w o r d s

Today, on the way home from work, the Jetta passed its 65,000 miles marker (and the airbag light came on). That means, it’s been running on mostly biodiesel for over 27,000 miles. :) Yippee!!

Last year had a couple of surprises for us, although most of these have yet to be completely realized: we found a new house, but we have yet to move there; we began planning our trip to Togo (and Ghana) for the upcoming July; and the Democrats won back the U.S. Congress.

One of the biggest changes in our lives in 2006 was Agbessi’s move to Durham. He stayed with us during the summer and then moved to an apartment in Durham. It’s great to have him here; he is like a family member to us. Hopefully we’ll all be able to travel back to our village in Togo together this summer. It’ll be really cool to show up back in Yikpa, the village where Laura and I met 15 years ago, with our children AND with one of the Yikpato from America!

In July 2007, Laura will lead a group of customers an volunteers from her Fair Trade store in Durham on a tour of Ghana, visiting some of the artisans and coops that offer their wares at One World Market. We are planning to leave a week earlier and visit our village in Togo first. This is a big deal to us - taking our children back to the village where we met. And if Agbessi can come with us that’ll e even cooler because he knows our life in the U.S. and his presence will strengthen the bond between our families even more.

In August, Laura found a little house for us, a bit closer to Durham, and a very pretty 2-acre property. We signed a contract but the inspection turned up some serious structural problems. The seller agreed to have the problems fixed. Now, three months later, the contractors have left, and a water test turned up problems with the well that supplies the house with water. Currently we’re in the process of determining what needs to be done to treat the water. Probably a filter and a UV light will be alright. It’s really too bad that this is such an obstacle course. Yet, we have looked around, and we have not found another house for sale that would change our mind.

For Laura’s store, 2006 was a great year. They sold over $430,000 in Fair Trade merchandise, which supports communities all over the world. About a quarter of that was sold between Thanksgiving and X-mas! During most of the year, selling $1000 worth in merchandise is a good day’s work at the store. During the peak of the Christmas shopping frenzy, the mostly volunteer-staffed store was selling at a rate of about $1000 an hour! And as they don’t have much storage space, they were almost continuously unpacking merchandise and stocking the sales floor. And Laura was continuously ordering more stuff. Still, when I saw the store last week, I was amazed to see how depleted it looked! But they set new sales records for the store, both for holiday sales, and for the entire year. Congratulations!

The biggest change for Jacob and Julia last year, I think, was discovering the Horse Ranch where they spend a couple of hours every day after school. While Julia got really serious about learning how to ride - and to ride well - Jacob seems to mostly enjoy playing with his buddies around the Ranch. Julia has won several shows at the Ranch, and she can canter a horse across 3-foot (one-meter-high) obstacles! Jacob has learned how to ride a horse, too, but he is still a bit young for the more advanced stuff.

On my end, my job at Duke changed quite a bit. In addition to all the network stuff and computer security business, I also got to re-design an office suite at Brightleaf Square. I moved my office and the server room, and my co-worker’s office into a new, self-contained office suite. The latter, we just completed in December. So, we’ll see how that shakes out …

A nice perk of my job was being able to sneak out and watch football games last summer, during the Worldcup. As I work with several “dang for’ners” from football nations (England, Germany, Turkey, Togo, Haiti) we had a pretty good contingent over at Satisfaction for some of the games. And the folks at Satisfaction even opened the bar early (at 9:00 AM) several times so we could catch some of the early games (like the Togo games).

The Worldcup was great fun: from the ecstasy of Germany’s win over Argentina to the agony of Togo’s first Worldcup appearance. We saw some wonderful football, especially in the first round, even though real upsets were rare and in the end the Worldcup was dominated by “millionaire football” and somewhat tainted by some really questionable officiating, most painfully noticeable in the Ghana-Brazil game and Australia’s 95th-Minute loss to Italy. And then, of course, there was this unfortunate incident during the very unfortunate Worldcup final.

In the fall of 2006, I started another chapter in my biofuels quest: I completed my biodiesel reactor and began producing biodiesel in the basement. I collect the used fryer oil from several restaurants around Brightleaf Square and process the vegetable oil at home into fuel for my 2002 Jetta TDI. Although this is quite a bit of work, it is very satisfying to reduce my reliance on fossil fuels, produce much less harmful exhaust and safe some money doing it. And it is also a fun, relaxing hobby. As I am typing this, my 200-liter “New Year’s batch” is sitting in the washtank downstairs.

