What are the advantages of using biodiesel?

You might have heard a lot about biodiesel. Biodiesel is diesel than can power up your car that is made from vegetable oils and other natural sources. It does not come from the regular crude oil that usually has to be imported from oil-producing countries.

Biodiesel can be considered a new technology, taking into account all the years consumers have had to settle for traditional diesel. Using biodiesel for your car has many advantages:

1. Biodiesel is not harmful to the environment. Unlike its counterpart, a car using biodiesel produces fewer emissions. If a vehicle uses traditional diesel, the vehicle emits black, stinky smoke. With biodiesel, the smoke becomes very clean indeed.

2. Biodiesel may not require an engine modification. Some cars can take advantage of biodiesel without the need to undergo engine alterations. Some mix 20% biodiesel with regular diesel. Doing so enables the car to benefit from the good points of biodiesel without the hassle.

3. Biodiesel is cheap. You can even make biodiesel in your backyard. If your engine can work with biodiesel fuel alone, then you really need not go to the gas station to buy fuel. You can just manufacture some for your own personal use.

4. Biodiesel can make the vehicle perform better. It is noted that biodiesel has a cetane number of over 100. Cetane number is used to measure the quality of the fuel’s ignition. If your fuel has a high cetane number, you can be sure that what you get is a very easy cold starting coupled with a low idle noise.

5. Biodiesel can make your car last longer. Because of the clarity and the purity of biodiesel, you can be sure it will not have too many impurities to harm your car. It is actually more lubrication. A car’s power output is unaffected by this type of diesel.

6. Biodiesel reduces the environmental effect of a waste product. Because biodiesel is made out of waste products itself, it does not contribute to nature’s garbage at all. Biodiesel can be made out of used cooking oils and lards. So instead of throwing these substances away, the ability to turn them into biodiesel becomes more than welcome.

7. Biodiesel is energy efficient. If the production of biodiesel is compared with the production of the regular type, producing the latter consumes more energy. Biodiesel does not need to be drilled, transported, or refined like petroleum diesel. Producing biodiesel is easier and is less time consuming.

8. Biodiesel is produced locally. A locally produced fuel will be more cost efficient. There is no need to pay tariffs or similar taxes to the countries from which oil and petroleum diesel are sourced. Every country has the ability to produce biodiesel.

Biodiesel is surely a viable fuel alternative. Moreover, it is also a sustainable fuel. Using biodiesel not only helps maintain our environment, it also helps in keeping the people around us healthy.

The production of biodiesel all over the world is now being looked upon favorably. In Europe, many biodiesel stations have been set up already. There is also a move to convert or make cars compatible with biodiesel fuel in the near future.

Biodiesel can surely change the way vehicles are manufactured and used. It is surely the best substitute right now, and everyone should consider ways to take advantage of the benefits of biodiesel.

MicroCglycerin for denitrification

Environmental Operating Solutions Inc. has introduced MicroCgylcerin microcgylcerin as a non-hazardous, environmentally-sustainable alternative to methanol for denitrification apps at municipal and industrial wastewater treatment facilities. The trademarked microcglycerin is derived from crude glycerin, a natural co-product of the nation’s growing biodiesel industry.

As monitoring of the nation’s surface water quality intensifies, wastewater treatment facilities in the cohesive states are growingly anticipated to upgrade their plants for intensified nitrogen removal, eos explained in its product release announcement. In numerous cases, this requires facilities to add an external carbon source as an electron donor. Historically, methanol has been utilized as an option, nonetheless, methanol fluctuates widely in cost, is flammable, has poisonous properties, requires expensive storage and feed strategies, and is derived from non-renewable natural gas. Furthermore, 90 percent of the methanol utilized in the USA is imported.

Biodiesel blend performs as well as ULSD

Those worried about a performance drop-off going from standard diesel fuel to the more environmentally friendly B20 biodiesel blend can ease their minds.

A new Purdue University study shows that there is almost no statistical performance difference in semitrailer trucks using B20, a 20-percent blend of biodiesel, and No. 2 ultra-low sulfur diesel, the current standard.

"In terms of performance, reliability and maintenance costs, it was basically a wash," said John Lumkes, the assistant professor of agricultural and biological engineering who led the study. "The only differences are environmental and economic."

