless.

But all these bad aspects of the Waxman-Markey bill pale before its potential impact on the world’s food supply. America’s agricultural sector is one of the greatest success stories in human history. In 1930, hunger still stalked the entire globe. Not just in Africa, India and China, but even in Europe and America, the struggle to simply get enough food to live on still preoccupied billions of people. Since 1930, the world population has tripled. But instead of going hungrier, people nearly everywhere are now eating much better. This miracle is the work of American farmers, who have not only produced huge surpluses to feed the world, but used the income gained from such good work to pioneer ever more advanced techniques that have enabled farmers everywhere to grow more. This progress is still continuing. In 2007, Iowa alone produced more corn than the entire United States did in 1947, and the 300,000 American corn growers as a whole produced 784 billion pounds of corn, an amount sufficient to supply 130 pounds of corn per year to every person on the planet. But this miracle depends upon the availability of cheap fertilizer and pesticides, which in turn require carbon-based process energy to produce. If you tax carbon, you tax fertilizer and pesticides. If you tax these things, you tax food, and by no small amount. A $15/ton CO2 tax would increase fertilizer production costs directly by about $60/ton, with the cap-and-trade bill’s increased transport costs inflating the burden still more. That’s enough to make many farmers use less fertilizer, and less fertilizer means less food.

To get a sense of what it would mean for farmers to abandon fertilizer, it is only necessary to go to the supermarket and compare the price of the “organic” produce, grown without chemical fertilizer, to the regular produce, which, while just as nutritious, typically costs less than half as much. It is one thing for wealthy organic food buffs to voluntarily pay such high prices for their food — that is their right. But to impose such costs for basic groceries on everyone else, and particularly the poor, as part of a largely symbolic effort to try to change the weather, is self-indulgent in the extreme. _RollCall

Zubrin is being kind to Obama, the Congress, and the EPA. If he were honest, he would advocate for throwing the bums into a dungeon until Oynklent Green [OTC:OYNK] has time to sort them out. The US must have access to coal, shale oil, oil sands, shale gas, offshore oils, methane clathrates, and every other fossil fuel it can get to bridge the next few decades.

The big joke: China, India, and the other emerging countries whose CO2 output is beginning to dwarf that of the developed word, are in control of human CO2 generation now. Fiddling with the US output -- and devastating the US economy in the process -- is something that a person dedicated to symbolic gestures would do.

We are in for a lot of unnecessary hardship, thanks to our naked emperor and his free-spending, delusional court. Because if the US economy goes down, not one other country or any group of countries is ready to carry the weight that the US has been carrying economically, militarily, scientifically, or in virtually any other way.

Nuclear Fusion and Fission: Alternative to Political Peak Oil

Brian Wang follows new developments in nuclear energy technologies, and has three recent blog postings worth looking at:

An Interview with the head of the Focus Fusion group

A look at how new modular nuclear reactors from India may change the energy equation

Suggestions for speeding the development and regulatory approval of new nuclear reactor designs

If the Obama / Pelosi outfit is successful in strangling the US energy supply, the damage to the economy at large will take decades in repairing. Political Peak Oil appears to be the ultimate goal of the new energy starvation reich. But it cannot happen unless the rest of the US Government, American media, and American society in general go along with the suicidal plans.

Nuclear energy -- particularly the safe, new, more economical designs -- would be able to evade the draconian carbon regulations favoured by the new reich. But faux-environmentalists and other entrenched Luddite interests appear determined to stop any effort to work around the broad plan of energy starvation. It will be "touch and go" for some time.

Wood Chips to Jet Fuel, Dust to Diamonds, Lynn Tilton Does It All Without Shrugging

When Al Fin learned about Tilton's Old Town Mill project to take a defunct paper mill and turn it into a potentially thriving wood chip to bio-butanol to jet fuel enterprise, he was quite impressed. While the bio-jet fuel project illustrates Tilton's "turnaround" ability to anticipate trends and to turn "dust into diamonds", it is just one of many projects that Tilton is working on. Follow the links to learn more about this modern "Dagny Taggart".

Dagney Taggart was the heroine of the Ayn Rand classic "Atlas Shrugged." Taggart was one of the competent pillars of American capitalism holding back the forces of government encroachment and societal decline. A gritty, smart, competent railroad executive, Dagny fought tooth and nail against the collapse of the massively interconnected economic system that she believed in, and played a large part in maintaining.

This determination to save the economic and industrial system of the US put Dagny at odds with the ever-grasping government -- and with a mysterious group of entrepreneurs, industrialists, and wealthy financiers who were disappearing from the face of the Earth. The ongoing disappearance of these important players in US and global capitalism made Dagny's work that much harder. When Dagny discovered that these capitalist cohorts were voluntarily dropping out of the system -- and inviting her to do the same -- she was infuriated, dismayed, and determined even more to succeed against all the odds. But that was before she met John Galt. Who is John Galt?

Lynn Tilton is the CEO of private equity firm Patriarch Partners. Tilton leads the $5 billion venture firm in the effort to "turn around" failing corporations and businesses -- to reverse the accelerating entropy of American business and manufacturing.