Finally, politics. I mean, I am pretty excited about the fact that the Republican’s lost the congress to the Democrats. Almost more importantly, though, are the implications of this loss to the power of the so-called neocons in the Republican party. Right now, it looks like that in 2008, the “New American Century” will come to an end. Finally. I just really hope that the Democrats manage to re-assert congressional oversight and reintroduce accountability into this corrupt, incompetent administration. And get the US troops out of Iraq ASAP!

I’d say 2006 was pretty good to us. We don’t take this for granted, as we see around us people who had a difficult time, and we certainly are quite aware of all the pain and suffering in the world. Yet, we also see all the hope and generosity around us and we try to contribute to the positive things that go on around us. I am painfully aware of the many serious problems and challenges ahead of us and future generations. But I also see all the energy and hope and strength growing in our children, I can’t help but feel optimistic about the future.

So, thanks to you all for your interest in my blog. I hope 2007 brings you good news and exciting things to do. Feel free to comment and share with us what is going on with you.

Cheers, and a Happy, Prosperous, Healthy 2007!

Jürgen

Tom Philpott (Grist) questions entomologist and biofuels skeptic extraordinaire David Pimentel (Cornell) about why crop-based energy won’t work. Interesting interview, but Pimentel does need to get out a bit more. And I wish Philpott had been a bit more probing on some of Pimentel’s assertions - like this one:

Pimentel: Conserve! One word. And no one talks about it, including the environmentalists.

Is he just yanking our chains??!! No one else talks about conservation?? He’s joking, right?

This is an interesting exchange:

Philpott: So if we converted 100 percent of a year’s worth of solar energy stored in plant matter to fuel, we’d only supply half of our current energy consumption. What’s that telling us?

Pimentel: It’s telling us we’re using too goddamn much fossil energy! And another thing it tells us is that you’re not going to be self-sufficient, or even produce half of our energy from biomass in the U.S., if we want to eat.

Yeah - thanks, Dr. P - I realize now you do need a PH.D. to figure out we’re using too much fossil fuel!

Interestingly however, Pimentel is very pro-organic:

“Pimentel: I don’t want to say that organic can supply all the food in the world, but it can be much more sustainable than conventional ag and just as productive.”

Biofuels Are an Environmental Dead End, Alternet, By Tom Philpott, Grist Magazine. Posted December 13, 2006.

What annoys me about Pimentel, is his focus on the problems. He finds that the numbers don’t seem to work, so he discounts a solution. He seems to be in favor of solar energy, which is great, but solar won’t help us run the trucks and trains that carry us and our good across the country. That does not mean we should ignore solar energy. It just means we need different solutions for different applications. But Pimentel acts as if alternative fuels advocates suggest that the entire energy input of the US should be covered by soy or corn.

Solving the sustainable-energy puzzle will require many different pieces, and solar, biofuels and conservation are some of the big pieces. Pointing out the lousy energy balances in ethanol is not particularly helpful. How about helping solve the problem? How about putting that Cornell-educated mind to work and help figure out how to make fuels that grow back in a more efficient way?

CSU announced a partnership with Solix Biofuels to get serious about commercializing technology that can produce huge amounts of very oily types of algae for biofuels production. “Algae are the fastest growing organisms on the planet, and can produce 100 times more oil per acre than conventional soil-tilled crops that are now being grown for biofuel use,” said Solix founder Jim Sears. I would love to see some real numbers as to how much energy input 50 Gallons of algae oil require. My guess is that it should be much lower than soy or canola. Biofuels from micro-organisms like algae has great potential for being a huge piece in the sustainable-energy puzzle.

The high density of the production allows for great capacity, and their production does not compete with human food production. Algae are also much less likely to provide incentive for the destruction of wildlife habitat, like palm oil. Yet, it’s not easy to grow the organisms:

“It’s very difficult to grow algae,” said Cary Bullock, CEO of Greenfuel Technologies, a startup developing a technology to turn smokestack emissions into ethanol and biodiesel (…).

Mr. Bullock described the process: First, you need a distributed light source to get light past the top layer of algae and deeper into the ponds. One you solve that problem, you discover that the algae runs out of food. To increase the food supply, you have to make significant changes to the nursery system. And once you’ve done that, you have to manage heat.

