Turkey guts to Oil. Why the hell aren't we doing this?

[TheFarseer]

If you will notice this article was written almost 2 years ago and I hear almost nothing about this. Does anyone have any new information about this? Oil produced in Missouri for 10 dollars a barrel providing jobs to Americans AND disposing of waste at the same time sounds good to me!

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/11/1125_031125_turkeyoil.html

Appel received U.S. $5 million from the EPA to build the $20-million dollar Carthage facility it jointly owns with ConAgra, one of North America's largest packaged food companies. At full capacity, the plant is designed to turn 200 tons of turkey guts into 500 barrels of oil a day. If it performs as expected, proposed plants in Nevada, Colorado, Alabama, and Italy will also get off the ground—and make the oil more competitively priced. Appel estimates he would need around a few dozen plants in operation to put the cost of producing the oil at around $10 a barrel. The price could drop further as more plants are built, he says.

[Jamison]

1. The big reason why...

b/c the big oil companies won't allow it.

They can't have anyone with a new technology coming in and reducing their multi-billion dollar profits ya know.:mad:

[silverweb]

2. I've been asking the same thing.

For over a year now. Naysayers like to whine about how the process "uses more energy than it produces" (it doesn't), or it's impractical for some other unknown reason, or it really doesn't work as well as proponents say, or it's still just experimental, or some other such bullshit.

We should have dozens of those plants scattered around the country by now.

[TheFarseer]

8. Why don't we hook up some wind turbines

to power these plants? or will that not work for some reason? It's not like we HAVE TO burn coal or natural gas to produce electricity.

[evlbstrd]

3. Here's a more recent press release:

http://www.changingworldtech.com/information_center/press_releases.asp?id=19

[TheFarseer]

10. Thanks for the update

looks like it's up to a couple hundred barrels a day unless the bushistas shut it down for its "UnAmerican activities" since the article was published.

[satya]

4. Not only turkey, but raw sewage and trash.And sterilized water is one of

the byproducts.

In answer to your question, apparently it's not profitable enough (yet) for Bu$hCo to take notice (and in fact, they've written tax laws to keep them from being competitive). Once they figure out how to corner the market, they will.

[cascadiance]

5. The "intelligent design" one will probably read this and decide to start

bombing Ankara for control of Turkey to get their guts for alternative fuel sources!

[slor]

6. I am reporting you all to Homeland Security!

it sounds like you people hate freedom. The freedom of the oil cartel to destroy the planet while gouging us of money.

[arenar]

7. Conservation is not on anybodies radar yet....

the problem with this particular system is that you basically need oil (fertilizers for feed stock, power for the operation and manufacturing of machinery) from outside to power it, making the energy-cost ratio a bit higher.

this is basically a form of recycling but in the long run it will not solve our infrastructure problems, although we could benefit from having a few plants like this around.

[Strelnikov_]

12. Good Point. My Impression Of TDP Is That It May Be Promising

as a 'recycling' technology, obtaining process energy from cogeneration (waste heat).

[KittyWampus]

9. thermal depolymerization? hell yeah! IIRC, there's a plant here on LI

new york

[TheFarseer]

13. really? is it cranking out oil? n/t

[Strelnikov_]

11. The Same Few (Old) Articles Regarding TDP Keep Recirculating

This is a single plant, using a single feedstock, being promoted by a private company.

If even half of the promises pan out, it will be significant.

I will, however, be waiting for peer-reviewed scientific studies regarding feasibility and scalability before I declare salvation. If people want to jump on the TDP cargo cult based on company 'glossies' and a few magazine articles, so be it.

In the meantime, I will be pushing proven technologies, such as wind, distributed PV, bio-D, ethanol, CONSERVATION, etc. etc.

[NickB79]

14. It isn't a net oil producer, just a 'recycler' of oil-based products

It runs off of feedstocks that require large amounts of oil to produce in the first place, such as turkey offal. Farmers use up large amounts of diesel fuel and petroluem-based fertilizers and pesticides growing the grain to feed the turkeys before they can be slaughtered. Using these would recapture some of the oil used to grow the turkeys (hence the recycling comment), but couldn't actually create more oil than was put into the system. I think they're a good idea, but it isn't a complete solution to our oil problem.

[TheFarseer]

15. some people can make anything require oil

It takes oil to grow turkeys?!?! How on earth did they raise livestock in the 1600's without oil? I see your point, but's it's silly to look at it that way. Turkey guts, old tires and sewage do us no good right now. They might just as well go to this and maybe you would be surprised at how efficient it is after a few years of tweaking the machine and maybe we can even find something that you people will agree takes no oil to produce.