The study, which compared two 10-vehicle truck fleets using the ultra-low sulfur fuel and B20, was released in the journal Applied Engineering in Agriculture. Trucks used for comparisons in the yearlong study had the same engines, similar miles already on them at the start and drove nearly the same number of miles over the year.

The only statistical difference related to the B20 was that it lowered the oil viscosity between maintenance intervals in engines slightly more than the ultra-low sulfur diesel. But even so, Lumkes said the oil still had sufficient viscosity so as not to damage engine parts.

"They were still within the range of what is acceptable before you need an oil change," he said.

The study followed each fleet's idle time percentage, average speed, engine load percentage and engine speed. Each pair of trucks had close to the same statistics in each category.

At the end of the study, each fleet of 10 trucks had driven more than 1.5 million miles. Differences in performance based on fuel economy, fuel test results, engine oil analysis, and service and maintenance costs were considered minute. B20 cost about 13 cents more per gallon during that time than the ultra-low sulfur diesel.

Lumkes said his study could ease concern about the effect biodiesel has on engine durability. He said some engine manufacturers are wary about extending warranties to those who use biodiesel because not enough has been known about how the biodiesel affects engine wear.

"This shows that there is no observable difference in performance of engines using biodiesel versus the more common commercial fuel," Lumkes said.

Lumkes added that the quality of the B20 also is an important factor. All the fuel sampled during the study exceeded the National Biodiesel Accreditation Commission standards.

The Indiana Soybean Alliance provided funding for the research, and a private company that provided the trucks also provided funding.

SOURCE: PURDUE UNIVERSITY

Market found for portable biodiesel processors

By Nicholas Zeman

While industrial size plants have gotten built without opening—signaling the struggles of the commercial biodiesel industry—there’s a company known as Springboard Biodiesel in Chico, Calif., that’s flourishing. Its business model, based on the sales of portable biodiesel processing units capable of producing only 36,000 gallons per year, is experiencing accelerated growth. “There is market out there for serving the small-scale biodiesel producers that aren’t going to sell the fuel, but process it for their own uses,” said Matt Roberts of Springboard.

Proprietary fluid separation technology marketed as the Induced Coalescent Separator (INCOSEP) can help home brewers dramatically speed up the process of local refining, therefore, increasing production capacity. “This type of equipment has no precedent— that we know of in our industry,” Roberts said.

The portable biodiesel processors are made of 304 stainless steel and all industrial-grade components. It allows customers to make ASTM grade biodiesel very cheaply—for less than $1 per gallon. Ninety-nine percent of its users make biodiesel from recycled vegetable oil, according to Springboard. “We’ve sold a large number of our machines to small businesses, universities, municipalities and co-operatives in the United States,” Roberts said.

“This technology (INCOSEP-Pro) is capable of inducing secondary fluids to ‘coalesce’ out of the raw biodiesel,” Roberts said. “It can rapidly separate glycerol and water from the fuel.”

The BioPro 190 biodiesel processor, Springboard’s flagship product, is capable of producing a 50 gallon batch of ASTM quality biodiesel every 48 hours. “With INCOSEP-Pro installed on the equipment, however, we can reduce that time to 21 hours,” Roberts said. Also, if existing users purchased a BioPro processor before the start of 2007, they can have their machines retrofitted to incorporate Springboard’s new technology.

Springboard also offers a dry wash system for biodiesel processing. The dual resin tower design, the SpringPro 76, helps double the capacity of “any biodiesel processor,” the company stated and can purify 480 gallons per day. “This is a dry wash column that uses resins to clean and polish the biodiesel,” Roberts said. “Water is a commodity that is becoming more and m ore scarce, especially in California.”

Source:www.biodieselmagazine.com

Make your own backyard biodiesel.

This one is a great guide on how to make your own backyard biodiesel.

The video shows us how easy it is to make a small batch that will work in any diesel engine. No special equipment needed -- you can even use an old juice bottle to serve as the "reactor" vessel--and on such a small scale, you can quickly refine your technique and perform further experiments.

Watch and enjoy. But be careful on this guide, no one really commented if these would work on your engine. You should better check the magazine where it is published. I have not tried this myself.

Lubricant additive addresses fuel dilution issues with biodiesel blends

By Ron Kotrba

For those concerned about using a B20 blend in late-model diesels that employ post-injection for controlling emissions, Chevron Oronite Company LLC developed a unique engine oil additive to help combat serious engine wear associated with methyl ester dilution in the engine oil crankcase.

