New Ethanol plant expected to achieve Net Energy Balnce of 2.5 to 1

[JohnWxy]

http://www.biontech.com/news/pressreleases/release20060620.asp

excerpt (emphases, my own_JW):

Ethanol facility powered by renewable energy from dairy waste planned for Fair Oaks Dairy Farm in Indiana
June 20, 2006

FAIR OAKS, Ind. -- Bion Environmental Technologies and Fair Oaks Dairy Farms, the largest dairy east of the Mississippi River and an industry leader in efforts to find a solution to dairy environmental issues, today announced a joint venture that will enable environmentally sustainable expansion of animal agriculture in concert with ethanol production.

Early results indicate that implementation of Bion’s patented and proprietary technology improves the net energy balance in the production of ethanol from corn from 1.4 to 1 up to 2.5 to 1. In essence, Bion’s technology platform utilizes the inherent energy value of the cellulosic component of the manure stream to improve both net energy value and margins in the production of ethanol.

The integrated Bion platform incorporating ethanol production at Fair Oaks will be a balanced, closed-loop system that the company’s research indicates will create sufficient renewable energy to support one million gallons of ethanol for every 1,000 dairy cows. “Based on Bion’s ratio forecast between herd concentration and ethanol production, it appears that both heat energy and ethanol co-product can be in balance in an environmentally sustainable manner,” according to John Ewen of Ardour Capital, an advisor to Bion.

Now, if they were to incorporate the ultra-sound process patented by the Iowa State University (which increases alcohol yield by about 30%) this could boost the Net Energy balance to something like 3.25 to 1. This a closed loop system which dramatically reduces or eliminates inputs of fossil fuel to power the ethanol production process - and processes animal waste at the same time. The farmers are PAID for waste they now have to pay someone else to deal with, or devote considerable land area to deal with themselves.

This is what can happen when people set about trying to make a technology work, and work more efficiently (instead of sitting on their butts, thinking up reasons why it might not work). Improvements can be achieved!

Bion’s implementation plan projects a number of dairies located within a geographic area, each with modular waste treatment facilities capable of handling the waste stream of 10,000 dairy cows or more. Renewable energy produced by the Bion technology platform will meet the natural gas requirements of an ethanol plant on a ratio of 1,000 dairy cows to one million gallons of ethanol production. This model will enable Bion to secure burner-tip (retail) values for the renewable energy produced, instead of wellhead (wholesale) values presently being achieved by anaerobic digesters and other renewable energy technologies focused on the animal waste market.
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The patented “microaerobic” process for treating dairy waste biologically converts most of the pollutants so they no longer escape into the air and water, reducing the nutrient content of the treated waste stream in the effluent discharge by 70-80% and air emissions by up to 99%. The closed-loop ethanol production system simultaneously provides an end user for the undried distiller grains and for the dairy’s waste stream.

The new research center at Fair Oaks will also test the closed-loop ethanol-production system with waste from other farm animals, such as hogs and beef cattle.

For more information on Bion’s system performance data, peer review team and test protocols, see http://www.biontech.com/technology/.

[eppur_se_muova]

1. Ethanol from cows? Oh, how that will change dairy farming!

I'm sorry, that's giving me all kinds of weird mental images ...

[Dead_Parrot]

4. lol. Genetic modification gone wild... nt

[bhikkhu]

2. That would be good news.

My main thought is, given the importance of the issue, "proprietary technology" should not remain proprietary - there should be a mandate for industry-wide sharing toward the best standard of production.

[TheFarseer]

3. This is what we need

ethanol has been promoted enough now. Now it's got to show results. If it can show results and improve performance, then everything else should take care of itself now. It might be possible to get it to be as efficient as sugar cane with more study and that's what we've got to do.