“Two of those problems would be difficult, but all four together are quite a problem,” he said, adding that Greenfuel expects to solve the problems with solutions it’s developing.
Biofuels Smackdown: Algae vs. Soybeans, Red Herring, December 7, 2006

The Red Herring title frames the issue a bit stupidly as a competition, but the story actually gives a pretty good overview of algae in the biofuels-feedstock discussion. From a technical standpoint, the feedstock question is evolutionary, not competitive. Over time, we will need to come up with more efficient feedstock. But of course this is also a highly political discussion - just ask the ASA.

Today I got my Wash Pro Stainless Steel Washer & Dryer from Utah Biodiesel Supply and I installed it on one of my wash tanks, where I had been bubble washing my latest batch for about a week. The washwater was still a bit soapy, but it looked like it was pretty well done. I drained it and used the Wash Pro to add fresh was water. Then I hooked up the wash tank to the pump and recirculated the wash water spraying it on the biodiesel. The pump is pretty strong and after about 15 Minutes all the water was totally blended with the biodiesel. There was no separation at all. I let it settle for an hour and did it again. After the second go-around the water was completely white with soap! That is totally amazing. This little bit of stainless steel is going to make a big difference in the quality of my fuel - at least as far as the soap is concerned.

Just how bad the effects of the soap actually are is not totally clear to me. Daniel Sheedy of Environment Australia, argues it’s no big deal at all (see section 6.16). I don’t think it can be good for the performance of the fuel.

My latest batch of biodiesel is looking pretty good. I washed it all week. I even built another washtank (left). Maybe tomorrow I’ll start drying part of the batch. There is no hurry - I still have about 30 gallons in stock.

Yesterday, after I built the new washtank, I filled it up with 25 gallons of biodiesel and another 15-or-so gallons of water, when I noticed that the damn tank was leaking all over the floor. Quickly I rigged up the pump, hooked it up to the tank and began pumping everything into the other tank. But the pump whipped the soapy water into an emulsion and could not move it! So I had to empty the contents into buckets and dump he buckets into the other tank! UGH!

When I fixed the leak today, I tightened the PVC adapter too much and broke it. I saw I still had a black iron 2” nipple, so I used that. Turns out that the iron nipple with the PVC ball valve works much better than the all-PVC business (right tank). It’s much sturdier.

(two more pics below the fold)

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How many types of computer networks do you know? There is the most common TCP/IP networking, across copper, fiber or wireless (very likely that is what you are using to read this page). IPv6 is the new kid on the block, and some may remember the old stuff, like Tokenring and IPX, and when all else fails, good, old sneakernet is never down! Now there is also DieselNET. On DieselNET, data take the bus - no not the SCSI bus! The BUS, as in public transportation! No joke! In this implementation of a packet-switched network protocol, the data are ferried across town by hitching a ride on the buses of the Amherst PVTA transportation system.

The University of Massachusetts at Amherst Diverse Outdoor Mobile Environment (DOME) Project is researching technology for disruption tolerant networking (DTN) systems (via NetworkWorld).

DieselNet currently consists of 40 buses each with a Diesel Brick, which is based on a HaCom Open Brick computer (P6-compatible 577Mhz CPU, 256MB RAM, 40GB hard drive, Linux OS). The brick is connected to three radios: an 802.11b Access Point (AP) to provide DHCP access to passengers and passersby, a second USB-based 802.11b interface that constantly scans the surrounding area for DHCP offers and other buses, and a longer-range MaxStream XTend 900MHz radio to connect to our throwboxes. Additionally, a GPS device records times and locations. Our custom software allows us to push out application updates, take mobility, AP-to-bus connectivity, and bus-to-bus throughput traces.

UMass Amherst - DOME website, Nov. 23, 2006

The idea here is to create systems that can route messages without knowing exactly where the message is going, because most nodes are only up for limited amounts of time (an average of 20 percent on DieselNET). So when two nodes are in range, they query each other for the other nodes they are likely to encounter along the route, and they pass messages along based on that information.

Why bother? Well, for one, DARPA has money for this kind of research. And I am sure the military has all kinds of ideas for implementations. Imagine a couple of dozen/hundred/thousand nodes (people who carry a wireless computer or robot/rover devices). If these nodes were moving about in more or less predictable ways, and not scattered too widely, a DTN could relay messages within that group within seconds from one end to another and failures of individual nodes have very little impact on the system as a whole. You can see, perhaps, why the military might be interested in this idea. But I think there might be also very useful civilian uses, like in disaster recovery, exploration of extreme environments (space, under water) and maybe in regular communications.