Some OEMs use post-injection in their strategies to “regenerate” or burn off soot accumulated in diesel particulate filters (DPF). Injecting fuel late in the combustion cycle does not combust the fuel but vaporizes it as the fuel is carried downstream through the exhaust to create an exothermic reaction, which burns off the collected soot in the DPF. This periodic soot burn-off is called regeneration. OEMs have a choice to utilize post-injection or fuel injection downstream of the engine, as in the exhaust system directly, but it is more cost-effective to use post-injection because there is no additional hardware needed to perform regeneration.

Fuel dilution has always been an issue with diesels, but never more so than with post-injection. Petrol diesel dilutes engine oil too, but it volatilizes off and eventually is released through the breather system. For biodiesel, however, the story is significantly different.

Biodiesel has a higher and narrower boiling range than petroleum diesel, and its physical properties lead to larger droplet sizes exiting the fuel injectors. This means that, while the petrol portion of the blend vaporizes and follows its destination to the exhaust stream as the piston is at the bottom of the cylinder, the methyl ester fraction—with its higher, narrower boiling range and larger droplet size—remains in liquid form collecting along the exposed surface area of the cylinder wall, and as the piston rises, much of the biodiesel bypasses the rings to enter the crankcase. Once in there, the biodiesel does not volatilize off like mineral diesel does. With the heat of the crankcase, there is concern about oxidation of the oil/biodiesel mix and engine wear resulting from the organic acids.

“In the case of biodiesel, once it gets in the crankcase and as it starts to degrade, it forms organic acids and starts to polymerize,” said Gary Parsons, global OEM and industry liaison manager for Chevron Oronite. “The organic acids can aggressively attack certain metals, particularly lead in the lead bearings. And then as it polymerizes and oxidizes, it can lead to increased deposits in the engine—in particular, deposits on the pistons.”

The engine oil additive Chevron Oronite developed is designed to counter the effect of the acids, so they don’t aggressively attack the metal; and also to prevent oxidation and formation of deposits.

Historically, in the context of acids, the lubricant additive business has largely been focused on formulations that help combat sulfuric acid damage. Before many of the recent sulfur limitations on diesel fuel went into effect, sulfur content in diesel fuel ranged from unlimited to 5,000 ppm to 500 ppm; but now, on road ultra low sulfur diesel only contains 15 ppm sulfur maximum. “Much of the historical effort had been in neutralizing sulfuric acids, and now much of the sulfur issues have gone away,” Parsons said. “But now we’re talking about putting this organic material in the oil, which forms organic acids, so part of what we’ve done is we’ve tailored our formulation to address those organic acids in order to prevent oxidation of the fatty acid methyl ester in the oil. That’s why it’s called for special research and development in that area—because it’s different than what’s been done historically. “

The product, which is commercially available and marketed under the Oronite Lubricating Oil Additive, or OLOA, trademark, has been receiving global attention since its commercial debut last year. “People are starting to see that there’s going to be more biodiesel in the market, and more exposure and potential risk, so we’re seeing more and more interest because of that,” Parsons said. “Until now, the use of biodiesel has largely been driven by economics or people who just want to do good things for the environment—not by mandates.”

Rethink biofuel, says Nobel laureate

By TJ Burgonio

MANILA, Philippines -- A Nobel laureate has cautioned the government against rushing into biofuel development because there’s little energy to be gained from it.

Dr. Hartmut Michel, the 1998 Nobel Prize winner for chemistry, who was in Manila last week for a talk, said investing in biofuel development was “counterproductive.”

“When you calculate how much of the sun’s energy is stored in the plants, it’s below one percent,” he said at a forum at the Philippine International Convention Center in Pasay City on Wednesday.

“When you convert into biofuel, you add fertilizer, and then harvest the plants. There’s not real energy gained in biofuel,” said Michel, 59, whose prize-winning research with two other chemists dealt with the process of photosynthesis.

Biofuel is made from alternative sources, such as crops, plant fiber, trees, poultry litter, animal waste and the biodegradable component of solid waste.

Biofuels include bioethanol, biodiesel and fuels from biomass. Bioethanol is a light alcohol produced by fermenting starch or sugar from sugarcane, corn, cassava or nipa. Biodiesel is fuel extracted from plant oils like jatropha, palm, soy, rapeseed and coconut.

