A high-school sophomore from Wisconsin was named the national winner of the 2006 Ag Day Essay Contest this week. The theme this year was “Growing Our Energy: Alternative Fuels From Agriculture” and here is a brief excerpt from Ashley Julka’s winning essay: “…By using gasoline-containing ethanol, we’re using homegrown products. Not only does this reduce our dependency on foreign oil, …
Happy Birthday, Rudolf
Today is St. Patrick’s Day – tomorrow is St. Diesel’s Day. Well, he hasn’t actually been canonized yet – at least not by the Pope, but maybe by the Biodiesel industry. March 18 is the fifth annual National Biodiesel Day, celebrated on the birthday of Rudolf Diesel – inventor of the diesel engine. According to a press release from the …
Brazil Industry Needed Government Help to Grow
I have been meaning to put up a link to this AP story that came out a week or so ago about Brazil’s ethanol economy. It’s a good backgrounder on the history of the industry in Brazil and of particular interest to some critics of the government trying to help the industry grow here in the U.S. is this line …
Making Ethanol from Cheese? No Whey!
Add cheese to the list of commodities that could be used to make ethanol. This AP story is about research into “using a cheese-making byproduct to make ethanol.” That would be whey – as in what Little Miss Muffet ate on her tuffet with curds. According to the article, whey can be made into lactose sugar, which can then be …
Ag Day Remarks On Ethanol
The chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee had lots of good things to say about ethanol yesterday at the kickoff luncheon for National Ag Day in Washington D.C. Senator Saxby Chambliss, a Georgia Republican, said that ethanol production holds promise even in areas outside the Corn Belt. “We may not be able to grow the corn in the abundance that …
Legislation Would Extend Biodiesel Tax Incentive
Biodiesel and soybean grower interests were happy to see legislation introduced this week that would extend the biodiesel tax incentive. According to a release from the National Biodiesel Board and the American Soybean Association, the bill was introduced yesterday by Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Ranking Member Max Baucus (D-MT). The Grassley/Baucus bill, S. 2401, extends popular …
Aventine Growing as Ethanol Marketer
Aventine Renewable Energy recently signed an agreement with its 14th ethanol production plant to market their product. According to a company release, Aventine will market all fuel grade ethanol produced by E3 BioFuels in Mead, Nebraska. Aventine also has agreements with plants in Wisconsin, Illinois, South Dakota, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota and Texas.
US BioEnergy to Build ND’s Biggest Ethanol Plant
Hankinson, ND is the designated location for a 100 million gallon per year ethanol plant to be built by South Dakota-based US BioEnergy, in partnership with local Gold Energy, LLC. A company press release (soon to be posted on their website), quotes North Dakota Governor John Hoeven saying, “We have put good programs in place and worked diligently with the …
See the USA in Your Flex-Fuel Chevrolet Grand Finale
Here is the final post from the I-CARE Cross Country E85 Trip last week. The students who took part in the last half of the journey were Brad Westrum, Pat Lennon, Nate Marean – the post is written by Brad. The end of the road…. Friday, March 10 and Saturday, March 11. After uncovering our truck from the snow, we …
Ethanol Not so Hot Down Under
Apparently the ethanol industry is not doing as well in Australia as it is here in the U.S., according to this story from the ABC Rural Network. (That’s ABC as in AUSTRALIAN Broadcast Company) The reason is that major oil companies have yet to sign contracts to meet future target production goals and officials with the Australian Biofuels Association are …