AmeriPride Adopts Propane

Joanna Schroeder March 5, 2015

AmeriPride Services has adopted propane autogas fueled trucks for its fleets after a successful pilot test program. In addition to the five ROUSH CleanTech Ford F-59 delivery trucks in Topeka, Kansas, the uniform and linen company is adding 20 more in Northern California later this year. AmeriPride announced their program expansion plans at the NTEA Work Truck Show in Indianapolis.

“We’ve been extensively testing fuels and vehicles to find the right area and application that gives us the best environmental and economical benefits,” said Banny Allison, fleet services manager for AmeriPride. “Propane autogas reduces greenhouse gas emissions and has easy, cost-efficient fueling infrastructure. Because of our success in Kansas, we are implementing the same propane autogas vehicles in the Sacramento and Fresno areas.”

According to AmeriPride, each of their propane autogas trucks will emit about 95,000 fewer pounds of carbon dioxide emissions over its lifetime. To fuel its vehicles, AmeriPride installed a private autogas station with 1,000-gallon tank at their Topeka facility because infrastructure for propane autogas is less expensive than any other alternative fuel, partly due to fewer requirements from the Environmental Protection Agency.

Currently the company pays $1.55 per gallon for propane autogas that, historically, has cost up to 50 percent less than diesel.

“AmeriPride has long been a champion for supporting the environment and the communities they serve,” said Todd Mouw, vice president of sales and marketing for ROUSH CleanTech, who is Ford’s only Qualified Vehicle Modifier for propane autogas. “Emissions-reducing, domestically produced propane autogas has met their criteria and now they are ready to expand into different markets with reliable Ford F-59 workhorses.”

Clean Energy, Propane

BioEnergy Bytes

Joanna Schroeder March 5, 2015

The Maryland Clean Energy Center (MCEC) has added Joanne Ivancic, Executive Director, Advanced Biofuels USA to the MCEC 2015 Advisory Council. Advanced Biofuels USA , a nonprofit educational organization headquartered in Frederick, Maryland, advocates for the adoption of advanced biofuels as an energy security, economic development, military flexibility and climate change/pollution control solution.
Clean Focus has announced the completion of a new 3.75 MW solar project in the City of Adelanto, CA. The ground-mounted system, interconnected in late January, received its certificate of occupancy earlier this week. Construction financing was provided by Seminole Financial Services; Sol Construction led building efforts; and MPE Consulting served as lead engineer. The Adelanto project, sited on 20 acres will generate 7,156,000 kW hours of clean electricity a year.
A week ahead of the fourth anniversary of the Fukushima reactor disaster, five leading organizations fighting for America’s clean-energy future – Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace, the Nuclear Information and Resource Service, Public Citizen, and the Sierra Club – are unveiling an interactive online video, “Our Epic Future: Create It With Clean Energy.” The entertaining, fact-filled video allows visitors to explore three scenarios in the “Epic Energy Labs” with very different future outcomes: one dominated by fossil fuels, another in which nuclear power is the focus, and a third relying on renewable energy.
Terra Motors Corporation, Japanese innovator of electric two- and three-wheelers, is establishing a joint venture to deal with the manufacturing and sales of electric vehicle in Dhaka with Runner group of companies, the most famous motorbike manufactures in Bangladesh, on February 18, 2015. The name of our joint venture is “Runner Terra EV ltd.”

Bioenergy Bytes

Do You Agree With Government Controlled Internet?

Jamie Johansen March 5, 2015

Our latest ZimmPoll asked the question, “What do you think of proposed government control over the internet?”

It has been called net neutrality or open internet but now it should be called government controlled internet. In a vote along partisan lines the FCC last Thursday passed sweeping changes in how it will be regulating the internet. Basically, they are treating it like the telephone system using some very out of date laws. The goal is to provide more “equality” for users. How this plays out is anyone’s guess. Estimates have been made that the cost of the new regulations will include losing 500,000 jobs and $62 billion over the next five years. Wonder who will pay that and what they will allow. This 317 page move pushed by the Obama Administration has already caused uncertainty for investors in new technology.

It will be interesting to see what impact this has on American agribusiness in coming years.

Here are the poll results:

Agree – 25%
Disagree – 73%
Don’t know – 2%

Our new ZimmPoll is now live and asks the question, Should Congress grant TPA?