The video above gives a very thin slice of Tilton's ideas, achievements, and projects. Tilton's twitter feed is here, and she also has a blog, Dust to Diamonds.

What would it take to convince a person like Lynn Tilton that "going John Galt" was the only viable alternative remaining? Quite a lot, I am sure. But Brocko and his gang appear to be doing everything they can to eliminate all viable alternatives.

I wish Ms. Tilton continued good fortune in her projects. Turning around the American economy -- and thus the world's -- is no easy task. Too bad the US has elected a government that is doing everything possible to make that task impossible.

If Ms. Tilton ever does go John Galt, you had best look to your bugout plans.

Taken from an earlier post at Al Fin

Gene Stacks, Cassettes, and Artificial Chromosomes: Giving Plants New Abilities

Chromatin is in the business of transforming plants with "gene stacks", to make crops hardier and more productive. Sugar cane is the latest plant to experience transformative change from Chromatin's gene stacking technology.

Chromatin has developed a novel approach to gene stacking, using the plant’s own DNA to deliver several genes. Under this agreement, Syngenta has obtained exclusive rights to use Chromatin’s stacking technology for trait genes in all plants from the genus Saccharum which includes commercial sugar cane varieties as well as energy cane, and crosses between Saccharum and other plant species. Syngenta obtained non-exclusive rights for use of this stacking technology in corn and soybean in 2007.

“Sugar cane growers and processors will benefit economically and environmentally from access to a combination of advanced traits that this technology could make,” said Ian Jepson, Global R&D sugar cane crop lead. “This new stacking technology, combined with the advanced plant varieties, crop protection choices, and our revolutionary new Plene technology will ensure our customers will have the best solutions in sugar cane and will give us a leading position especially in the large Brazilian market.”

Sugar cane is among the top crops grown today for use in sugar production and biofuels. Syngenta offers a broad range of crop protection products for sugar cane growers and is developing a novel planting technology planned for launch in 2010 under the brand name Plene that will help reduce production costs. New trait combinations in sugar cane could offer growers additional improvements in production efficiency and yield increases. _BiofuelsDigest

The technology to transform a plant by introducing new "gene sets" is in its infancy. It will be a few years yet before new strains of sugar cane will have the ability to grow in cold, dry high deserts, or on subarctic tundra.

But researchers are already introducing new genes into maize plants which will facilitate the conversion of cellulose in stover to simple sugars, for fermentation into fuels and high value chemicals.

As Al Fin always says, it's not nice to bet against Mother Nature. She knows where you live.

Energy and Bioenergy News

Virent Energy Systems has developed a water based catalytic method for producing diesel, gasoline and other hydrocarbon fuels from sugar, starch, and cellulose. Virent claims that its process is competitive with fossil fuels at a $60 a barrel oil cost. Brian Westenhaus has much more.

Amyris Biotechnologies is opening a demonstration plant in Brazil to demonstrate the production of fuels and high value chemicals from the bagasse waste product left over after the processing of sugar cane. GreenCarCongress and BiofuelsDigest have more.

The University of Florida's Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, Buckeye Technologies, and Myriant Technologies are partnering to produce a wide range of high value chemicals, materials, and fuels from cellulose. Virtually every petroleum product used by humans could be substituted with a cellulosic product. Energy Daily has more.

Brian Wang has news on Liquid Thorium nuclear reactors and space based solar power.

More on space based solar from Brian Westenhaus

Converting from a petroleum based economy to an economy based on biofuels and electrical power from nuclear, space solar, enhanced geothermal etc. will require the use of coal IGCC, oil sands, oil shales, shale gas, heavy oils, offshore oils, methane clathrates, and all the other forms of energy that the Obama administration is in the process of shutting down. All of those fossil hydrocarbons are a vital bridge to better energy sources.

The Obama administration combined with the Pelosi Congress appear dedicated to bringing on political peak oil decades ahead of schedule. Combined with the ongoing (and worsening) financial crisis and ill-advised Obama mass-tinkering with the private / public sector balance of the US, the move to energy starvation by the US government is likely to be financially and strategically devastating for the country.

All of this is only possible with the active and conscious complicity of the news and entertainment industrial complex. It makes sense in a perverse way. In the news business, large scale suffering is newsworthy. Obama / Pelosi promise to make people suffer with their incompetent policies. It makes perfect sense if you are a total slime.

BTL + FT = Synthetic Jet Fuel and Diesel

Rentech is taking its Fischer-Tropsch process and combining it with the Biomass-to-Liquid process of ClearFuels Technology Inc. to accelerate the production of synthetic jet fuel and diesel fuel from biomass. This partnership will begin at up to 12 US-based projects and expand outward from there.

ClearFuels has begun project development of multiple commercial scale biomass-to-energy projects in the Southeastern US, Hawaii and internationally that will use the integrated ClearFuels-Rentech design and will be co-located at sugar mills and wood processing facilities. The wood waste projects alone are estimated to have an aggregate annual capacity of more than 100 million gallons of renewable synthetic fuels and 30 MW of renewable power.