Biofuels Act

President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo signed into law the Biofuels Act in January last year, which mandates a minimum 1-percent biodiesel blend and 5-percent bioethanol blend in all diesel and gasoline fuels.

The government is implementing an alternative fuels program to reduce the country’s dependence on imported oil, and provide cheaper, more environment-friendly alternatives to fossil fuels.

It is encouraging the massive cultivation of jatropha, a shrub that produces golf-ball-size fruit that contain oil.

Land Bank of the Philippines has signed an agreement to provide Philippine National Oil Co.-Alternative Fuels Corp. with P5 billion to finance the jatropha development program.

The corporation is looking at some 1.2 million hectares as its main hub for jatropha production in Mindanao.

Burning forests

Michel further pointed out that producing biofuel would sometimes entail clearing a forest, a process that destroys biodiversity and emits more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

“When you burn the forest, you produce too much carbon dioxide, which you can’t save in the next several hundred years,” he said at the Nobel Forum on Wednesday, where he and three other Nobel awardees were the guests.

Burning destroys many natural compounds in forests, according to the scientist. He said these natural compounds could be remedy for new kinds of cancer.

“We should not put money in biofuel development. It’s counterproductive,” he said.

Top climate victim

Michel said the Philippines is vulnerable to a rise in sea level and stronger storms as an offshoot of global warming.

“The Philippines has every reason to do everything to reduce the use of fossil energy,” he said.

The Philippines, which was battered by storms in 1996 that killed more than 1,000 people, and suffered losses worth billions of dollars, was named by the environment group Germanwatch as the world’s top climate victim that year.

Tap wind power

Michel suggested that the government tap renewable energy sources to generate power.

“The islands are rich in wind power. You should invest in wind to generate electricity,” he said.

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences awarded the 1998 Nobel Prize in Chemistry jointly to Michel, Dr. Johann Deisenhofer and Dr. Robert Huber for the determination of the three-dimensional structure of a photosynthetic reaction center.

They were the first “to succeed in unraveling the full details of how a membrane-bound protein is built up, revealing the structure of the molecule, atom by atom,” the academy said.

Taiwanese Yuan T. Lee, one of the three 1986 Nobel Prize winners in Chemistry, said biofuel production might not be the “right solution” for countries with small land areas.

“It’s important to realize that in Europe, like Taiwan, biofuel may not make sense. If we use land to develop biofuel, it’s not the right solution,” he said at the open forum.

“In the long run, biofuel will not be the solution,” he said.

Others fear that using arable land for biofuels can cause food shortages.

Seaoil to put up ethanol refinery in Negros

MANILA, Philippines - Being first to introduce ethanol blend in gasoline in 2005, four years ahead of the passage of the BioFuels Law, Seaoil Philippines Inc. wants to ensure the sustainability of its bioethanol fuel operations by building a 30-hectare ethanol distillery in Negros, the country's sugar central, and entering into contract growing with sugar farmers in initially 1,000 hectares to sustain the distilling facility.

"We can see that ethanol will continue to grow in popularity and usage since bunker or fossil fuel resources are rapidly being depleted worldwide and it makes a lot of sense to invest in planting sugarcane and putting up a distilling plant right now," said Stephen Yu, Seaoil chief operating officer.

When the law required only a five-percent blend of ethanol in gasoline, Seaoil was already offering a 10-percent blend. It is now market testing e85 blend (15 percent), a high heating blend suitable for race cars, SUVs and even normal cars of people who prefer to have rapid and high burning fuel, Yu said.

The e85, which is being test-marketed at the Pasig Boulevard station of Seaoil is priced almost the same as e10 at P34.75 per liter although the cost to blend it is a lot more. Seaoil said it is shouldering the additional cost. The e85 is a big hit among owners of Expedition, Pajeros and other SUVs and race car models because of its 105 octane content (even higher than the aviation gas' 96 octane), Yu added.

Meanwhile, Seaoil obtained last December the Quality Management System (ISO 9001:2000) certification from Geneva-based International Organization of Standards.

With this certification, Seaoil will find it easier to attract investors for its expansion programs, said Yu whose expertise is logistics considered Seaoil's fastest growth area.

