Ceres, Inc.

For any cellulosic ethanol industry to take off, there needs to be an abundant, biomass intense area from which to cultivate the plant material. The great hope is that this will not only pertain to areas already covered in biomass, such as corn-stalks or forested areas in the Southeastern United States, but that this will allow for the development of crops that can be grow in many areas of the US that are not hospitable to current agricultural growth. This includes the ultra-arid Southwestern United States where the development of a perennial crop could produce a valuable crop on marginal land but also would hopefully improve the land in the process by decreases soil erosion as well as providing a more humid environment where more rain development might occur.

A company called Ceres Inc. is trying to establish this idea of optimum energy crops for each region of the United States. To do this they have sequenced many of the genomes of switchgrass, miscanthus, and other plants and have then used selective breeding technologies to isolate varieties of the plant that match different areas, such as the desert Southwest.

Here is a map and diagram of their outlook for the next several years:

http://www.greencarcongress.com/2008/08/ceres-readying.html#more

Go to the website shown above for more information about the crop varieties listed above.

Ethanol Plants Lower Costs and Save On CO2 Emissions

As the ethanol industry continues to establish itself, ethanol plants are improving their efficiency as well as their carbon dioxide emissions. This is not a totally selfless act, but it is done so that the ethanol plants are both able to survive in a climate where it can at times be hard to make a profit as well as a way to improve the overall efficiency of their process.
With the spike earlier this summer in corn prices, ethanol plants struggled to even make a penny on a gallon of ethanol sold, even with oil prices as high as they were. Now that corn has retreated and oil has remained comparatively high, ethanol plants have begun to breath a small sigh of relief. However, they are no where near out of the woods yet. Ethanol plants face dangers from possible rises in grain prices to the very volatile natural gas market that is most commonly used to power the large heaters used in an ethanol plant to boil off the ethanol from the water.
Two ethanol plants are leading the way in establishing a more sustainable process towards ethanol production. The first is an ethanol plant in Johnson County, Missouri that is teaming up with a local landfill to help make its process more efficient. Mid-Missouri Energy's ethanol plant will team up with the landfill to supply enough natural gas to offset 90% of the natural gas needed to power the plant. This is an amazing amount of renewable energy that, if calculated specifically for this ethanol plant, would make ethanol's benefit in GHG-emission reductions much greater than the 16% reductions seen in conventional plants. This is not only good because of the decrease in green-house gas emissions, but one of the biggest expenses for an ethanol plant is the energy needed to drive its distillation, (which can amount to 60% of the entire plant's energy requirements). So by establishing a reliable, cheaper source of natural gas, the ethanol plant, which is owned by a local farming cooperative, should become much more competitive in its industry.
The second ethanol plant to mention is located in Superior, Iowa. The local ethanol plant has won approval to install three wind turbines on site to generate electric power for the plant. This will not speak to the power needed to drive the distillation process but it should go a long way in providing renewable power to the ethanol plant at a cheaper cost as well as driving down some of the GHG emissions.
Both of these two plants are using unique ideas in an effort to improve the production of ethanol. From an innovative standpoint as well as a practical financial standpoint these improvements make sense if ethanol plants are to move forward in producing an environmentally friendly product at a price that competes for consumers.

Sources for the information above can be found at:
http://www.esthervilledailynews.com/page/content.detail/id/501320.html

http://www.bizjournals.com/kansascity/stories/2008/07/28/daily11.html

Nuclear "Deep-Burn" Technology

I've said in the past that my mission is to focus these posts on matters directly related to ethanol. However, the current evolution of our energy situation has made the entire field complex and interdependent. For this reason, this post is about nuclear energy and, while not speaking directly to an ethanol issue, I think it is connected in that if we are to have flex-fueled cars with PHEV (plug-in hybrid electric vehicle) technology included, we better have an efficient, reliable, and clean source of energy to power the electric side of these vehicles.

The Department of Energy recently announced grant money going towards two labs, the Argonne National Labs, and the Idaho National Labs for the study of "Deep-Burn" nuclear reactors. These designs are slated to go into the technology for the next generation of nuclear power plants, known as Generation IV nuclear reactors, which may be put into electrical production sometime around the year 2020. The idea of a Deep-Burn is to coat the outside of the plutonium or other nuclear fuel particles with a ceramic shell. This allows the nuclear fission process to occur at much higher temperatures, thus dramatically increasing the efficiency of the electricity generation as well as eleminating almost all of the nuclear waste produced in the process. In fact, in preliminary studies, the process is so efficient that it makes reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel rods from LWR (light water reactors) economically feasible for nuclear power plants.

What this means is that if the process of the Deep-Burn nuclear reactor can be implemented correctly, we could enjoy efficient, cheap, nuclear power with much less nuclear waste. Of course, the problems of the plant over-heating resulting in a nuclear meltdown would still exist, and since the process would still result in some nuclear waste, it is by no means perfect. It is however, a great step forward. One last thing to keep in mind is that with this event horizon (at least 10 years away), the technology for a fusion-style nuclear reactor may be perfected in that time frame and allow for much more efficient fuel burning with little or no nuclear waste. We will just have to wait and see on that one.