To facilitate the development process, ClearFuels plans first to install a demonstration-scale biomass gasifier at Rentech’s Product Demonstration Unit (PDU) in Commerce City, Colorado to produce syngas from bagasse, virgin wood waste and other cellulosic feedstocks. The gasifier will be integrated with Rentech’s Fischer-Tropsch Process and UOP’s upgrading technology to produce high-quality renewable drop-in synthetic jet and diesel fuels at demonstration scale. _GCC

In other bioenergy news, Chemrec is planning a biorefinery plant in Ornskoldsvik, Sweden, to convert black liquor to synthetic fuels. Converting the pulp/paper waste product (black liquor) to a useful fuel is becoming more popular in the paper industry worldwide. It is but one example of the increasing conversion of waste and pollutants into useful products and fuels.

Energy Starvation is a Top Reich Priority

...not one new commercial nuclear reactor design has been approved and built in the United States for 30 years.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Department of Energy were both formed in the 1970s to develop nuclear energy and thereby reduce our dependence on foreign oil. But neither has reduced our dependence on foreign oil, especially not with nuclear energy. _WSJ

Image SourceUnder President Obama and Speaker Pelosi, the US government has no intention of allowing cheap and plentiful nuclear energy to blossom. A bloom of clean, safe modular nuclear reactors would allow the US economy to sprout new wings and grow in a thousand new directions. An economic renaissance based upon plentiful energy and free markets is the last thing the new O / P Reich wants to see. But it could happen if the government only allowed it to.

These new small reactors meet important criteria for nuclear power plants. With no control rods to jam, they are far safer than the old models -- you might well call them nuclear batteries. By not using weapons-grade enriched fuels, they are nonproliferating. They minimize nuclear waste. And they're economical.

All of the new start-up reactors are tiny compared to the 104 old ones, each of which was custom designed for and constructed at the site of its utility power plant. Small enough to fit on a large kitchen table, the new reactors can be manufactured at very low cost and shipped by truck to power-plant sites. As an Internet guy, these small fission reactors seem to me like the microprocessors that took over from the huge, air-conditioned, glasshouse mainframe computers.

As venture capitalists, we at Polaris might have invested in one or two of these fission-energy start-ups. Alas, we had to pass. The problem with their business plans weren't their designs, but the high costs and astronomical risks of designing nuclear reactors for certification in Washington.

The start-ups estimate that it will cost each of them roughly $100 million and five years to get their small reactor designs certified by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. About $50 million of each $100 million would go to the commission itself. That's a lot of risk capital for any venture-backed start-up... _WSJ

The US government is certainly in no hurry to approve newer, safer reactor designs. Brian Wang looks at one government effort to develop a newer reactor design. From my perspective, it certainly looks a lot like "dragging one's feet," on the part of government bureaucracy. Keep in mind that government labs -- as helpful as they have been -- conduct research according to the academic model, which tends to stretch things out to the ultimate time limit. Corporate research takes economic imperatives into account, and often gets things done more quickly -- when government allows it.

Of course when government intervenes with tonnes of regulatory and bureaucratic requirements, no lab or enterprise in the world can get anything done efficiently or promptly.

More at Atomic Insights blog

Bioenergy's Big Future

It is fashionable to express skepticism about the potential of bioenergy to solve many of the energy problems for large parts of the developed and undeveloped worlds. Here at Al Fin Energy, we reject fashion for the sake of realism. Planet Earth is a biological planet -- the only one we know of for certain. Biology is an excellent anti-entropic nano-conglomerate system. It is open-ended and almost endlessly modifiable. Biology can be scaled from the microscopic to the planetary.

Here are 3 very good articles dealing with bioenergy:

Brian Wang looks at 12 leading biofuel technology firms, and the prospect of a fast expansion of biodiesel production globally.

GenEngNews looks at alternative feedstocks for boosting biofuels production of several types. This article is a good complement to Brian Wang's article above, for a more comprehensive survey of the biofuels field.

And Brian Westenhaus takes a closer look at the use of diatoms in the production of biodiesel and bio-oils.

Diatomaceous Oils Make a Move

Brian Wang and GreenCarCongress recently looked at research into the use of diatoms to produce biofuels -- specifically diesel - like oils.

Scientists in Canada and India are proposing a variety of ways of harvesting oil from diatoms—single cell algae with silica shells—using biochemical engineering and also a new solar panel approach that utilizes genomically modifiable aspects of diatom biology, offering the prospect of “milking” diatoms for sustainable energy by altering them to actively secrete oil products. Their communication appears online in the current issue of the ACS’ bi-monthly journal Industrial Engineering & Chemical Research.