BTW: if these folks have their way, DieselNET should really be BiodieselNET!

Last week I spent two evenings getting 200 liters of veggie ready for processing. After I filtered the oil, I pumped it into the waterheater and heated it to 120 Deg. F. Then I pumped the warm oil into an empty tank to evaporate the water and to dry the oil. Yesterday, I finally got the batch going - my first 50-gallon (200 liter) batch of biodiesel. When I add the 40 liters/10 gallons of methoxide the reactor is just about full to capacity. The batch is settling now, and this afternoon I’ll pump it out and start washing it.

Last weekend I drained the last 25 gallons of oil from my outside storage tank and I was surprised about how wet this stuff was. That would explain whey the last batch was so soapy. So this time I used only oil that I had stored inside in buckets and I decided to go through the trouble of drying the oil. Now I’ll just have to figure out what to do with the wet oil. Probably I’ll heat it and try to dry it. That’s not great for the energy balance for the fuel, but I’d hate to waste the oil.

Yesterday I also built another wash tank for the biodiesel. I built a sturdy 2-foot-high platform from some 2×4s and some plywood. Then I took a 55-gallon plastic drum, cut out the bottom and set it on the platform upside down with a drain valve at the bottom, made from PVC pipe. Now I should be able to process the entire 50-gallons of biodiesel when the batch is ready to be washed. The previous batch was a 40-gallon batch, and I had to process the biodiesel in two parts, 20 gallons at a time. That was pretty tedious, especially since the batch was so soapy. This batch should be a big improvement.

Piedmont Biofuels in Moncure, North Carolina, has openings for interns next year (see flyer). If I were 20, I’d jump on this one myself! This is a great opportunity for a “total immersion” experience in the biofuels-powered, sustainability-focused lifestyle on a small biodiesel refinery/produce farm in rural North Carolina. Contact Matt if you’re interested (see the flyer for his email address).

Piedmont Biofuels is a cooperative run agriculture operation with strong interest in sustainable practices and renewable energy. Our farm consists of a small acreage market garden and oilseed crop research.

A main portion of our operation is a biodiesel research production facility. We currently produce biodiesel for our farm’s diesel tractor from waste vegetable oil. Piedmont Biofuels is also researching bioregionally sound oil producing crops for on-farm energy production. We also dedicate our building practices to recycling and utilizing varied green building like cob, earth plaster, and Hebel block. Other farm projects include a solar thermal heated production facility, a PV (photovoltaic) powered Biodiesel fueling station, glycerin refining and composting.

Piedmont Biofuels website, Nov. 2006

To be clear: this is only for enthusiasts - this is not a cushy internship, nor a hippie vacation. This is hard work, from chopping firewood to hauling waste veggie - they will work you to the bone. But you get to work with some real trail blazers in biofuels production, and you will come out of this internship with valuable experience from the cutting edge of sustainable lifestyles.

The Senegalese department of Agriculture last week announced a collaboration with Brazil and India to begin producing biofuels in Senegal. As part of the program “retour vers l’agriculture” the government aims to replace Senegal’s oil imports with homegrown fuel. A pilot project calls for 4000 hectares of jatropha for vegetable oil to produce 10 percent of Senegal’s fuel in the country.

Apparently, Senegal is in the forefront of African countries seizing upon an opportunity to rid themselves of their dependence on imported fuel. Expensive fuel is one of many factors that burden countries like Senegal. Biofuels leverage the domestic resources and keep wealth within the country, instead of sending hard-earned money abroad to the already rich oil companies in Europe and the US.

This is a good example of initiatives that will have a much bigger long-term impact on economic and social development in African countries than “big development aid” campaigns. Before we pledge a certain percentage of, say, the US budget to development aid, we should first stop American and European companies and governments from sucking the wealth out of Africa and from fueling conflicts with military aid. We should support Fair Trade and sustainable business practices, like micro-loans.

Secondly, development aid needs to help African entrepreneurs and governments develop economic strategies that focus on value-added, not on exporting raw materials. And development aid needs to use local solutions and know-how to solve problems, instead of parachuting in and imposing “solutions” without regard for the problems.

