I just read an interesting story from Reuters courtesy of a reader:
UK technology could turn U.S. ethanol industry green
DUNSFOLD PARK, England (Reuters) – A compost bacteria bred by a British company could be set to transform both the profitability and environmental credentials of the U.S. ethanol industry.
“The application of our technology results in the greening of corn ethanol,” Hamish Curran, chief executive officer of TMO Renewables Ltd said in an interview on Tuesday.
OK, I am listening. Just to reiterate, I don’t think the political support in the U.S. for corn ethanol is ever going to go away, so I would certainly like to see it “green up.” Despite sometimes being viewed as simply “anti-ethanol”, this has been my position for years. (See here or here). So I am certainly interested in technologies that can improve ethanol’s energy balance.
Incidentally, as I frequently do when I hear about a “new” technology, I dug back in my G-mail to see if I had any references to it. I have over 10,000 G-mails archived, so sometimes it is hard to recall if I have e-mails regarding a specific technology. In fact, I have exchanged about a dozen e-mails about TMO Renewables over the past 2 years. I even had some questions answered by their Technical Director over costs and ethanol tolerance of the microbes.
Continuing:
Curran said the TMO technology uses a by-product of the U.S. corn ethanol industry, distillers’ grains (DDGS), converting it into additional ethanol and boosting production levels by about 15 percent.
He said U.S. corn ethanol plants also currently use large amount of energy drying the DDGS before selling it as fodder for livestock.
The TMO process uses the material while still wet, allowing substantial energy savings as well as additional output, raising profit margins by 50 to 60 percent, he said.
Therein lies a potential accounting problem that could result in a conclusion of no greenhouse gas savings. The current energy balances for corn ethanol (the “official” balances calculated by the GREET model, which the U.S. government relies on) already use the DDGS to help improve ethanol’s energy balance. If they consume the DDGS in the process, they may run into a problem based on the way we have historically calculated the energy balances.
Consider this example (for illustrative purposes only, but not far off from the 2004 USDA report on ethanol’s energy balance). Let’s say I put 100 BTUs of fossil fuel into my ethanol production process. In the process, I make 110 BTUs of ethanol and some quantity of DDGS. The way the USDA has accounted for the energy balance is that they assign some quantity of the energy inputs to the DDGS. For instance, let’s say I allocate 45 BTUs of the energy inputs to the DDGS. That leaves 55 BTUs for the ethanol, and voila, my energy balance for ethanol is 2/1 (110 BTUs out/55 BTUs in).
So we now lose the ability to allocate energy inputs to the DDGS because we are now using DDGS to produce ethanol. While the “true” energy return might indeed be better, the previous accounting method may not reflect that because we can no longer split those energy inputs.
Now the energy return might look something like this. If we can produce an additional 15% ethanol in our previous example, we now might have something like 130 BTUs of ethanol out and 100 BTUs of fossil fuel in (in fact there would be additional BTUs needed to distill the new ethanol production, but savings from not having to dry the DDGS). All of the energy inputs get allocated to ethanol now, and even if we presume a generous 25% savings on energy inputs due to not having to dry the DDGS, the prior accounting method that USDA has used may show a drop in the energy return (unless they again change the accounting method). This could result in little or no calculated greenhouse gas savings (since earlier savings were based on the earlier accounting method), and thus no “greening” credit.
This is not to say that this new bacteria may not be well worthwhile. But some people have gotten quite creative with ethanol accounting by using DDGS, and we have long heard how wonderful DDGS is and how it helps out with the ethanol story. This new bacteria may giveth, but it also taketh away a story that the ethanol lobby has come to rely heavily upon.
This new bacteria may giveth, but it also taketh away a story that the ethanol lobby has come to rely heavily upon.
Big Corn and Big Ethanol wouldn't like that, would they? Just as they wouldn't like any breakthrough in biomass gasification of corn that would make obsolete the 240+ old-technology stills they've built.
Big Ethanol is pretty much locked into the status quo until they can amortize those stills.
Beauty.
Here we go again.
DDGS displaces other feed. If it is being used to feed livestock, other "energy-intensive" feeds aren't being used. It's very simple Mr. Rapier.
The energy input for drying is a canard. The heat is simply recycled into processes that were to use the energy anyway. Steam and distilled hot water are the by-product of the DDGS by-product. Ofcourse that's just "creative accounting."
Even without reading their papers I can tell you the process with create a single-cell feed product. Future dry fractionation mills will avoid most of the (non)issues of DDGS by pre-processing the non-fermentable fractions outside the ethanol plant. Liquid feedstocks will still generate residues which will be upgraded via any additional biodigestion. Much of the feed by-product has limited nutritional value (pentose, fiber, denatured protein) and won't be missed ie this isn't a replay of the feed vs fuel debate.
