Emerson is Choice for Dynamic Fuels Biodiesel Plant

John Davis

DynamiFuelsA Louisiana biodiesel plant that needs intense heat to turn animal fats and waste materials into the green fuel has chosen a Texas company that specializes in the process control system that uses hydrogen to create the heat needed.

Biodiesel Magazine reports that the 75-million-gallon-a-year Dynamic Fuels renewable diesel plant… a 50-50 joint venture between Tyson Foods Inc. and Syntroleum Corp… currently under construction in Geismar, La. will use automation and process control technology designed by Emerson Process Management of Austin, Texas:

“This is a hydrotreating plant, which involves high temperatures, high pressures and catalytic reactors, in addition to handling hydrogen gas,” said Jeff Bigger, president of Syntroleum. “So process controls are very important.”

Emerson’s PlantWeb digital plant architecture, which will be integrated into the Dynamic Fuels facility, networks an automation system and predictive maintenance software with smart devices installed throughout the operation, including control valves, flow meters and temperature transmitters. But for Emerson this is not unfamiliar territory—the company has worked with Syntroleum since 2000 when they outfitted a pilot syngas plant. “We have a long relationship with them,” Bigger told Biodiesel Magazine. “They have a very robust system, they’re very cost competitive and have a design that can be exported to other locations. That’s one of the things we get with this system—it’s scalable.”

The plant is about half done and projected to start operations in 2010.

Biodiesel

Advanced Technologies to Improve Wind Turbines

John Davis

Getting inspiration from a fish, researchers are looking at making wind turbine blades out of advanced materials that will change shape to make the systems more efficient and longer lasting.

This article from U.S. News & World Report says the blades with changing aerodynamic profiles will best suit whatever the prevailing wind conditions bring:

Beyene“The idea was born from a simple observation of a fish in an aquarium,” said researcher Asfaw Beyene, a mechanical engineer at San Diego State University. “Many flying and swimming animals have superior efficiencies than manmade devices. The primary difference between natural motion and motion of manmade devices is lack of geometric adaptability to varying flow conditions.

“In flying and swimming creatures, the geometries morph to fit to a flow condition,” Beyene added. “In man-made devices, typically the geometry remains rigid in spite of widely varying flow conditions.”

Beyene is leading one team exploring morphing blades for wind turbines. Another team is working at the University of Bristol in England.

“The wind can be very harsh on blades — turbines turn off if the wind gets too much, or else the blades will break fighting the wind,” explained researcher Paul Weaver, an aerospace engineer at the University of Bristol.

“A morphing blade uses the wind to its advantage rather than fighting it, adapting its shape to get greater performance,” Weaver added. “This has the potential to significantly relieve unwanted stresses in the blades, increasing their efficiency and helping to prolong their life.”

Researchers believe that today’s glass and carbon-fiber-reinforced plastic blades can be controlled by an electric signal, and future wind blades made of urethane rubber will be able to flex, bend and twist shape to reach the optimal angles that get as much energy from the wind as possible.

Wind

Texas to Run More Vehicles on Alternatives

John Davis

PerryMore state vehicles in Texas will be running on something other than the non-renewable petroleum the state is known for.

This post on Examiner.com says the new law, effective September 1st, will require at least half of the 27,000-vehicle state fleet will run on alternative fuels 80 percent of the time:

“House Bill 432 addresses the fact that our state is a leader in the research and production of alternative fuels, but we lack the infrastructure to get drivers who would use it to fuel their vehicles”, Governor Perry said at a ceremonial bill signing in Dallas last week. “Since our state already spends money on a fleet, this bill requires it to include vehicles that use alternative fuel. That will drive the creation of a basic distribution infrastructure and take advantage of the fuels we produce in Texas, including natural gas coming from the Barnett Shale”.

Earlier this year, Dallas-based AT&T announced it was working to build up to 40 new compressed natural gas (CNG) fueling stations and retire its fleet of gasoline-powered vehicles and invest up to $565 million in alternative fuel vehicles.