Richard Gordon, T. V. Ramachandra, Durga Madhab Mahapatra, and Karthick B note that some geologists believe that much of the world’s crude oil originated in diatoms, which produce an oily substance in their bodies. Barely one-third of a strand of hair in diameter, diatoms flourish in enormous numbers in oceans and other water sources. They die, drift to the seafloor, and deposit their shells and oil into the sediments. Estimates suggest that live diatoms could make 10-200 times as much oil per acre of cultivated area compared to oil seeds, Gordon says. _GCC

It looks as if oil yields from diatoms are comparable to algal oil production per acre. This means that research and development into diatomaceous oils will be in competition with R & D into algal oils. The only way to do justice to both areas of research is to slash funding for climate catastrophe orthodoxies in government, academia, industry, and the media -- and apply those resources to development of high yield biofuels.

Political Peak Oil -- The Only Kind of Peak Oil

Brian Westenhaus presents an excellent example of how US government regulations are choking domestic energy supplies and driving up costs of industry, commerce, and daily life for every American.

Everyone world wide would be affected. Today the U.S. is a very small importer of natural gas. The proposed bill would certainly change that forcing the U.S. into the world natural gas market in a big way. _NewEnergyandFuel

How far will the Obama government go to create "political peak oil" and other fabricated disasters? And how long will it take for the American news and entertainment media to let the people know what is happening, to wake them up?

Government is creating political peak oil for reasons of its own. Someone benefits from the expanding web of regulations, taxes, fines, restrictions, and opening up to lawsuits that Americans are now experiencing. It is great job security for government bureaucrats, trial lawyers, and faux environmental activists, at the very least. But it is hell on the productive class of a country. Long term, this type of government destroys the productive potential of generations of citizens, until they wake up and get rid of it.The government is not the country. The government is a parasite on the country and on the people. The installation of particular persons in high governmental office leads to a pathological bloating of the parasite with the blood of taxpayers and commercial enterprise.

As long as government is kept strictly limited to the essential roles of protecting citizens from violence, theft, and fraud, the parasite can be managed. But the US government broke the chains put on it by the people and the Constitution in the early 20th century -- and has been growing oppressively larger in fits and starts ever since.

Under the current president, the US government has chosen to expand beyond all precedent, over a very short time span. This growth is very profitable to a select group of insiders -- labour unions, trial lawyers, campaign contributors, "connected" individuals -- but it is death to the people's hopes and dreams.

How will the people respond to the uncontrolled growth of the parasite?

Previously published at Al Fin

Energy News

Brian Westenhaus takes a look at specific energy in batteries, and where the technology may be going.

Germany's venerable and vaunted chemical industry is making plans to shift from petroleum-based feedstocks to biomass feedstocks.

Mitsubishi hopes to build an ultra-clean coal technology power plant in Australia -- the first of its kind. It would combine IGCC -- Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (gas turbine cycle plus steam turbine cycle) -- with carbon sequestration. Talks are ongoing.Green Car Congress has more on the fascinating discovery of methane hydrates in Gulf of Mexico seafloor sands.

Atomic Insights blog looks at the potential impact of mPower modular nuclear reactors on the stock market.

Biofuels Digest looks at the use of algae for carbon sequestration. Algae need a lot of CO2 to grow optimally, and the best places to find CO2 are the chemical and fossil fuels industries.

BTL, Black Liquor Gasifiers, Diesel Fuel Cells etc.

Finland's Neste Oil continues to lead the pack for production of ingenious biofuels methods. Now it is teaming with Enso to build a BTL pilot plant for producing biocrude from forestry waste.

The demonstration facility at Stora Enso Varkaus Mill includes a 12 MW gasifier. It will be used to develop technologies and engineering solutions for a commercial-scale plant. The demonstration process units will cover all stages, including drying of biomass, gasification, gas cleaning and testing of Fischer-Tropsch catalysts.

Swedish Chemrec AB is now operating a demonstration plant to produce syngas from "black liquor", a waste product of the paper and pulp industry. Formerly considered a pollutant and a significant disposal liability, black liquor appears to be quickly becoming a valuable revenue stream for these companies.

The development plant, DP-1, has a capacity of 20 metric tons of solids per day, is oxygen-blown and has an operating pressure of 30 bar(g). It gasifies black liquor, a by-product in the kraft process, using the Chemrec entrained-flow, high temperature technology. This technology is differentiated in that from a renewable feedstock in a single step it achieves full char conversion and produces a gas which is very low in methane and tars&mash;important characteristics of synthesis gas for production of synthetic motor fuels or chemicals.

The US DOE Pacific Northwest National Lab is developing a process to reform diesel fuel for use in portable fuel cells, using pressurised steam. Such a process could allow autos, trucks, trains, etc. to run off more efficient diesel powered fuel cells instead of diesel engines.

Biofuels Digest has an update on progress from Coskata and Zeachem.

