Engineering Case Studies
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Biodiesel Moves from Backyard to Mainstream
| posted 09-28-2009 |
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 Long gone are the days when biodiesel was something your granola-eating neighbor brewed in his backyard using recycled cooking oil. Rather, biodiesel is fast-becoming a mainstream alternative to traditional petroleum-based motor fuel—and a prime business opportunity for entrepreneurs with an eye on renewable fuels. According to Emerging Markets Online, a global energy and utilities market research firm, in the year 2007, there were only 20 oil-producing nations supplying the needs of the rest of the world. By the year 2010, most countries will be biodiesel producers. In the U.S., biodiesel is powering more and more cars and trucks. For example, the city of Mesa, Arizona, switched its entire fleet of more than 1,000 diesel-powered vehicles—from high-performance fire trucks to lowly street sweepers—to biodiesel last summer. Fueling demand The appeal of biodiesel is easy to understand. Both biodegradable and non-toxic, biodiesel is a clean-burning alternative fuel derived from natural oils from plants like soybeans as well as other renewable botanical resources. Because it contains no petroleum, biodiesel is better for the environment and has lower emissions compared to petroleum diesel. In fact, according to the Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), a 100 percent soybean-based biodiesel can reduce global warming carbon dioxide pollution by more than half relative to conventional petroleum-based diesel. The emissions benefits are even higher for biodiesel produced from canola oil. In the future, non-conventional sources like algae may have the potential to provide nearly 90 percent reductions in global warming carbon dioxide pollution. Josh Tickell has long recognized the benefits of biodiesel. Tickell is an environmentalist whose film FUEL won the 2008 Sundance Film Festival Audience Award for Best Documentary. He is also the author of From the Fryer to the Fuel Tank—The Complete Guide to Using Vegetable Oil as an Alternative Fuel. “Biodiesel is energy positive, so no matter what you do, it contains more energy than it takes to make it,” he says. “It’s an efficient converter of solar energy into hydrocarbons so the promise is … that biodiesel will become the basis for a new generation of biofuels that can run in both gasoline and diesel engines.” Better yet, the U.S. Department of Energy reports that some biofuels are less expensive per gallon than gasoline—slashing the average cost of gas by 20 to 35 cents per gallon. That’s good news to penny-pinching car owners: An average American family can save up to $300 per year by using pure ethanol. Business is booming Such eco-friendly and cost-conscious perks are opening the doors for entrepreneurs with an interest in alternative fuels. “The opportunity for entrepreneurs is a trillion-dollar-a-year industry in the U.S. alone,” says Tickell. “We’re talking about a world-wide multi-trillion-dollar-a-year industry, representing the largest single conversion of cash into jobs and infrastructure that we will see within a hundred years.” Bob Schildgen agrees. The environmentalist behind Sierra magazine’s “Hey Mr. Green” environmental advice column, Schildgen says, “Everyone is looking for an alternative to fossil fuel. Anytime you have a new technology, you’re going to have people thinking about making money off of it.” The promises—and pitfalls But winning the race to bring biodiesel to the masses is tougher than many think. Because while “anything from hemp oil to soy beans to coconuts to rendering fats in meat processing” can be refined into biodiesel, finding just the right formula can be a difficult undertaking, according to Tickell. “Biodiesel has been dismaying because it has large quality issues,” says Tickell. “There are so many different ways of making it, it has so many different producers, you never know what you’re going to get out of that pump.” Another obstacle facing entrepreneurs is sourcing materials. After all, some critics argue that growing enough crops to meet the demand for soybean-based biodiesel may require diverting large amounts of soy crops from food use to biodiesel production and converting millions of acres of forests to agricultural land. “If we took all the soybean acreage now and made it into biodiesel, we’d still get far less than we’d need—a fraction of the 160 billion gallons of fuel we consume,” says Schildgen. “Plus, the price of soybean oil is $3 or $4 a gallon, so it’s not economically feasible at this point.” Even the much-ballyhooed approach of converting algae oil into biodiesel fuel has been hampered by high processing and water disposal costs. Says Schildgen, “Many times when a technology or a new idea is launched, investors put a lot of money into it, but it doesn’t necessarily pan out or fulfill its big promises.” Even Tickell, who is driving the first algae-powered car across the U.S. for a nationwide tour promoting his film FUEL, admits that biodiesel fuel from algae “is still cutting-edge technology. It’s not as if you’re going to go up to the pump in two weeks and pump it. But it will be available for both gasoline and diesel cars within a 5–10 year period of time.” Researchers have been hard at work making algae-based biodiesel easier on the pocketbook. Chemists at United Environment and Energy in New York have developed what they termed the first economical, eco-friendly process to convert algae oil into biodiesel fuel. Researchers say their process is at least 40 percent less expensive than that of others now being used. The playing field Innovations aside, there’s still stiff competition to consider. Earlier this summer, oil giant ExxonMobil announced that it would invest at least $600 million in algae-to-fuel research and development deals with biotech company Synthetic Genomics. Such deep pockets can make it tough for budding entrepreneurs to have any impact on the biodiesel industry. But Tickell says heavily-funded research and development partnerships shouldn’t discourage entrepreneurs from vying for a slice of the renewable-energy pie. “As good as a large company’s research and development is, it has always been the entrepreneurs who have put forth all of the little solutions that lead to the big solutions,” he says. “There were other car manufacturers at the time that Henry Ford put the Model T on the road. He wasn’t educated; he had no engineering background; he wasn’t backed by the steel industry at that time. He was a man with a vision to put a car on the road.” However, Schildgen says it’s important for entrepreneurs to continue looking outside the box for biodiesel opportunities. “If I were an entrepreneur, I’d put my eggs in the energy audit and conservation basket because I think that’s where you can make money the quickest,” he advises. “The real, most immediate, cheapest and lucrative solution is in conservation and efficiency. Not that we shouldn’t be looking at alternatives, too, but for the immediate future, we need to be tightening up our efficiencies to the point where we don’t need to be so concerned about developing [fuel] sources.” In the meantime, the race continues to bring yesterday’s backyard biodiesel to the mainstream masses. “This is a wide open playing field,” says Tickell. “There will be leaders and there will be losers.” Let the games begin. ______________________________ The chemistry of biodiesel Fueling change: A biodiesel documentary ______________________________  COMMENTSBiodiesel is a buzzword-du-jour but can it really become a mainstream alternative to conventional petroleum-based motor fuel? Leave your response in the comments below. |