Miscellaneous

Mississippi Firm Opens First of Three Biodiesel Plants

John Davis

MIPCOOfficials at a biodiesel plant in Mississippi have finished the commissioning process for the 8-million-gallon-a-year facility.

This article from Biodiesel Magazine says Mississippi Investment Petroleum Co. LLC (MIPCO) bought the plant from Tri-State Petroleum Products in Houston, Mississippi and retrofitted it to produce the green fuel from poultry fat and waste vegetable oil:

The Houston, Miss. [facility], is actually the second project launched by MIPCO. Ground work had begun at the first project planned at Aberdeen, Miss., Lunsford said, when the Aberdeen mayor requested the project be put on hold while the city applied for a grant to help with road access in the industrial area. “What was supposed to be a 60 day delay turned into 120-days,” [Jon Lunsford, CEO of MIPCO] said. Construction on the 10 MMgy facility is set to begin once final permits are in place, with completion anticipated by the end of the year.

MIPCO is in final negotiations on a third facility, a shuttered biodiesel plant at Nettleton, Miss. Lunsford said the deal should be completed within the month and the plant operational within 60 days after closing. MIPCO hopes to achieve a 24 MMgy capacity at Nettleton, he added.

Biodiesel

E85 Now Offered in Neosho, MO

kum-and-goKum & Go L.C. has recently opened an E85 station in Neosho, Missouri. The company, headquartered in West Des Moines, Iowa, opened the 3,400-square-foot convenience store after only 84 days of construction.

“Kum & Go is please to open our second store in Neosho, and plans to provide the best customer service for everyone who visits us,” said Kyle Krause, president and CEO of Kum & Go, which operates 400 convenience stores in 12 states (Iowa, Arkansas, Colorado, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Wyoming and Wisconsin). “We are eager to offer interstate travelers, businesses and patrons within the Neosho community an additional Kum & Go location for all their convenience store needs.”

Kum & Go is now 50 years old. Since 1997, Kum & Go has been offering E85 fuel. The company has 23 E85 facilities in seven other states – Minnesota, Missouri, North Dakota, South Dakota, Colorado, Nebraska and Oklahoma.

The new site in Neosho is located at Highway 60 & Kodiak Road in Neosho.

Miscellaneous

Ethanol Co-Product Could Make Fertilizer

Cindy Zimmerman

The leftovers from an ethanol co-product could be used as a fertilizer, according to research being done at South Dakota State University.

When the ethanol by-product known as dried distillers grains with solubles (DDGS) is heated at high temperatures under limited oxygen to make synthesis gas, or syngas, the remains are a fine, dust-like ash. SDSU Soil Testing Laboratory manager Ron Gelderman set out to learn whether that residue could be applied to fields as a soil nutrient, since the ash likely would be discarded in a landfill otherwise.

An SDSU greenhouse study found that dried distillers grain ash resulted in about the same increase in corn growth as fertilizer phosphorus. Use of dried distillers grain ash as a source of potassium in that study was inconclusive, since the selected soil supplied adequate plant potassium.

However, a separate field study at SDSU showed that DDGS ash was just as effective as fertilizer phosphorus and potassium in providing both nutrients for corn production, Gelderman said.

“After ashing or burning, the inorganic minerals are generally left in the ash and usually are plant-available. But we have to test that to be sure. We found that it worked quite well,” Gelderman said.

However, Gelderman says the problem is that the material is too fine to be used as a fertilizer spreader-type application, which means that further processing of the material — for example, into pellets, or as a liquid slurry, or mixed with manure or lime — might be necessary to get it back onto the land.

Distillers Grains, Ethanol, Ethanol News, Research

More Green Collar Jobs for Iowa

Cindy Zimmerman

Iowa Governor Chet Culver is taking action to create more green jobs in Iowa.