ZeaChem confirmed that it is developing both fuels and chemicals on C2, C3, C4 and C5 platforms, including the two-carbon cellulosic ethanol and four-carbon biobutanol. Eggeman said that the company can also produce the two-carbon ethylene, an intermediate used to make plastics and other products, which is a $26 billion market, and also can make ethyl acetate from the C2 platform for a $3 billion market for that product. ZeaChem also is targeting the 3-carbon propylene, a $10 billion market.

mPower Modular Nuclear Reactor for TVA

Modular nuclear reactors provide a much more versatile load matching for utility and grid designers. Babcock and Wilcox of Lynchburg, Virginia, build a modular 125 MW nuclear reactor called the mPower. The US TVA is lining up to be the lead client for the mPower, possibly siting the first modular reactor in the Oak Ridge area.

Here is a bullet list of the key features of the mPowerTM as I see them:

* Pressurized water reactor (PWR) 17 x 17 fuel bundles
(Shorter than normal, but otherwise standard)
* Five year refueling schedule
* Fuel storage pool large enough for 60 years worth of fuel
* Adaptable to advances in LWR fuel
(MOX or thorium)
* Below grade construction in most locations
* Air cooled condensers
* Tall, thin pressure vessel
* Passive cooling
* Manufactured system with rail delivery to site
* American engineering and manufacturing (avoids queue at Japan Steel Works)
* 125 MWe of electrical power output
(I admit, I was wrong yesterday with my prediction of an even smaller system, but 125 MW is about 10th the size of the AP-1000.)

Knowing what I know about the company's performance for a very demanding customer, I feel reasonably confident that the timelines announced yesterday (design certification application in 2011, COL application in 2012, full license in 2015 and commercial operation in 2018) are not "stretch goals", but are reasonably achievable with some margin for the inevitable obstacles. _AtomicInsights

Medium sized nuclear reactors of this type can be "ganged" to achieve the power production of a full-sized 1 GW reactor, or can be distributed at strategic locations along the grid to provide critical baseload power for a region if adjacent grid regions shut down for some reason.

Like any nuclear reactor, it takes time to start up and shut down safely, so it would not serve as backup for unreliable wind power installations.

Small scale nuclear reactors -- smaller than the mPower -- would be ideal as local and regional baseload power in case of a large scale power shut down caused by EMP or excessive solar electromagnetic activity. In such a situation, available power components such as transformers and power electronics would be relatively scarce, and insufficient to support full scale power grid re-start. The grid would have to re-start in sections, as the components could be repaired, rebuilt, or replaced -- which could take years in some circumstances.

American Southeast Prime Bioenergy Location

KC Das, professor of engineering from the University of Georgia -- in the American southeast -- looks at the bioenergy prospects for his state (and region). His informed viewpoints tend distinctly optimistic for bioenergy.

Does Georgia have an advantage in bioenergy production?

Yes, because we can grow great quantities of biomass through our agriculture and forestry industries. Universities like University of Georgia, Georgia Tech and others provide the technology. The UGA Complex Carbohydrate Research Center is strong in the biological sciences. In addition, the Agricultural Innovation Center and the Georgia Environmental Facilities Authority assist companies interested in getting into the business through their “One Stop Shop.”

How much petroleum-based energy can be replaced with bioenergy in Georgia?

About 30 percent of our energy needs can be met with bioenergy today. By patching together multiple strategies, we can achieve this amount. This would include burning chicken litter to heat farms in north Georgia, fermenting outdated cola products for ethanol, generating biogas from cow manure on dairy farms, harvesting landfill gas for electricity and producing cellulosic ethanol from pine waste in south Georgia. All of these projects exist today in Georgia and many more are coming on line.

Cellulosic ethanol is being promoted as part of the next generation of bioenergy. Is it economically viable?

Yes, at the current price of oil, it is economically viable. But we must mass produce it. It should be in large scale production in five years.

In your opinion, is any one feedstock more viable than another?

Algae shows great promise because it grows rapidly in warm climates like what we have in Georgia. It can produce 2,000 gallons of oil per acre. Soybeans generate approximately 50 gallons for each acre. Extracting the oils from the algae is difficult, and we are working to resolve this problem.

What kind of biofuel research does your team at UGA conduct?

Essentially, we try different processes on a variety of agricultural and forestry wastes and fuel crops to create bioenergy. The wastes include peanut shells, poultry litter and forestry residues and promising fuel crops include algae, bamboo and kenaf. We’re not opposed to trying any feedstocks as long as there are great quantities available. Through a thermochemical process called pyrolosis, we heat biomass in the absence of oxygen to produce oil, gas and charcoal. UGA engineers and soil scientists collaborate to characterize the char and determine its value as a fertilizer or soil amendment.

We examine the entire carbon cycling process. Gasification is another thermochemical process we can use to make liquid fuels. This is done by heating the feedstock with a little oxygen. UGA CAES scientists work with researchers in the UGA Warnell School of Forest Resources to convert wood waste from sustainably managed forests into cellulosic ethanol. We look at the full life cycle of making biofuels and part of that involves pre-processing the waste. Biomass is heated at low temperatures to increase its energy density and remove less desirable properties. This works well for wood waste and makes it easier to transport and more efficient in co-firing with existing power plants. _Bioenergy

Food Waste to Fuels

Humans in modern societies waste more food than they can imagine. But biofuels engineers and entrepreneurs are riding to the rescue, to turn what was once waste into useful fuels and energy.

