[Rhodes22-list] The Hydrogen Economy

Sat Jan 8 06:00:23 EST 2005

Brad,

For ethanol, the efficiency depends upon which crop feedstock and which
process you use.  For corn feedstock, using "smart" water & ag-chem farming
strategies, the dry milling process, molecular sieves for the final water
removal, and waste heat recovery, a current state-of-the-art ethanol process
is about 1.7 to 1 efficient.  That means you get about 1.7 btu of energy out
in the form of fuel ethanol for every btu put into running the farm,
transporting the harvested corn, and operating the ethanol plant.  Add my
process for energy recovery from the byproduct distiller's dry grain (DDG)
and the efficiency number jumps to around 3.2 to 1.  Plus, my process gets
rid of the byproduct DDG in an environmentally acceptable way.  Remember,
the corn-to-ethanol process generates about 1 lb of byproduct DDG for every
lb of ethanol produced.  DDG is currently sold as animal feed; but, it's
high in protein and fat content.  You can only feed about 20%wt DDG in the
diet of a plant eating animal like a cow or a sheep before they start to get
sick from it.  So, as we ramp up ethanol capacity, there aren't enough
critters on the planet to feed the byproduct DDG to.  So, you've got to do
something with the byproduct DDG or we'll be buried in it!  By the way, DDG
doesn't store very well & the smell when it starts to rot is almost
indescribable.

Anyone for a nice Soilent Corn milkshake? :)

Rummy, for you we can leave the 6%wt ethanol in the sludge as it comes from
the fermenter.  Soilent beer!

Long term, it would be better to use cellulosic crops like switchgrass and
fast growing woody plants as an ethanol feedstock because they require less
energy input at the farm in the forms of water, ag-chemicals, and are easier
to harvest than row crops like corn.

Hey, it all depends upon whether you believe the energy crisis is "real"
this time around.  Personally, this time, I think it is "real" because it's
not being driven by the US economy.  This time, the demand for oil is being
driven by 3rd world economies, primarily China and India.  With their GDP
growth rates, we'll have to push real hard using the sorts of strategies I
outlined in my US Energy Czar strategy just to keep US fossil fuel demand in
balance with global supplies.

The whole point about the hydrogen economy is that, with limited resources
and time, we need to be working on strategies that can be made to work right
now.  Global fossil fuel supply and demand is going to be tight for the
foreseeable future.  Hydrogen has only a minor contribution to make to this
scenario and it's a waste of limited resources to be working on it at this
point.

Roger Pihlaja
S/V Dynamic Equilibrium

----- Original Message -----
From: "brad haslett" <flybrad at yahoo.com>
To: "The Rhodes 22 mail list" <rhodes22-list at rhodes22.org>
Sent: Friday, January 07, 2005 7:24 PM
Subject: Re: [Rhodes22-list] The Hydrogen Economy