CulverCulver signed an executive order last week which creates the Iowa Green Jobs Task Force. “In recent years, thanks to our efforts in biofuels and wind energy, we have created thousands of green-collar jobs for Iowans,” said Governor Culver. “However, if we are to expand these industries, we must also have the workforce necessary to fill those positions. That is why I am creating the Green Jobs Task Force, which will help coordinate our state’s efforts in creating and filling the green-collar jobs of the future.”

Culver previously signed an executive order to require state agencies to purchase more flex-fuel vehicles that use up to 85 percent ethanol.

Energy, Ethanol, Ethanol News, Government, Wind

Green Fuels from Grass and Leaves

Cindy Zimmerman

ArgonneA newly proposed collaboration between the U.S. Department of Energy’s Argonne National Laboratory and the City of Naperville, Illinois would convert “landscape waste”—essentially, grass and leaf trimmings—into one of several different environmentally friendly fuels, including ethanol, bioelectricity and hydrogen.

This new partnership, known as the “Green Fuels Depot,” provides “a golden opportunity for Argonne to be associated with one of our neighboring communities in promoting new technologies that we have pioneered here at the laboratory,” said Glenn Keller, manager of vehicle systems in Argonne’s Center for Transportation Research.

The depot will use a gasifier from Packer Engineering to convert grass, leaves, branches and other biomass into syngas, a gas mixture that contains carbon monoxide and hydrogen. The syngas can then be used to create cellulosic ethanol, bio-electricity or hydrogen. Although the proposal calls for trying all three fuel types, Keller said it would be more practical to concentrate on producing just one fuel when the depot is built.

Because Naperville’s official vehicle fleet currently includes flex-fuel vehicles that run on both gasoline and ethanol, any cellulosic ethanol produced by the depot could be quickly put to use. Although the pilot project will use only 3 percent of the annual landscape waste collected by the city, if all 48,000 cubic yards of Naperville’s landscape waste were used in a full-scale Green Fuels Depot, it would be enough to fuel all 300 vehicles in the city fleet.

Cellulosic, Energy, Ethanol News, Flex Fuel Vehicles, Research

NREL Installs Two Giant Wind Turbines for Testing

John Davis

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Colorado has installed two of the biggest wind turbines ever tested at the facility.

The video above shows workers putting up the 220 tons of wind turbine parts for the 253-foot diameter blades. This story in EnergyCurrent.com says they’ll be able to generate 1.5 megawatts of power:

“This turbine is a modern, utility-scale machine that will serve as a general-purpose research platform,” said Fort Felker, director of the wind center.

Thousands of similar turbines are already being used at wind farms across the country, but the blades on those machines need to keep spinning, generating as much electricity as possible and working to recoup investments in the farm.

But at the wind center, researchers will be able to tweak the turbine to get the most energy possible from the available wind in an effort to close the already-shrinking gap between the cost of wind energy and the cost of electricity from fossil fuels.

“Wind energy is cost-effective now, but there are lots of opportunities to be more reliable and more efficient,” said David Simms, manager of testing and operations. “We’re trying to figure out how to get more wind turbines out there that are more effective.”

The article goes on to say that an even bigger wind turbine with a rotor diameter of 331 feet will be put up at NREL’s National Wind Technology Center later this year. Researchers believe the extreme wind conditions, along with snow, ice, lightning and severe storms, in that part of Colorado will be a great testing ground to see how much the big blades can take.

Wind

Rising Diesel Prices Good for Biodiesel Biz

John Davis

dieselpriceschartPrices for diesel continue to climb in the U.S., hitting their highest point of the year… and that’s good news for producers of green, renewable biodiesel.

Biodiesel Magazine reports that according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, the national average price of diesel fuel went up 1.6 cents per gallon from $2.652 per gallon Aug. 17 to $2.668 per gallon Aug. 24:

This marks the fifth week in a row for rising diesel prices, which biodiesel producers and marketers should make note of. The lower the price of diesel fuel, the tougher it is for biodiesel to remain competitively priced.

While it’s good news, the diesel prices are still considerably lower than a year ago when they were pushing $4.15 per gallon… and still down from the July 2008 high of $4.764 per gallon.

Biodiesel