For more detailed information, go to:

http://www.greencarcongress.com/2008/07/us-doe-awards-7.html#more

Argonne's Futuristic Combustion Engine

Like it or not, whether we find ourselves driving purely electric cars, hydrogen cars, or nuclear-powered cars like in Back-to-The-Future, we will undoubtedly have residual contact with the conventional gas-burning engine for quite some time in the future. It might be in the form of cars driven in developing countries or it could simply be that other alternatives in the future here in the United States are simply too expensive for the regular driver to pick up the tab on the new technologies. For this reason, improving traditional engines to run on a mixture of fuels such as gasoline, ethanol, or butanol, would allow for a technology that improves the environment and domestic fuel supplies to become more mainstream in a faster time.
Argonne National Laboratories has announced plans to work diligently to create an engine that would be able to burn efficiently using any blend of gasoline, ethanol, or butanol, and do it in a way that optimizes mpg's and reduces emissions. To do this Argonne Labs proposes an improved sensor inside the fuel cylinder that will be able to monitor the oxygen-contents of the fuel and time the injection properly to optimizes the burning of the fuel in the engine. Remember, ethanol and butanol are different than gasoline in that they contain an OH (oxygen and hydrogen) group at one end of the molecule. The extra oxygen is what provides a better burn in ethanol and butanol and sustains higher octane ratings for the fuel. However, in conventional engines made today that are not flex-fuel, the computer can not distinguish the extra oxygen in the fuel and ends up injecting too much ethanol into the cylinder, resulting in fuel waste and lower miles-per-gallon.
The beauty of Argonne's idea is that if an engine such as this could be created in the near future, it could allow all new cars to be produced in what would essentially be a "flex-fuel" category but allow for all fuels to function equally well. Since such a technology would be cheap to implement, it could potentially go a long way in providing an alternative solution to conventional gasoline to people that might not be otherwise able to participate in this revolution.

Ford Continues March Toward Next-Gen Vehicle

In previous posts I have mentioned Ford's Escape Hybrid as being the vehicle to take us into the next generation of vehicles with a mpg rating higher than most cars and the capability of combining flex-fuel and hybrid into the same package. Today Ford announced improvements to come out in its line of Ford Escape Hybrids for the 2009 model year. Although none of the 25,000 vehicles they plan to produce in 2009 are planned to contain a flex-fuel advantage, they still hold several benefits over other vehicles.

What Ford did was to improve the timing of the fuel injection and increase the speed at which the car's hybrid battery carries engine performance up to 40 miles per hour. This means that until the small sized SUV tops 40 miles per hour, the battery will be in control of the engine. Amazingly, Ford was able to do this without increasing the engine's need to charge the battery more. They did this by improving the breaking efficiency and convert that saved energy into the battery for greater storage.

With these combined technologies, Ford can offer an Escape Hybrid that gets 34 mpg's in the city and 31 mpg's on the highway -- almost as good as the most efficient four-door cars on the road. However, the price tag will probably be around $27,000. If flex-fuel studies on the Ford Escape/Hybrid come to flurishen, this could be a great vehicle for the future, particularly in the prices for the battery and hybrid system can come down.

For original article, go to:

http://www.greencarcongress.com/2008/06/ford-gives-2009.html#more

New Additions to the Cellulosic Ethanol Stage

Although thermochemical and biochemical methods for the production of ethanol are the most practical and widely used methods to produce ethanol and cellulosic ethanol, electrochemical methods are another option. Thermochemical methods pertain mainly to burning the cellulose in a controlled fashion to produce a gas stream. This is usually combined with a biochemical catalyst (most likely a bacterium), where the gas stream is converted into ethanol. This combination of thermochemical and biochemical methods are what GM and Coskata are backing in their hopes to pioneer efficient ethanol production from cellulose.

However, Mitsubishi and RedOx Biofuels have agreed to work together on an electrochemical approach to producing ethanol from cellulosic feedstocks. With gas prices soaring and the price of corn skyrocketing due to the flooding in the Midwest, there has been an even greater push towards the creation and implementation of an efficient process to produce cellulosic ethanol. Electrochemical methods, such as those used by Mitsubishi, uses electricity and acid/base hydrolysis to break the bonds in cellulosic ethanol so that the sugars can be accessible to the bacteria that can convert them into ethanol.

The problem with Mitsubishi's method is that unless they develop a way to use electricity in a highly efficient manner to break the bonds in cellulose I can almost guarantee to you that the process will use more energy than it produces. Thermochemical methods have the potential of working because the burning process can be self-sustaining once the material begins to burn (requiring only a portion of the feedstock to continue the process). So my reasoning is that although Mitsubishi is trying something new, it doesn't seem like they will be able to get very far with this process. Their proposed target is only 800 liters of ethanol produced next year, which is pitifully small even for a pilot-plant.

The facts are that fuel molecules, such as ethanol and certain furfural compounds that can mimic gasoline can be produced using electrochemical methods. The problem is that they can only produce a small amount of product and it takes an immense amount of energy using current procedures to make the process work. If nothing else works, these methods would be fine.... but I think we can do much better.

Here is a schematic diagram of what Mitsubishi envisions for their process:

New Ford Flex-Fuel Hybrid

Finally got a few seconds to make a quick post on Ford's new concept vehicle. It is a Ford Escape PHEV with flex-fuel capabilities. In other words, the compact-SUV is plugged in at night and can run approximately 30 miles on the charged battery (not great but not too bad for city driving). Once the battery is run down, the flex-fuel engine runs on 85% ethanol with a hybrid system to save energy during stop and go driving. This is exactly what I have been e-mailing Ford and other car companies about -- we need to integrate technologies in order to build a car that will operate in the future.

The beauty of this Ford Escape? It gets 88 miles per gallon in the city and 50mpg in highway driving! And, with the use of the batteries and ethanol additives, CO2 emissions from the vehicle are cut 60% over conventional gasoline vehicles -- 90% if the ethanol is made from cellulosic feedstocks. We need this car right now and if it were on the market, I'm sure it would be a hot seller. Unfortunately, Ford only has one produced and has given it to the Department of Energy for testing. If you are interested in this technology I strongly suggest doing what I have done and e-mail Ford directly, telling them you want to see this type of vehicle come on line as soon as possible.