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Such a method would eliminate the need for the superhigh temperatures and toxic catalysts used in other thermochemical methods for cellulosic-biofuel production. While O'Connor says that he is still improving Kior's catalyst, his first versions are different kinds of modified clays, which are both cheap and environmentally friendly. The product is high quality as well, containing less acid, oxygen, and water. These characteristics make it suitable for burning as heating oil or for use in petroleum refineries, which can use existing processes and equipment to convert it into the longer hydrocarbon chains of gasoline and diesel fuel.
Bioecon has produced lab-scale quantities of its biocrude, a few grams at a time, from materials such as wood shavings, sugarcane waste, and various grasses. While the input material affects the yield somewhat, O'Connor says that the output is "all very similar, so we do not have a real preference." This means that the process can work around the world, with whatever biomass is locally available, almost year-round.
Kior is already in talks with at least two oil companies to establish partnerships to further develop the technology. It is starting a pilot plant with one company that should produce around 20 kilograms of biocrude a day within six to twelve months, says Kior CEO Rob van der Meij. If all goes well, the process could scale up to production of hundreds of kilos per day by 2009, and refined versions of Kior's biocrude might be blended into gasoline or diesel by 2010. In addition to being renewable, these fuels would have lower sulfur and nitrogen content, which should decrease smog in cities such as Los Angeles and Houston.
Because of its ability to slide into the existing petroleum refining and delivery infrastructure, the technology has a huge cost advantage, says O'Connor. It could also be adopted much more rapidly, according to Khosla. "If you can do a solution that's compatible with the oil companies and their current refineries, it becomes much easier for them to get comfortable with it," he says. "Getting them into the game would be a big addition."
Steve Deutch, a senior research scientist at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, says that the little information Kior has released about its process is plausible enough, but that until the details are available, the company's claims are "not really possible to evaluate." The main challenge for Kior, or anyone working on cellulosic fuels, Deutch says, is to develop a process simple enough to bring close to the sources of biomass--farms. "Collecting biomass and getting enough of it in one place to make a difference is a problem in the biomass world," Deutch says. "Trucking costs can become exorbitant. You want to preprocess it at the farm and then ship a high-density, high-energy intermediate to processing plants."
A solar-driven process could yield far more fuel than conventional biomass production.
Making ethanol from corn is expensive. Better biofuels are years away from the gas tank. Farmers are reluctant to change their practices. But do we really have any alternative to biofuels?
consider other forms of biomass
Wood is fine, although if the Romans are any indication they denuded most of western Europe to feed their hypocausts during the first century AD, sending "wood" ships as far as Britain to scavenge for fuel.
Why not use sewage treatment plants as biomass converters? The infrastructure for delivering the biomass is there, we know how to handle it safely, there's plenty of supply and we get a beneficial product out of it in the end (besides Milorganite). I'm sure the energy content of waste has to be something greater than zero and pipelines could be put in place to carry the fuel to distribution networks.
Re: consider other forms of biomass
Great idea!
- I think there is also potential for bringing into play a cost efficient domestic waste disposal strategy. I know that all my lawn and tree clippings go into the bin, but wouldn't it be great to tap into all that unused energy from my house, and my neighbor's house, etc. etc. Ad nauseum...!
We all know thatthe fastes growing wood is bamboo
and there are literal forests in a couple of continents.Not withstanding our own ability to grow it.It could be a never ending resource.
Thank you all for the valuable suggestions. One of the key features of our technology is that it takes all types of cellulosic material. Current experiments have been done with wood and sugarcane.Future experiments will include other (fast growing) feedstocks. Key is that we use materials that are currently considered 'waste' or hardly utilized and make our technology part of a sustainable fuel/energy production chain.
Rob van der Meij, KiOR Inc.
I like what your company is doing. Our own company is developing renewable energy projects in South East Asia and we see huge potential for these types of technologies there. The main reasons for this is the availability of biomass in the form of agricultural wastes and potentially the energy crop industry. Coupled to the huge need/shortage of energy in this region and willingness to pay a higher price for renewables these kinds of projects have great potential. Just do it - good luck.
Rob,
This is great news, if it pans out well.
Does the biomass need to be dried throughly for this process? Eliminating that step (and the ability to provide relatively decentralized/on-site processing) would be huge.
Congrats in the successes so far.
Consider using wood slash piles left over from logging to solve two problems - create biofuel feed stock and elimination of wood piles that we pay to have burned, or let to rot. Rotting creates problems in elimination of space for tree replanting, and it creates methane, which is 20X more powerful as a global warming gas before oxidizing 7 years later into CO2. As long as it is less than cost of burning, I would pay to have someone remove the slash piles. Alternately, can a wood burning furnance, like a Heatmor, be inexpensively created that releases heat AND creates oil, which can be collected?