> Roger,
>
> Correct me where I'm wrong.  Ethanol is about 1.1 to 1
> efficient.  However, it's a great replacemtnt to MBTE.
>  Biodiesel is about 3 to 1 efficient. The University
> of Tennessee in conjunction with the Oak Ridge Lab did
> a study on a Switchgrass/Willows/Poplar permaculture
> biomass program that vastly improved on those formulas
> but it would require a major overhaul of our current
> crop subsidy programs to be eonomically profitable.
> The driver in the current consumption market for
> hydocarbons is China.  We will be in direct conflict
> with China until we wean ourselves from the cheap and
> easy oil from the Middle East.  Well, lets just say
> its easy, the price is going up.
>
> Brad
>
> --- Roger Pihlaja <cen09402 at centurytel.net> wrote:
>
> > Brad,
> >
> > If I were the energy czar of the United States,
> > here's what I would do:
> >
> > I would start building ethanol & biodiesel plants as
> > quickly as possible.
> > As the ethanol production capacity is ramped up, the
> > %wt ethanol blend in
> > gasoline would be gradually increased.  This would
> > be completely transparent
> > to the average consumer.  The final optimum %wt
> > ethanol in motor fuel will
> > be driven by market factors other than the
> > transportation market.  You have
> > to understand that crude oil is a complex mixture of
> > thousands of different
> > compounds.  The minimum amount of crude oil consumed
> > in the United States is
> > probably limited by the market requirements for the
> > heavy components like
> > asphalt and tar plus chemical feedstocks for other
> > petrochemicals like
> > plastics and lubricating oils.  The heavy components
> > in crude oil are used
> > for things like asphalt paving and roofing and would
> > be expensive to replace
> > with other feed stocks like coal tar.  At the
> > moment, we use much more crude
> > oil than we would need to provide these heavy
> > components.  At present, the
> > excess heavy components are either burned as low
> > grade fuels (bunker C) or
> > catalytically cracked to increase the yield of
> > lighter components like
> > gasoline and fuel oil.  In the biomass economy,
> > there would be just enough
> > heavy components.  The excess gasoline and diesel
> > fuel components would be
> > catalytically cracked to produce important chemical
> > raw materials like
> > ethylene, propylene, vinyl, etc.  I haven't done the
> > global mass balance;
> > but, I would estimate the %wt ethanol "sweet spot"
> > will be in the range of
> > 70-90%wt ethanol.  As a spark ignited motor fuel,
> > you don't want 100%wt
> > ethanol anyway.  You would blend in 10-30%wt light
> > gasoline components in
> > order to have good winter running characteristics.
> > Also, in case of a fire,
> > you don't want 100%wt ethanol because the flame is
> > invisible.  Blending in a
> > little gasoline will make the flame burn yellow,
> > smoky, and visible.
> >
> > There is no shortage of corn and other crops.  In
> > 2002, US farmers grew
> > about 9E9 bushels of corn of which about 900E6
> > bushels were used to make
> > ethanol.(1)  US corn production is no where near
> > maxed out.  Ethanol can be
> > made from other crops like sugar cane, sorghum, and
> > wheat, which are also
> > available in large surplus and no where near maxed
> > out on production
> > capacity in the US.  As energy czar, I would phase
> > out crop subsidies as
> > ethanol production is ramped up.
> >
> > As energy czar I would pump money into R&D on
> > producing ethanol and
> > biodiesel from fast growing cellulosic crops like
> > switchgrass plus crop
> > residues like wood trimmings and slashing from
> > logging operations, bagasse,
> > crop fodder, etc.  I would slash spending on
> > scale-up for fuel cells while
> > maintaining basic research funding.  This basic
> > research would concentrate
> > on solving the difficult technical issues with the
> > hydrogen economy that
> > I've discussed in previous posts on this thread.  I
> > would maintain R&D
> > spending for wind, solar, geothermal, and would push
> > for commercial
> > implementation of these technologies where it was
> > appropriate.  I would push
> > for the construction of a new generation of nuclear
> > power plants.  I would
> > push for a massive upgrade in the nation's electric
> > distribution grid.
> >
> > The advantages to this strategy would be:
> >
> > The same pipelines, tanker trucks, and existing
> > filling stations will be
> > used.
> >
> > Modifications to existing crude oil refineries will
> > be minimal and readily
> > doable.
> >
> > Ethanol has similar vapor pressure and flammability
> > characteristics as
> > gasoline.  So the safety issues are essentially the
> > same as now with
> > gasoline and become a nonissue.
> >
> > Many modern computer controlled engines can already
> > operate just fine on any
> > blend of ethanol/gasoline from 0%wt ethanol up to
> > nearly 100%wt ethanol.
> > Required modifications to older engines are minimal,
> > consisting of things
> > like upgrading certain components like rubber hoses
> > and gaskets in the fuel
> > system and adjusting the spark ignition timing.
> >
> > The net result of all this is that the switch will
> > be transparent to the
> > average consumer when they visit the filling
> > station.  Motor fuel prices
> > would gradually rise; but, would be much less
> > subject to the wide price
> > swings they now exhibit.  As %wt ethanol is
> > increased, the consumer would
> > notice a slight decrease in fuel mileage due to the
> > lower energy content/lb
> > of ethanol vs. gasoline.
> >
> > All this new crop production and new construction
> > would have a tremendous
> > positive effect on the economy, much more than
> > offsetting any negative
> > effects caused by shutting down unnecessary
> > refineries.  It would be the old
> > inefficient big polluting refineries that would get
> > shut down anyway.
> >
> > If the United States were to embark on this strategy
> > today, I bet we could
> > meet or exceed the Kyoto greenhouse gas emission
> > targets while cutting our
> > imports of crude oil in half without harming our
> > domestic economy within 5
> > years.
> >
> > Reference:
> >
> > (1) "Debunking The Myths of Ethanol", National Corn
> > Growers Association,
> > Chesterfield, MO, 2003,  www.ncga.com
> >
> > Roger Pihlaja
> > S/V Dynamic Equilibrium
> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: "brad haslett" <flybrad at yahoo.com>
> > To: <rhodes22-list at rhodes22.org>
> > Sent: Thursday, January 06, 2005 9:14 PM
> > Subject: [Rhodes22-list] The Hydrogen Economy
> >
> >
> > > Roger,
> > >
> > > Things have been a bit hectic in the supply chain
> > > logistics business (we used to call it a cargo
> > > airline) lately and there hasn't been much time to
> > > participate in any threads.  However, I have
> > followed
> > > your energy and job search thread and will quickly
> > > throw in two cents worth.  I couldn't agree more
> > that
> > > the hydrogen economy is over-hyped.  At the
> > current
> > > level of technology, the production of hydrogen
> > relies
> > > on hydrocarbons and electricity produced from
> > > hydrocarbons - where's the gain?  The biomass
> > energy
> > > field looks very promising, especially oil-seed
> > > produced biodiesel, but even if we turned all our
> > > agricultural land into fuel production and bought
> > our
> > > food from overseas we couldn't replace our current
> > oil
> > > consumption.  Wind is now economically
> > competitive, in
> > > fact, the largest wind producing utility is
> > Florida
> > > Power and Light using wind farms in North Dakota.
> > > However, wind is now facing the NIMBY's in
> > California
> > > and the East Coast and future growth is
> > threatened.
> > > I've been studying "Hubbert's Peak" for a few
> > years
> > > now and am convinced that the hydrocarbon economy
> > as
> > > we know it is coming to an end. The financial
> >
> === message truncated ===
>
>
>
>
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