Posted on 04/13/2004 10:24:01 AM PDT by m1-lightning
URBANA, Ill. - A University of Illinois research team is working on turning pig manure into a form of crude oil that could be refined to heat homes or generate electricity.
Years of research and fine-tuning are ahead before the idea could be commercially viable, but results so far indicate there might be big benefits for farmers and consumers, lead researcher Yanhui Zhang said.
"This is making more sense in terms of alternative energy or renewable energy and strategically for reducing our dependency on foreign oil," said Zhang, an associate professor of agricultural and biological engineering. "Definitely, there is potential in the long term."
The thermochemical conversion process uses intense heat and pressure to break down the molecular structure of manure into oil. It's much like the natural process that turns organic matter into oil over centuries, but in the laboratory the process can take as little as a half-hour.
A similar process is being used at a plant in Carthage, Mo., where tons of turkey entrails, feathers, fat and grease from a nearby Butterball turkey plant are converted into a light crude oil, said Julie DeYoung, a spokeswoman for Omaha, Neb.-based Conagra Foods, which operates the plant in a joint venture with Changing World Technologies of Long Island, N.Y.
Converting manure is sure to catch the attention of swine producers. Safe containment of livestock waste is costly for farmers, especially at large confinement operations where thousands of tons of manure are produced each year. Also, odors produced by swine farms have made them a nuisance to neighbors.
"If this ultimately becomes one of the silver bullets to help the industry, I'm absolutely in favor of it," said Jim Kaitschuk, executive director of the Illinois Pork Producers Association.
Zhang and his research team have found that converting manure into crude oil is possible in small batches, but much more research is needed to develop a continuously operating reaction chamber that could handle large amounts of manure. That is key to making the process practicable and economically viable.
Zhang predicted that one day a reactor the size of a home furnace could process the manure generated by 2,000 hogs at a cost of about $10 per barrel.
Big oil refineries are unlikely to purchase crude oil made from converted manure, Zhang said, because they aren't set up to refine it. But the oil could be used to fuel smaller electric or heating plants, or to make plastics, ink or asphalt, he said.
"Crude oil is our first raw material," he said. "If we can make it value-added, suddenly the whole economic picture becomes brighter."
Zhang's site: Zhang's site: http://www.age.uiuc.edu/faculty/yhz/index.htm
The Arab world has bribed, bullied, and killed their own best customers for far too long. Western intelligence,hard work and good old fashioned capitalism is going to put these douche bags out of business. They don't understand, the game will be played ONLY as long as WE are willing to play it. When, in the capitalist system, a thing becomes too expensive and inconveniently we simply invent another way to achieve the same purpose. It saves money for business, it makes money for other businesses, and the people enjoy a better standard of living. Well, ole Mohammed just ask the buggy whip makers and the lamp oil companies about that little fact. In a few years you might want to sell high colonics with your sweet crude, cause that's all it'll be good for.
My guess is that they got about 20 good years left....tops.
As are flights of total fantasy! Cold fusion, Bill Lears steam engine driven De Lorean, etc., etc., etc., yada, yada, yadaaaaaaaaaaaa... We've had to listen to Governor Moonbeam's verbal diahreah about reducing, reusing and recycling the "waste stream" for so long that we've learned these hogwash fairy tales are just more anti-capitalistic liberal rhetoric and have absolutely NOTHING to do with science, other than the theory stage!!!
"...it's enough that this will be profitable one day..."
It's either being run commercially, thus making a profit, or it is just an experimental pilot plant that's losing money! Since not even CWT-Carthage claims they are making a profit, why not just admit upfront that it is not yet a commercial process?
"[Look at] all the oil being produced consistantly...we may see a dramatic decline in imported oil with 10 years or so."
When it comes to feces, I'm afraid I'll have to yield to your self-proclaimed expertise in the field. However I would hazard a guess that even if we were somehow able to process 100% of America's human and animal feces, the resulting product would not put even come close to putting a 1% dent in our oil imports. "Dramatic decline", indeed!
LOL, talk about flat out over-selling a technology! And you wonder why we don't trust the "Trust me" whiz kids that come up with these hair-brained schemes!
It's not that we don't see the benefits of this technology, when applied to the waste treatment industry, it's just that we hate to be lied to so outrageously about it being some sort of miracle energy production technology (OMG, it's 85% efficient!) and that it will also free us from Middle East oil dependence.
--Boot Hill
Like the theoretical factory in Carthage that takes theoretical turkey waste and turns it into theoretical oil.
There is no convincing you if you won't allow the evidence to be presented. You are as bad as those who are convinced Bush had those planes crash into the WTC so he could steal Iraq's oil. No logic, no objectivism, no chance for converstation. You know it because you know it and facts and science be damned!
For you to make that statement, it presupposes that you have some idea of the total daily production of feces in America. Would you like to share that information with the rest of us? Along with a link, reference, source, etc.?
Unless I miss my guess, even if we were to convert 100% of America's total daily production of feces to energy products, it would only amount to "mouse nuts" when compared to the vast oceans of oil we import every day. So how is that going to free us from dependence on foreign oil?
Some numbers, sources and links, please.
--Boot Hill
Then you'll need about 1,000 more plants. Good luck with the Not In My Back Yard (NIMBY) crowd. They're mighty and they're MILITANT!!!
This whole thread is nuthin but sucker bait!!! Sorry you don't like that. Maybe someday you'll get over it. I certainly hope so for the sake of your sanity. You've been way... WAY oversold on this stinkin idea!!!
LOL !
Wow, am I impressed! Why that's a whopping 0.005% of our yearly imports! Heck, with only 200 more plants (and next-door turkey processors) just like this one, we'll import 1% less oil! By gum, that'll teach those nasty a-rabs and put a big dent in their income! (Of course we only import a 1/4 of our oil from the Persian Gulf!)
The only reason I can figure that you'd want to mis-represent this Rube Goldberg contraption as any kind of energy solution or a solution to foreign oil imports, is that you (they) intend to seek government subsidies to support this boondoggle. It is not an energy solution. It will not lower our dependence on foreign oil in any significant way.
The only advantage to this technology (and it is a substantial one) is its ability to efficiently treat waste products.
--Boot Hill
So, it's your understanding of economics and the market place that, if Butterball had to pay (say) $100 per ton to dispose of their waste prior to the CWT-Carthage plant, that the CWT plant would charge Butterball $0 per ton to dispose of it now?
--Boot Hill
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