Removing and then using wood waste is a value added to logging areas which have to remove or burn slash piles. Intensively logged areas such as where I'm located would benefit from such a process.
There is limited land available for planting trees on . Natural habitats are being replaced with farmland to provide food for a growing world population . That means the largest area available for storing carbon is agricultural . This isn't such a bad thing because farms are good wildlife habitats as well . By building up the level of carbon in agricultural soil , fertility increases , providing more food for people , more food for wildlife and more biofuel . Carbon negative food and fuel would be superb .
A good use for kudzu, a noxious plant that grows so fast you can hear it.
Guest (Rudolf)
What about using (dried) algae or seeweed for converting it to hydrocarbons? This natural product should be easy to grow at sea farms or in the open sea in the south and easy to harvest from the sea and to drie it there at the air - and you could put the factory on a ship and from there you can deliver it all over the world. Isn't it an alternative?
See
http://www.unh.edu/p2/biodiesel/article_alge.html
and
http://www.livefuels.com/
Rather than using greatly needed algae and seaweed from our oceans, utilizing a procedure that will aid in cleaning the oceans and rivers of acumulated waste products and pollutants would greatly aid this planet's survival.
This is potentially useful. However, as we run out of things to eat and burn, it might be useful to focus even more attention on ways to reduce consumption, especially in the context of climate instability, growing populations, and increasing vehicle miles traveled.
At our house, we are gradually working our way towards going 'off the grid', but this makes us realize that the first step is reduction in consumption, since generally once you go off cheap fossil fuel, you really appreciate how much energy is worth and how hard it is to get.
So every article or discussion of some form of alternative energy supply should be accompanied by discussion of new and creative ways to reduce usage.
Generally, it seems like these reductions come from: Community (sharing things), being 'light', being more easily satisfied, moderating wants, better systems, and technology. It can be just as useful to look to the past as to the future for 'innovative' systemic (or even technological) solutions to many problems.
I like this approach. Reducing energy consumption is useful in any of the scenarios from renewables to fossil based energy sources, especially if one keeps in mind that any energy capturing and storage system has some manufacturing and assiciated environmental costs. Energy use reduction also is not necessarily only big changes, but a collection of small changes can also have an impact. Going about giving examples will be a new thread and maybe does not belong here.
About 70% of the cost for biocrude is the production, transportation and handling of feedstock. As time goes on, these costs grow. Then the feedstock would likely be pulverized into a sawdust consistency in order to obtain high permeation by the clayish catalyst. That takes extra energy and money too.
This method sounds like a step forward from the high-energy biocrude processes proposed so far, which cost $100/bbl or more and make a low-quality fuel. Maybe Kior represents a technology that yields high-ER quality fuel for about $85/bbl.
The problem with costly alternatives is that they would be victims of their own success. Look at ethanol: facing a glut and high feedstock prices. If we make significant amounts of synfuels, then they need to be cheap in order to compete with falling oil prices. Otherwise, they remain marginal.
Without knowing specifics about these catalysts, it's quite possible that they will be in limited supply.
oil from woood as a source of fuel
What for????? that is the most --------- idea i have ever heard imagine the processing etc, the only way this would work would be to tie it in with some other industry we already do like paper or something else,( but we are trying to lessen paper usage). Kearns has got the best idea i have heard so far everything is there collection processing may need to be modified to incorporate the new processes etc.
Cost of implementing it would be low, but they wont go for it it would have to be wasteful and destructive and damage our planet beyond repair before you people get it. stop speaking it and start using it. hehehe lol You people looking for oil outa wood man oh man simple. Only for paint maybe, anyways enuff said some people really need to use their heads and not something else, or if we implement this, the other way around, ohhh ehehehe damn im funny.
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norppa
1 Comment
Lack of immagination?
"Trucking costs can become exorbitant. You want to preprocess it at the farm and then ship a high-density, high-energy intermediate to processing plants."
The answer is ofcourse harvesting of seaweed. You have huge refinary ships that process the seaweed collected with smaller boats. You pump the ready fuel to tankers and the waste products can be shipped as fertilizers (?)
Land can be used for more constructive things. E.g. forests
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urian1975
16 Comments
Re: Lack of immagination?
actually more construtive use for the land would be expanding industry especially energy related....forget about trees...the population is growing
Reply
Tysto
34 Comments
Re: Lack of immagination?
Yeah, we can always put all the trees in a tree museum and charge all the people a dollar and a half to see 'em.
Reply