Finally, the most difficult, and perhaps the most important aspect of development aid ought to be “leadership” development. Identifying and supporting leaders at all levels of society and providing support must be a priority, along with encouraging and supporting access to education and information for everyone. These are the building blocks of a participatory, democratic society, which is, in turn, the foundation of economic opportunity for everyone.

Last weekend I got my latest batch of homebrew ready and I made some modifications to the reactor. I added a intake valve, so that I can easily use the pump as a transfer pump from the washtank to the drying tank and from the drying tank to the storage tank (on the right). I also moved the the temperature gauge up a bit; in front of the intake for he methoxide, so that I get better temperature readings while I am adding the methoxide to the process.

The additional intake valve was called for because the oil intake is gravity fed from the oil storage and the intake is at the lowest point, so I cannot easily unhook it to use that intake for transfer. So instead, I leave it alone and plug another hose into the new one and conveniently pump from one tank to the other. I can also use it to completely drain the entire plumbing, which is useful.

One of my fellow biodieselers started calling this setup the “apple turnover” design, when I described it. That is because it is an appleseed reactor with the water heater installed upside down to facilitate better, more complete draining of the reactor.

Click on the image for a closer look at the plumbing.

Looks like I found a good source of methanol for my fuel production. Last Thursday I drove out to the Roxboro Motorsports Dragway and procured a 55-gallon drum of this critical ingredient for biodiesel. Racetracks have methanol supplies because they use it as a racing fuel - “racing alky.”

So this German guy and this African guy show up at this drag strip way out in the country in a Volkswagen Jetta, load a drum of “racing alky” on their trailer and talk about making diesel fuel out of used fryer grease. I bet that was the cross-cultural experience of the month for the guy who sold us the methanol. However he did mention that they do use quite a bit of fryer oil at their concessions, and that we could have it if we wanted it. Next time I go there, maybe I’ll drop off a plastic drum for them to collect the fryer oil.

One thing that worked great for transporting the 55-gallon drum was laying down a crate upside-down, and then dropping the drum sideways into one of the two openings at the bottom of the crate. Secured with a couple of straps, this was a great way to transport the methanol.

So that night I worked from 8 to 11 to start a new batch of biodiesel, which I am washing right now.
Praise the lard!

Last week we drove up to Michigan for a visit with Laura’s mom. We did the entire 850 miles north on homebrew, and I had already been feeding my Jetta homebrew for over 700 miles. So the first part of the trip marked the first 1,500 miles straight on homebrew!

Going north, the Jetta was loaded with two adults and two kids, plus baggage, and we were travelling at an average 70 Miles (112KM) per hour. The car used about 17 gallons for the trip north, which comes out to 50 miles per gallon. I calculated that my cost for the ingredients for a gallon of homebrew is abut 75 cents, plus 26 cents road tax, that’s $1.01 per gallon so the fuel cost for the 850-mile trip to Michigan was $17.17 :).

Since the temperatures in Michigan at night already dipped below 40 F, I added four gallons of kerosene to the remaining biodiesel in the tank. I also found a local biodiesel distributor (D&L Fuels) where I bought 15 gallons for the trip back to North Carolina. (Note: D&L Fuels only sells B20 retail at the pump, but they will fill containers with B99) However, on the trip south our car was towing a 4-foot x 8-foot U-Haul trailer (1.2 M x 2.4 M), which changed the fuel mileage of my 4-cyl TDI Jetta a bit.

Going south, with a 1000-pound trailer in tow (600 pounds tare plus 400 pounds in antique furniture), the Jetta used 27 gallons on 850 miles, which comes out to 32.5 miles per gallon. The biodiesel (or “soy”) I bought in Michigan cost $40 and I bought 4 gallons of kero ($11) and topped off with 2 gallons of diesel (to make it home). Plus 6 gallons of homebrew to start with (@ $1.01), I end up with a total fuel bill of $62 for the return trip.

Altogether, I spent just under $80 for the fuel for the 1,700-mile round trip. Not too bad!
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350.092 MpH (529km/h) - that is the new land speed record for a diesel-powered vehicle. Andy Green, a British RAF officer set this new landmark this morning with the JCB DieselMax. The vehicle is powered by two 4-cylinder diesel engines that deliver a peak power of 750hp and torque of 1500Nm at 2000 RPM. The engines are based on JBCs 444 engine, an industrial, common-rail injection diesel engine, which usually powers backhoes and other equipment.