Congress is considering granting Trade Promotion Authority (TPA), formally known as Fast Track, to move forward on trade agreements being negotiated in Europe and Asia. Every president since Franklin Roosevelt has been given this authority to negotiate agreements that can just be voted up or down by Congress, but there is opposition even in agricultural circles to granting TPA or even pursuing new free trade agreements. What do you think?

ZimmPoll

Tennessee Waste-To-Energy Facility Approved

John Davis March 5, 2015

A sustainable waste-to-energy facility has been approved for construction in Tennessee. PHG Energy (PHGE) says its deal with city of Lebanon, Tennessee, will build a downdraft gasification plant that will cleanly convert up to 64 tons per day of blended waste wood, scrap tires and sewer sludge into a fuel gas that will generate up to 300Kw of electricity. The power generated from this plant will provide the plant’s internal power needs as well as contribute electricity to the wastewater treatment plant where it will be located.

“This is not incineration or burning,” Lebanon Mayor Philip Craighead pointed out. “There is no smoke or odor. The feedstock material is broken down at very high temperatures in a sealed vessel, and about 95 percent of what goes into the gasifier comes out as the fuel gas.” Craighead also said the remaining 5 percent to 10 percent of material exiting the gasifier is a high-carbon biochar that can be recycled or sold for agricultural or industrial uses.

PHGE President Tom Stanzione said the Lebanon project will deploy what his company believes is the world’s largest downdraft gasifier and added, “This is the same basic technology we utilized in all our previous designs, and we have upgraded capacity and power density to accomplish a lot more gasification in what is not a lot more space.”

The Large Frame gasifier, as the company refers to it, has been vetted through a rigorous testing process for more than two years at PHGE’s research facility. A standard PHGE gasifier can convert up to 12 tons of feedstock per day to fuel gas, while the Lebanon model will process up to 64 tons per day without substantially increasing the footprint of the plant.

PHGE officials say the plant will keep more than 8,000 tons of material out of landfills each year – the equivalent of a line of trucks over 4 miles long, as well as cutting carbon dioxide emissions by 2,500 tons each year.

This project will mark the 14th gasifier installation for PHGE.

Utilities, Waste-to-Energy

Moms Fight Colorado Roll Back of Renewable Energy

John Davis March 5, 2015

A group of moms in Colorado are fighting proposed changes in that state’s legislature to Colorado’s renewable energy standards. The group, Colorado Moms Know Best, say they oppose the changes that would rollback from 30 percent down to 15 percent of the energy produced and consumed in the state.

“Moms believe we have a moral obligation to protect children’s health and future, ensuring they have clean air is one of the very basics,” said Data Gutwein with Colorado Moms Know Best. “The reality is that chopping the state’s renewable energy standard in half would mean relying more on coal-fired plants and more kids dealing with asthma and other respiratory problems.”

Colorado has been a leader in renewable energy. In 2004, Coloradans passed the first state ballot initiative to establish a renewable energy standards; 29 states and the District of Columbia have since adopted similar standards. In the years since, Colorado has added tens of thousands of clean tech jobs with an average salary of $78,000, according to the Metro Denver Chamber of Commerce’s 2014 Energy Cluster report.

“Renewable energy is not only good for kids’ health, it’s also great for their future career options,” said Colorado Moms Know Best’s Dana Gutwein. “If Colorado can remain on the cutting edge of the renewable energy industry, our children will be able to prepare for plentiful high-paying, clean tech job opportunities.”

The group has previously helped influence Colorado’s Air Quality Control Commission to adopt stricter air quality standards for oil and gas operations in the state of Colorado.

biofuels, Government, Legislation

Iowa Governor Visits Golden Grain Energy

Cindy Zimmerman March 4, 2015

Golden Grain Energy officials and employees had the opportunity to thank Iowa Governor Terry Branstad for his support of ethanol when he paid a visit to the plant in Mason City on Wednesday.

“Governor Branstad has always been very supportive of the plant and the industry as a whole. It means a lot to be able to have the governor here in person to give a pat on the back to all of the people who have worked hard to help us reach the billion gallon production mark,” said Dave Sovereign, Chairman of the Board of Directors at Golden Grain Energy.