Four ReFood plants already operating in Germany currently generate energy from food collected from 60,000 points across the country, using 14 logistics centres.

Like the German network, the British version will also use collection points located across the country, supported by the network of AD plants.

Anaerobic digestion involves organic wastes or energy crops being used to feed bacteria, which under controlled conditions generate a biogas that can be put through an internal combustion engine or burned to generate heat and power.

Mr Simpson said the ReFood technology was "very advanced" compared to other AD technologies available in the UK since it was designed around using food waste as a feedstock, rather than an adaptation of technologies using sewage sludge or farm wastes.

"As a result, the ReFood system is able to focus on recycling greater quantities of this type of material," he said.

Franz Bernhard Thier, a member of the board of Saria Bio-Industries, said: "ReFood has been operating on an industrial scale successfully in Germany for a number of years. We're delighted to be teaming up with PDM to bring both our areas of expertise together to create an offering that is really going to support food waste recycling and renewable energy generation in the UK." _bioenergy

While the uninformed debate over "food vs. fuels", more intelligent persons are looking into the future for ways to convert waste from an overabundance of food -- into energy and fuels.

Better Cellulose to Fuels Converstion Will Lead to Billions of Gallons Annual Biofuels

USDOE researchers at the Pacific Northwest National Lab are perfecting an efficient method of turning lignocellulose into biofuels and high-value chemicals.

PNNL scientist David King presented the work on 8 June at the North American Meeting of the Catalysis Society. A pair of metal chlorides (CuCl2 and CrCl2) dissolved in an ionic liquid (1-ethyl-3-methylimidazolium chloride ([EMIM]Cl)) at temperatures of 80-120°C collectively catalyze the single-step process of converting cellulose to HMF with an unrefined 96% purity among recoverable products (at 55.4 ±4.0% HMF yield).

The paired CuCl2/CrCl2 catalysts in the ionic liquid solvent show high activity for hydrolytic cellulose depolymerization. The product selectivity can be tuned by simply varying the CuCl2/CrCl2 ratio.

Cellulose depolymerization occurs at a rate that is about one order of magnitude faster than conventional acid-catalyzed hydrolysis. In contrast, single-metal chlorides at the same total loading showed considerably less activity under similar conditions. _GCC

What about those "billions of gallons of biofuels?" Novozymes says that Brazil is setting up to produce 2 billion gallons a year of ethanol from cellulosic bagass, cane biomass residue.

In Brazil, Novozymes has released a report projecting that, by 2012, Brazil could commence commercial-scale production of cellulosic biofuel made from sugarcane residues, and could produce up to 2.1 billion gallons of cellulosic ethanol by 2020.

Novozymes CEO Steen Riisgaard, presented the report’s findings at the Ethanol Summit in Sao Paulo, and said that the additional production could add up to $4 billion in Brazilian export revenue. Novozymes and CTC (Sugarcane Technology Center) in Brazil are studying the production of cellulosic biofuels in Brazil, while Novozymes confirmed that it continues to work with partners in Denmark, Sweden and Brazil on reducing the cost of enzymes to make cellulosic ethanol commercially viable. _Biofuelsdigest

This is the beginning of the beginning of the biofuels age. People who get stuck in the "food vs. fuels" faux debate, or who fixate on maize ethanol efficiencies or "water consumption" for biofuels, or "smaller than expected yields from jatropha plantings in Zambia" and so forth, are looking years and years into the past and pretending to see into the future.

Unfortunately, many of these retrograde thinkers occupy chairs in universities and government bureaucracies. They will do a lot of damage before they die off.

Regardless, there will be plenty of opportunities to keep forward thinking individuals busy, if Obama and his clowns don't shut off the power prematurely.

7th Annual Int. Energy Conversion Conference

From 2-5 August, 2009, in Denver Colorado, the 7th Annual International Energy Conversion Conference will explore a wide range of topics of interest to Al Fin Energy readers:

The 7th IECEC will explore the future of clean energy systems through a series of panel discussions and technical paper presentations. This year's hot topics include:

* Alternative power systems – such as fuel cell technology and solar system technology
* Biofuels, including biodiesel fuels and fuels created from food-waste
* Electric power systems which would replace traditional fossil fuel based propulsion systems
* Nanotechnlology applications for solar power systems, among many others. There will also be a discussion of future energy policy needs to answer the demand for “green” energy systems. _IECEC

In a special joint conference with the "Jet Propulsion Conference" the IECEC will also be taking a look at biofuels as the source of rocket propulsion fuel for space launch.

The 7th IECEC is sponsored by Battelle Memorial Institute and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency. The 45th JPC is sponsored by Lockheed Martin Space Systems Company, Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Company, and Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control.

For more information, visit http://www.aiaa.org/events/IECEC or http://www.aiaa.org/events/JPC, or contact Duane Hyland, at 703.264.7558 or duaneh@aiaa.org. Registration for both conferences is complimentary for credentialed members of the press.