In comparison, the fastest piston-engine car is currently Tom Burkland’s Streamliner, at 417 MpH (the official FIA record is 409.978 - set Aug 21, 1991 by Speed0Motive (source). The curent holder of the overall land speed record is ThrustSSC a jet-propelled land vehicle, which achieved 763 mph, or 1227 km/h on October 15, 1997. This was the first time a land vehicle broke the sound barrier.

Yesterday I decided that the biodiesel I made last weekend looked good enough for a fill up. I spent last week washing the stuff in my washtank - first is sprinkled water on it and drained the soapy water from the bottom. Then I put a bubbler in the water below the biodiesel. The rising bubbles drag water through the biodiesel, then they pop and the water sinks back down to the bottom. Kind of like Spongebob and Patrick riding the fishing hooks -up and down and up and down … and every time they pick up the soap from the biodiesel. This process gets the soap out, but it leaves water dissolved in the biodiesel, and that needs to get removed in the next step.

There are several ways to dry washed biodiesel. I chose bubble drying. I just removed the water from the bottom of the washtank and fired up the bubbler, again. I also pointed a box fan at the surface of the biodiesel. Now the bubbles of air pick up the water, and drag it to the surface, where it evaporates. After a couple of days of bubble treatment, the biodiesel had turned from murky to clear.

So Sunday evening, I drained five gallons from the tank and filtered it to 5 microns using a sock filter. Finally, I poured my first homebrew biodiesel into the fuel tank of my 2002 Jetta. I took it for a spin, and all was well. There were only about 1 1/2 gallons of commercial biodiesel left, so it is running on mostly homebrew at this point. I drove about 30 miles (50 KM) today, and I noticed no difference, compared to the commercial biodiesel.

This weekend I brewed my first 30-gallon/120 liters batch of biodiesel, using the modified appleseed reactor I built in the basement. I used fryer oil from a local restaurant that titrated at 1.6 with KOH, so it’s pretty decent quality feedstock. Saturday, Manfred came over and we did the titration, mixed the Methoxide and started the process. I had heated the oil to about 120 deg. F, and then I cut off the heater. When I started blending in the Methoxide, the temperature went down below 100 F (that’s as low as the thermometer goes) due to 6 gallons of the cooler fluid. Once all the Methoxide was blended in, and the pump was just blending the reactant, the temperature went back up to almost 120 F, which is great, as the reaction is an exothermic reaction.

I let the pump run for 6 hours, the I cut it off and let the reactant settle for about 20 hours. On Sunday evening I drained the glycerol and the I pumped the biodiesel into the wash tank. The product came out a tad soapy, and I turned up the spray washer too high at first. So when I held a light behind the wash drum I could not see a separation at all, and I thought the stuff had emulsified … pretty quickly, however, the water settled down, and I started draining the soap water out - 15 gallons so far. I could probably start bubble-washing now, but my bubble stone broke, and so I ordered new ones from Utah BD supply.

So I’ll be washing the stuff this week, and then drying it next week, and before long I should be able to feed my Jetta my first homebrew biodiesel.

Praise the Lard and celebrate the “Good Juice” today! It’s International Biodiesel Day - celebrate VEGPOWER!

Transesterification of a vegetable oil was conducted as early as 1853, by scientists E. Duffy and J. Patrick, many years before the first diesel engine became functional. Rudolf Diesel’s prime model, a single 10 ft (3 m) iron cylinder with a flywheel at its base, ran on its own power for the first time in Augsburg, Germany on August 10, 1893. In remembrance of this event, August 10 has been declared International Biodiesel Day. Diesel later demonstrated his engine and received the “Grand Prix” (highest prize) at the World Fair in Paris, France in 1900. This engine stood as an example of Diesel’s vision because it was powered by peanut oil—a biofuel, though not strictly biodiesel, since it was not transesterified. He believed that the utilization of a biomass fuel was the real future of his engine. In a 1912 speech, Rudolf Diesel said “the use of vegetable oils for engine fuels may seem insignificant today, but such oils may become, in the course of time, as important as petroleum and the coal-tar products of the present time.”
Wikipedia: Biodiesel - Historical background

This weekend I plan on brewing my first big batch of biodiesel at home. I have all the ingredients - the only glitch is that my scale gave up the ghost :( but I’ll borrow one from a fellow biodieseler …

The use of biodiesel in Germany has increased by two-thirds compared to last year, according to press reports of the latest issue of the Wochenbericht des DIW Berlin. Germans overall drive a bit less, but the Germans who have to drive a lot, are switching to the more fuel-efficient diesel vehicles, which now represent 21 percent of the total passenger vehicle fleet in Germany. And I’d bet that more and more people switch to diesel vehicles planning to use biodiesel.