Governor Branstad toured the plant as to mark Golden Grain Energy’s recent production milestone of producing one billion gallons of corn ethanol.

“The backing and support from the governor’s office and from the local community helps us go a long way as we work towards producing another billion gallons of ethanol,” said Sovereign.

For his part, Governor Branstad had a photo posted on his Facebook page with – “Golden Grain ethanol just produced their BILLIONTH gallon of ethanol. To celebrate, the governor visited and got one of their t-shirts. “Keep calm and fuel on” ‪#‎iagov‬”

ACE, Ethanol, Ethanol News

Southwest Research Institute Award $4.9M

Joanna Schroeder March 4, 2015

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has awarded Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) $4.9 million as part of a $9.9 million continuation contract to manufacture and test a high-efficiency supercritical CO2 (sCO2) hot gas turbo-expander and compact heat exchangers for concentrating solar power (CSP) plants. Dr. Klaus Brun, program director of the Machinery Program in SwRI’s Mechanical Engineering Division says this project is one of eight DOE-funded sCO2 power cycle projects currently in progress.

The award was given through DOE’s SunShot Initiative and continues a previous DOE project to design the sCO2 expander. SwRI will lead a team of industry collaborators that includes Aramco Services Company, Bechtel Marine Propulsion Corporation, Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI), General Electric, and Thar Energy.

According to SwRI the highly cyclical nature of CSP plant operation requires an sCO2 hot gas turbo-expander to operate at high temperatures and pressures over a wide range of load conditions while maintaining high efficiency, handling rapid transient heat input swings, and offering very fast start-up to optimize the plant’s online availability. Similar sCO2 expanders also have the potential to significantly improve the efficiency of waste heat recovery, nuclear and fossil-fueled power plants.

“Over the last two years, SwRI and its industry collaborators have developed a highly efficient, multi-stage axial flow sCO2 hot gas turbo-expander that advances the state of the art from laboratory size to a full mega-watt scale prototype,” says Dr. Jeff Moore, manager of the Rotating Machinery Dynamics Section in SwRI’s Mechanical Engineering Division, and principal investigator of the project.

A second objective of the project, according to SwRI, is to optimize novel compact heat exchangers for sCO2 applications to drastically reduce manufacturing costs. The scalable sCO2 expander design and improved heat exchanger will close two critical technology gaps and potentially provide a major pathway to achieve power at $0.06 per kilowatt hour, increasing energy conversion efficiency to more than 50 percent, and potentially reducing total power block cost to below $1,200 per kilowatt installed. Conventional steam-based CSP systems typically operate at less than 35 percent efficiency. These efficiencies also will allow solar plants to be competitive with conventional fossil-fueled power plants.

Clean Energy, Electricity, Renewable Energy, Solar

PACE Calls for Fair Solar in Louisiana

Joanna Schroeder March 4, 2015

The Louisiana Public Service Commission has released a draft report that the Partnership for Affordable Clean Energy (PACE) says sheds “significant light” on the inequities caused by the state’s treatment of distributed solar generation. The report finds that the state’s current public subsidy for solar power is unsustainable but also that the net metering requirement for utilities is shifting considerable grid costs from solar customers to non-solar customers.

PACE is calling this “unfair” and wants the state to change its treatment of distributed solar. They cite several important conclusions found in the report:

More than $2 million in grid costs are being shifted to non-solar customers in Louisiana. This could grow to $31.4 million by 2020.
Costs associated with net metering in Louisiana far outweigh the benefits. The negative cost is already $89 million and is estimated to rise to between $125 million and $488 million.
Net metering customers have incomes on average 35% higher than non-solar customers, meaning the state’s net metering policy is shifting grid costs from those with more money to those with less.
Louisiana’s net metering policy could cause power customers to pay as much as $809 million more if it is left unchanged.
Louisiana’s taxpayer subsidy to solar customers has grown from an originally estimated half a million dollars annually to $42 million per year, making it one of the most generous in the nation.

In Louisiana, as in many other states, regulatory policy allows a small group of customers to use the power grid as a battery backup when they are unable to rely on their solar rooftop systems. However, PACE notes that these customers are unwilling to help pay for the cost of maintaining a reliable electricity grid in Louisiana. While solar is a valuable resource, says PACE, everyone should pay their fair share for the use of the power grid. Right now, as the report clearly shows, those costs are being shifted to less affluent non-solar customers, which is both unfair and unsustainable.