AIAA is the world's largest technical society dedicated to the global aerospace profession. With more than 35,000 individual members worldwide, and 90 corporate members, AIAA brings together industry, academia, and government to advance engineering and science in aviation, space, and defense. For more information, visit www.aiaa.org. Bioenergy

Natural Gas to Europe, Residential Fuel Cells

The map of the proposed Nabucco natural gas pipeline suggests the scope of Europe's need for natural gas. With the global climate showing signs of reversing a recent warming trend, Europe risks freezing in the dark cold winter unless she finds a way to break her uneasy dependency on Russian fuels. North America and Australia already have plenty of natural gas (and coal).
Natural gas is a cleaner fossil fuel than coal or oil. Just as important, natural gas works well for fuel cells -- a form of power generation that is growing in importance. In fact, in Japan, in the UK, in the US, and in Australia, home fuel cells for combined residential provision of hot water, space heat, and electricity (CHP) is slowly becoming an important player in the overall power utility scheme.

Of course almost anyone with access to natural gas can provide home CHP (combined heat and power) using a gas-powered combustion generator. But with fuel cells, combined efficiency can reach almost 90%. With a combustion engine, combined CHP efficiencies are closer to 60%.

Regular Al Fin readers will recognise the theme of "independence" and "decentralisation" in the trend toward home generation of power. Being able to produce your own methane or methanol to power your own CHP fuel cell would be even better. Off the grid for power, hot water, heat, cooking, etc. makes you less vulnerable to the Obama / Pelosi reich energy starvation policies.
Cross posted at Al Fin

Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor

Google Tech Talk Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor
The world needs safe nuclear energy by the Gigawatt and Terawatt. Since Thorium is far more abundant than Uranium, and less prone to being turned to nuclear weapons uses, the Thorium fuel cycle makes sense. The following Peswiki editorial discusses using the liquid fluoride thorium reactor in conjunction with coal gasification and solid oxide fuel cells, to provide the energy and fuel needed for the next few centuries -- or until cheap abundant nuclear fusion comes along.

For those individuals who understand the global energy situation the answer is quite clear and it involves advanced technology, chemistry, money, and political support. The comments in the clean coal comic truly express a viable technological solution which will lead to the realization of a long term solution going beyond the hundreds of years which coal and other fossil fuels would provide.

A 1000 MW nuclear reactor could produce 18,000 barrels of fuel a day with technology which currently exists. There have been several different Thorium reactors in operation within the past 40 years. So what happened? The era when these reactors were brought online was during the cold war. Uranium-fueled nuclear power plants are the suppliers of weapons grade plutonium which we use within our nuclear arsenal [hence their being favored]. The Yucca Mountain project is simply a nuclear weapons storage silo in disguise. The question I ask, which is more important, being whether we will destroy our planet or save it from our destruction?

There will always be a need for man to have the capability of defending itself but at what expense?

The thorium nuclear fission cycle eliminates the risk of meltdown and weapons proliferation while the byproducts have a reduced half-life on the order of 1/2 century rather than thousands of years. Thorium can be recycled and poses no direct risks to our environment unless the facilities themselves were attacked. Even in this situation we would not have another Chernoble. People fear nuclear energy because of the Three Mile Island incident and what they see on the History Channel. Thorium nuclear reactors have demonstrated their viability in the past so what is the problem? _Peswiki

Future energy needs will be filled using multiple energy sources. Biomass and microbe energy will be very important. But nuclear reactors of several types and sizes will be integral to the transition to clean and sustainable energy, power, and fuels. Coal, kerogens (oil shale), bitumens (oil sands and heavy oils), and various forms of gaseous fossil fuels will be critically important, using newer cleaner technology. Fuel cells will provide important improvements in efficiency in utilising liquid and gaseous fuels (solids too).

Looking at modern political planners who call themselves "green", we see that green is scarcity and death. The "green" approach is no cleaner and is far less sustainable than the wise multiple source approach. Today's leaders in Europe, the US, Australia, and other countries are stupidly green -- adherents of scarcity and death. We cannot afford these leaders or their bigoted and genocidal policies.

Algae to Biofuels Pathways

Microalgae offer “great promise” to contribute a significant portion of the renewable fuels target specified in the Renewable Fuels Standard. In the longer term, the roadmap notes, algal biofuels could provide sufficient fuel feedstock to meet the transportation fuels needs of the entire United States, while being completely compatible with the existing transportation fuel infrastructure (refining, distribution, and utilization).

However, despite their huge potential, the state of technology for producing algal biofuels is regarded by many in the field to be in its infancy.

There is a general consensus that a considerable amount of research, development, and demonstration (RD&D) needs to be carried out to provide the fundamental understanding and scale-up technologies required before algal-based fuels can be produced sustainably and economically enough to be cost-competitive with petroleum-based fuels. For this reason, a major objective of the Workshop was to help define the activities that will be needed to resolve the challenges associated with commercial-scale algal biofuel production and lay the framework for an algal biofuels technology roadmap.
—USDOE Algal Roadmap _GCC

Time, work, investment. More on algae future from Europe.