"With the ISO we are going to attract new international clients to do business with us, particularly in the area of logistics, plus it would be a lot easier for us to market our services," Yu said. – Rose de la Cruz

Algae as Biofuel: Graduate Research Assistantship

I am seeking a motivated student to fill a graduate research assistantship at the M.S. or Ph.D. level in the Department of Oceanography at Florida State University (www.ocean.fsu.edu). The position is available beginning in Spring, 2009. The research project will focus on the growth of marine algae as a feedstock for biofuels production. The student in this position will be expected to work closely with other scientists in the newly established Institute for Energy Systems, Economics, and Sustainability (http://www.ieses.fsu.edu/) at FSU.

Interested students should have a background in marine biology, cell biology and/or microbiology, and should have strong quantitative skills. Mechanical skills and/or experience in aquaculture would be viewed positively. The assistantship will have an excellent stipend relative to the cost-of-living, and will also include a full tuition remission along with research expenses.

Florida State University is located in the city of Tallahassee, where cost-of-living is inexpensive and ample opportunities exist for cultural/artistic and outdoor activities. The University has a distinguished and rapidly expanding marine laboratory located about 45 minutes to the south of Tallahassee, and the Apalachicola Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve is located about 1 hour west.

For more information, or to be considered for the position, please email Dr. Mike Wetz at wetz@email.unc.edu. Letters of interest will be accepted until December 31st, though particularly strong candidates may be encouraged to apply in full to FSU earlier.

Waste plastics made into diesel, gasoline

by Zac B. Sarian

Would you believe that waste plastics which are ordinarily a big problem to dispose can be converted into diesel and gasoline that can run engines?

The ordinary plastic materials include shopping bags, garbage bags and even styropor used in packing various products. All these can be converted into precious fuel that is 20 percent cheaper than the current price of diesel and gasoline.

The technology is newly patented and was one of those exhibited during the recent Inventors Week expo at the Philippine Trade Training Center along Roxas Blvd., Pasay City, under the auspices of the Department of Science and Technology (DOST).

Holder of the patent which was released only last November 8 is inventor Jayme Navarro of Bacolod City. The waste plastics are converted into diesel and gasoline through what Navarro calls depolymerization of the materials. Assorted plastics are first shredded into evenly-sized pieces and then entered into an agglomeration chamber.

The shredded plastic enters a feeding screw where it is melted and the polymers are mixed with a catalyst. The melted plastic goes to a specially-designed pyrolysis chamber where depolymerization occurs, and where hydrocarbon gases are produced. It then passes through distillation (to separate different hydrocarbon chains), filtration and centrifuge (to remove contaminants and impurities).

Besides the gasoline and diesel, light gases are also produced which are purified, compressed and stored. These gases are used as fuel in the process of depolymerization.

Navarro said that the process is done entirely inside a vacuum so no resultant chemicals are released into the environment, The conversion efficiency rate is 75 to 80 percent, depending on feedstock components. That means it can produce 750 to 800 liters of fuel from one ton of raw materials.

Navarro said that he has been involved in the plastic industry in the last 30 years, using plastic scraps as feedstock in producing plastic twine, straw and stick. During the oil embargo in 1973, he started his first experiment in converting plastic waste to liquid hydrocarbons, and again during the first Iran-Iraq war in 1980.

However, because of the cheap price and abundant supply of crude oil during those years, it was not financially viable to pursue the project. He said that with the recent environmental issues regarding the disposal of waste plastics, and the high price of crude oil prompted him to develop his original technology of converting plastic waste into fuel.

Navarro said that after years of intense efforts in improving, refining and scaling the technology, he was able to conduct the first trial run of a prototype conversion plant that successfully produced liquid hydrocarbon in December 2007. Then in February 2008, he sent samples to the Department of Energy and DOST for analysis.

He said that the results confirmed that the fuel produced has all the properties of regular diesel fuel, but with substantially lowered sulfur contents, which means it is less polluting. The fuel can be used for different applications involving standard diesel engines.

Navarro revealed that his company, Poly-Green Technology and Resources, Inc., will put up a manufacturing plant in Montalban, Rizal early next year. The technology is modular in concept and may be developed in 5, 10 and 20 tons-per-day capacities. The operation can be carried out in smaller plants and processing may be situated wherever it is deemed feasible.

Source: Manila Bulletin, photo courtesy of http://globalplasticrecyclers.com, plc