A major motivator for Germans are the fuel prices: a liter high-octane costs 1.398 Euros - that’s $6.76 per Gallon (US)! Considering those prices, I find the 3-percent reduction in average annual driving distance rather modest.

US gas price map by county
International Fuel Price comparison

Last weekend was a big weekend for my biodiesel production project. Friday I pulled a 220 Volt/30 Amp circuit to the reactor in the basement. A friend who is an electrician emailed me instructions for what breaker and wiring to get, after I explained the project. So I cut the power, plugged in the new breaker, pulled the wire and hooked up the reactor. No biggie.

Saturday I filtered 120 Liters (30 Gals) of veggie oil and pumped it into the reactor, 20 Liters at a time, to calibrate the sight tube. That way I now know how much feedstock is in the vessel. Since I turned the water heater upside down, the heating element is a bit higher off the bottom as it would be the other way around. So the minimum fill is about 100 liters (25 Gals) for a batch. I then fired up the heater, and began circulating the oil to warm it up. I ran it for several hours to test it and to calibrate the temperature to just below 140 Deg. F. Once the oil was warm, I noticed a couple of leaks in the plumbing - nothing serious, just a little dripping. I’ll fix that this week.

Sunday I tinkered with my wash tank setup and realized that the stand for the tank is not sturdy enough. I’ll need to improve it - probably with some plywood. Also, the stand pipe leaks, because it’s not glued in yet. I’ll do that once I am happy with the setup.

This is very exciting. I am so close, I can smell my first big batch of homebrew!

To do:

• Fix plumbing
• Buy methanol and KOH
• Fix washtank
• Drying tank
• Setup for final filtering
• Prepare storage

There’s still a bit of work, but it looks like the centerpiece of my homebrew operation is in place now.

Praise the Lard!

Ah - hark the master of the moral high ground: the chief ethical executive from Royal Dutch Shell has spoken:

Royal Dutch Shell, the world’s top marketer of biofuels, considers using food crops to make biofuels “morally inappropriate” as long as there are people in the world who are starving, an executive said on Thursday.
Shell Says Biofuels From Food Crops “Morally Inappropriate” - PlanetArk, July 7, 2006

Yeah, biodiesel becomes popular and Big Oil finds its soft spot for the poor, starving masses. I would like to see them to produce a single current example where the biofuels cause hunger. Food shortages are usually caused by war, which in turn is often caused by conflict over scarce or valuable resources like oil. If any fuel is “morally inappropriate” it’s petroleum based fuel. Access to oil is the underlying reason for war, oppression and violence. Oil extraction destroys environmental resources and pollutes the earth.

Just ask the Ogoni people in Nigeria if Shell is acting in a “morally appropriate” way in the Niger delta:

Since Shell began drilling oil in Ogoniland in 1958, the people of Ogoniland have had pipelines built across their farmlands and in front of their homes, suffered endemic oil leaks from these very pipelines, been forced to live with the constant flaring of gas. This environmental assault has smothered land with oil, killed masses of fish and other aquatic life, and introduced devastating acid rain to the land of the Ogoni.
Shell in Nigeria: What are the issues? - Boycott Shell, 2001.

Big Oil buys arms for the Nigerian military, which terrorizes and kills anyone critical of the actions of Big Oil in the Niger Delta. A huge portion of Nigeria’s revenues come from oil, but the people who live in the Niger Delta, where the oil is extracted, see nothing of it. Except maybe the guns bought from it. But they are at the wrong end of the gun barrel.

Clearly it would be preferable for fuel and food production NOT not to be in competition. Pursuing ways to make fuel from waste biomass is great. We need to pursue all options that might yield efficient, renewable sources of fuels, and if Shell can come up with a way to make fuel efficiently without competing with food crops for land or resources - more power to them. But to have Big Oil make pronouncements regarding the ethics of fuel production is absurd.