Several US companies are projecting competitive pricing for their algal fuels within 5 years. European Algae Biomass Association says they will take at least 10 to 15 years and even then may not be competitive. Are the European biofuels projects that far behind?

Simpler, Cheaper Biodiesel From Waste Oil

Chemical engineers at Univesity of La Guna in Spain have developed a simpler and less expensive method of producing methyl ester biodiesel from waste oils and vegetable oil triglycerides. The process involves substituting an easily separable solid catalyst for harsh basic catalysts such as sodium hydroxide. Highly basic NaOH creates side reactions that decrease yield and force expensive and time consuming purification steps that would be unnecessary using the La Guna researchers' method. The production facilities could be simpler and less expensive, and the production time from feedstock to product would be reduced.

Biodiesel is a cleaner burning fuel than diesel and a suitable replacement. It is made from nontoxic, biodegradable, renewable resources, such as new and used cooking oil and animal fats. Fats and oils are chemically reacted with alcohols (transesterification reaction) to produce fatty acid methyl esters (biodiesel). Glycerine, used in the pharmaceutical and cosmetic industry along with many other applications, is produced in this reaction as a byproduct. The processes and production of biodiesel (methyl esters) from vegetable oil and animal fats feedstock remain a strong growth market in the European Union as well as the United States and Canada.
The most commonly used technology for fats and oils transesterification is based on the use of batch reactors, in which a basic homogeneous catalyst is used. The use of homogeneous catalysts requires extensive conditioning and purification steps for the reaction products (methyl esters and glycerol) to separate the catalysts. In contrast, heterogeneous catalysts are easily removed from the reaction mixture, making the purification step easier.(1) Biodiesel production costs could certainly be reduced by using a heterogeneous catalyst for transesterification reaction instead of a homogeneous catalyst. This heterogeneous process provides higher quality esters and glycerol, which are more easily separated and further expensive refining operations are not needed.(2) _ACS

Hydrochloric Acid Process Converts Cellulose to Fermentable Sugars

The fermentable sugars are a gateway to advanced biofuels (biobutanols, biodiesel, jet fuel etc) and biochemicals (bioplastics etc). The HCL CleanTech’s process allows a large variety of feedstocks to be used with minimal configuration, requires very little water and self sufficient energetically. _BiofuelsDigest

For now, the best way of converting lignocellulosic biomass to liquid fuels is via either gasification or pyrolysis, with catalytic conversion to fuels. But a number of other processes are being developed using biological or chemical conversions -- without the gasifiers and pyrolytic units. These alternative approaches may eventually introduce a wider range of scaling into the bioenergy.

“Basically, the Company tackles the pre-treatment and hydrolysis step all at once, without use of enzymes,” said Burrill & Company Director, Greg Young. “Accessing cheap sugar locked in biomass is one of the greatest challenges now faced by those pursuing renewable fuels and chemicals. HCL CleanTech’s technology represents a step change in accessing these sugars, and drops into the pretreatment step of any fermentation-based process or chemical reforming technique which starts with oligosaccharides. We are eager to see this proven at scale, at which point it becomes immediately relevant to adjacent industries aiming to use biomass as a feedstock.” _BiofuelsDigest

Biomass can be feedstock for not only the biofuels industry, but the chemicals, plastics, and biomaterials industries as well. Advances and breakthroughs in one area are bound to have spillover effects in other areas of industry.

Backwater areas that previously had nothing to offer to attract jobs and investment, will suddenly discover that their economic prospects are rising on a groundswell of opportunity in bioenergy etc.

A World Floating In Methane

A recent USGS, US Minerals Management Service, and a group under the management of Chevron have done a survey of methane-rich sand reservoirs in the Gulf of Mexico. Brian Westenhaus reports:

...gas hydrate can and does occur at high saturations within reservoir-quality sands in the Gulf of Mexico with highly saturated hydrate-bearing sands discovered in at least in two of three sites drilled. Dr. Collett said, “In addition, we have found gas hydrate in a range of settings, including sand reservoirs, thick sequences of fracture-filling gas hydrates in shales, and potential partially saturated gas hydrates in younger systems. These sites provide a wealth of opportunities for further study and data collection that will enable significant advances in understanding the nature and development of gas hydrate systems.”

The project also featured a number of technical advances, including the use of an advanced suite of logging-while-drilling tools that provided unprecedented three-dimensional images of hydrate-bearing sediments. The wells sited at Walker Ridge, drilled to approximately 3,500 feet below the seafloor, were more than 1,000 feet deeper than any previous gas hydrate research well.

It all looks very good. _NewEnergyandFuel

Methane hydrates -- methane plus water -- have been found under the sea floor and under surface layers around the world. The quantity of methane within the Earth's crust is more than scientists imagined. More methane than oil, coal, conventional gas supplies. No one knows how much more, the exploration has just begun.

Besides methanol, methane is another near-ideal fuel for the coming age of fuel cells.