This is really starting to sound like a good, practical solution to our oil problems. Granted we still need sustainable energy sources but this could be a good alternative until we get the other sources of energy operational.
Dad
Yeah, this won't solve all our problems on it's own, but I think it is pretty sustainable, as it's not using a finite resource, and creates very limited amounts of pollution. It would also have a positive economic impact, particularly on smaller farmers that could make extra income from wastes.
youre right. this is the right track. we hope that this development happens soon though, because oil prices are really sky-rocketing and the climate really is changing. good work!
Thanks, Jeff, for the plug.
Iogen definitely gets credit for pioneering the commercialization of enzymatic hydrolysis as you describe it - creating ethanol from single sources of cellulosic feedstock. Another company, Novozymes, is bringing the price of enzymes down from the stratosphere.
But my money is on syngas fermentation and I'll tell you why: because enzymes are not very effective on blends of feedstock. However, blends of cellulosic matter - be it wood, crops, tires, sludge, urban waste - can be converted to ethanol through gasification and bioreaction with bacteria in syngas fermentation. Even sulfurous coal (think East Germany and China) can be gasified and bioconverted with zero toxic emissions. BRI Energy is the leader in that field.
Cross your fingers that they finalize their plans with the D.O.E. for building two commercial-scale plants at ORNL this coming year.
I still think that the use of corn-based ethanol will be the earliest system to widely adopted. Had corn been used earlier and more widely, investors may not be so wary of funding cellulose processing now.
I think the one that'll ultimately win is the one that can produce the most ethanol at the highest BTU using the least amount of consumable material. If ethanol production can include the use of waste in farming then it deserves its fair shake. I'd hate to see the oil market succumb to the corn market. Options are always a good thing, and I think we're all slowly seeing that.
For more than 20 years, the JR Simplot Company pumped ethanol made of potato peelings into Idaho gas stations and cars--and filled their bank accounts with the profits.
Right now, Florida orange juice producers are testing orange peels as ethanol fodder and projecting higher profits from the gas than from the juice!
Growing, trucking, and processing corn is one of the most environmentally costly ways to make ethanol. Lower impact alternatives abound, with potentially staggering environmenal pluses.
More, the potential for increased profit throughout industry is huge. As they say at New Leaf Paper, "Waste is a terrible thing to waste."
curious about that lignin. how does the co2 output compare to coal burning?
isn't necessarily a sticking point. if that process for turning coal stack fumes into ethanol-stock algae goes well, then they could just hook it up for extra use.
I'm guessing the lignin would produce less CO2, but can't say for sure... anyone know this?
Hi Guys & Dolls....all this co2 is doing aggwavations to my organic cawwots...I stood there wondering about the monster TNC,s silently hovering like godzillas waiting for the moment when all the little guys like ant-ony this and ant-ony that had run around busily creating the new energy options and then swooping down to suck the juice from the fruit of their labours...all these brutes have mega PR and THAT is what all the new moves in greening are about...some are like the japanese wrestlers, massive machinations of instant strength and shove, all currently warming up to psyche the punters out, with outrageously concocted stories of how they're going to go green(finally)..but this is only the beginning of the beginning...third world juices must first be 'jooced-out...technology is not the answer, it is only the means, the answer is democracy and justice! And until that time 'green' is only a brush stroke by clever PRtists....ecowabbit
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