How to incorporate solar energy in way that is fair and benefits all electricity consumers is becoming a hot button issue around the country. For example, Arizona and New Mexico, fees for solar users have been viewed as solutions to this issue while Hawaii has recently lowered net metering rates. PACE is calling on Louisiana to review other states’ policies as a guide to create fairness.

Clean Energy, Electricity, Renewable Energy, Solar

BioEnergy Bytes

Joanna Schroeder March 4, 2015

Berlin (gtai) Wind turbines fed over 10,000 gigawatt-hours (GWh) of electricity into Germany’s grid in the first month of the year, setting a new record, the BDEW German Association of Energy and Water Industries and ZSW Centre for Solar Energy and Hydrogen Research reported this morning. That is approximately one fifth of the annual production from wind in 2014.
U.S. prices for Chinese-produced Tier-1 modules were higher than those of any other market tracked in GTM Research’s latest report, Global PV Pricing Outlook 2015. Driven up on a year-over-year basis by the ongoing trade case against Chinese- and Taiwanese-produced modules, U.S. prices averaged around 72 cents per watt in the fourth quarter of 2014, compared to just 56 cents per watt for the same modules in Chile, the least expensive module market tracked in the new report.
Hennessy Capital Acquisition Corp. has announced the completion of its previously announced acquisition of School Bus Holdings, Inc., which, through its subsidiaries, conducts its business under the “Blue Bird” name, from The Traxis Group B.V., which is majority owned by funds affiliated with Cerberus Capital Management, L.P. As part of the transaction, Hennessy changed its name to Blue Bird Corporation. Effective Wednesday, February 25, 2015, Blue Bird will be publicly traded on NASDAQ under common stock ticker symbol BLBD.
Alstom was awarded by the Chinese company Sinohydro a contract worth about €58 million to provide electro-mechanical equipment and technical services for Karuma Hydropower Project, Uganda’s largest electricity plant. Alstom will provide six 100MW Francis turbine-generator sets and related equipment for this project. Alstom Hydro China (AHC) is responsible for the equipment design, manufacturing, supervision to the installation, commissioning, testing as well as site services.

Bioenergy Bytes

How to Deflate Range Anxiety

Joanna Schroeder March 4, 2015

Millions of people could be suffering from “range anxiety” a condition that keeps consumers from purchasing electric vehicles for fear of becoming stranded with an empty battery. A new study published in Human Factors addresses range anxiety and aims to explain what it is, and determine whether putting a consumer in a battery electric vehicle (BEV) to drive would reduce or eliminate the fear.

In “Understanding the Impact of Electric Vehicle Driving Experience on Range Anxiety,” Rauh and fellow researchers Thomas Franke and Josef Krems asked 24 experienced and inexperienced BEV users to drive a test route through country roads, in villages, and on the German Autobahn. To increase range stress, participants were told that because of an unexpected technical problem, the BEV was not fully charged.

“Range anxiety is a popular topic in the field of electric vehicles, and is frequently named as a key barrier for widespread adoption of BEVs,” said coauthor Nadine Rauh, a research assistant in the Department of Cognitive and Engineering Psychology at Germany’s Technische Universität Chemnitz. “We strongly believe that a better understanding of the phenomenon of range anxiety can help us to find ways of enhancing user experience in BEV driving, thereby increasing acceptance of this type of alternative vehicle.”

The authors found when the vehicle’s display showed that the remaining range was less than the anticipated trip length, experienced BEV drivers exhibited significantly less anxiety than did those who were unfamiliar with electric cars. The researchers caution that further study is needed to determine what other variables play a role in decreasing range anxiety.

“Drivers who are new to BEVs can experience a lot of stress, but as time goes by they will become more confident in both the BEV’s range and in their own abilities to manage any situations that may arise,” added Franke, a postdoctoral researcher at Technische Universität Chemnitz. “Despite advances in technology that will allow for a longer range, human factors research will remain an important tool for helping to design sustainable and user-friendly electric mobility systems.”

Electric Vehicles, Research

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