Here we go again.
We aren’t going anywhere again, because we haven’t been here before. The point is not whether you agree or disagree that the previous method was creative accounting. The point is that use of DDGS to produce ethanol means you can no longer account the way they were doing it because you don’t have DDGS to dump energy inputs into.
The reason they engaged in creative accounting is pretty simple. In the 2001 paper, the USDA came up with an energy return of 1.3. In the follow-up two years later they reported an energy return for the ethanol of 1.67. How? They changed the way they accounted for it, and the reason was quite transparent: To make the energy balance of corn ethanol look better than it was if you merely accounted for all of the inputs and outputs.
DDGS displaces other feed. If it is being used to feed livestock, other "energy-intensive" feeds aren't being used. It's very simple Mr. Rapier.
That was the way they initially calculated the energy allocated to DDGS. But it wasn’t enough energy, so they changed the method. From the report:
In the previous studies, we used a replacement method to allocate total energy to ethanol and byproducts. For this report, we used ASPEN Plus, a process simulation program, to allocate the energy used in the plants to ethanol and byproducts. On the average, 59 and 64 percent of the energy used to convert corn to ethanol is allocated to ethanol in dry- and wet-mills respectively.
RR
"Big Corn and Big Ethanol wouldn't like that, would they? Just as they wouldn't like any breakthrough in biomass gasification of corn that would make obsolete the 240+ old-technology stills they've built.
Big Ethanol is pretty much locked into the status quo until they can amortize those stills."
If you like eating corn protein via beef you shouldn't be so gleeful about the premature disposal of such useful molecules. DDGS is no more a corporate-state conspiracy than sawdust pellets are a conspiracy of the wood door lobby.
Anon, you have been warned previously to check personal attacks at the door. If you wish to debate a point, please do so. Inclusion of personal attacks or profanity will result in deletion of your posts. Counting the previous three, I think that's five of yours that I have had to delete.
If you wish to engage in civil debate, your posts will not be deleted – even if they are 100% in disagreement to mine. But start with the ad homs, and your posts will go "poof."
And by the way, I think it's pretty cowardly to hide behind anonymity and hurl insults.
RR
Don't forget that those USDA reports also failed to account for secondary energy inputs, explaining that the "information in this area is old and outdated." Yes, far better to simply omit the data than to use old data. There is certainly a political agenda there.
Does all of the DDGS get consumed in this TMO process? If there is (or expected to be) an oversupply of DDGS, that might not be a bad thing. Is there some other byproduct (perhaps some form of protein) that can be sold instead (and have some BTUs allocated to it)? What is this "single-cell feed product"? Yeast or the geobacillus thermophile?
Not much information in the article, but from what I read I'm skeptical.
Ethanol sells for about $0.25/lb. DDGs sell for about $0.05/lb. You get a little over 17 lbs of DDGS from a bushel of corn, and about 18 lbs of ethanol. So, you're going to get an extra .15 X 18 X .25 = $0.67 worth of ethanol, but
You're going to give up 17 X $0.05 = $0.85 worth of DDGS. And, you have to spend money to do it.
Also, you have to give up your plans to add a fractionation unit, and extract another $0.30 worth of corn oil.
In addition, there is no "buzz" anywhere about this deal. I don't think so.
Now, you probably will end up with some kind of feed. But, then, you have to "build a market" for it. This takes years, and years. DDGs are still selling for much less than they should (on paper,) and they've been on the market since the 70's.
Black Swans are Devastating if you're a cattle feeder. Adoption of Any "new" feed is going to be very, very slow.
Also, there are so many other options. You can remove the oil from the DDGS After the distilling process, or you can burn the "syrup" and replace about half of your process energy while, at the same time, increasing the value of your DDGS.
I would say, "Someone" will, maybe, get some Guvmint money to try it on one small operation, but it seems unlikely that it would be high on anyone's list for their "own" investment.
Dennis,
"Who is making electricity at efficiencies approaching 90%."
Penstock Hydro ???
Most of the losses and energy inefficiencies occur with the transmission lines.
This is why the Chinese are sending their power from the Three Gorges Dam by way of DC lines (some 900 kilometers) to Shanghai..
John
DDGS displaces other feed.
Anon,
Yes, it displaces other feed — such as grass which is the food ruminants naturally evolved to eat.
DDGS is a solution looking for a problem that doesn't exist. Why don't we just let cattle eat what they evolved best to handle — grass — instead of corn and corn-based DDGS which their digestive systems are not well suited to handle and makes them more susceptible to disease?
Does blogger do IP blocks? Just a thought.
Blogger rufus said…
"Not much information in the article, but from what I read I'm skeptical."
Sounds like you are brainstorming ideas for a risk analysis, which is a good idea for any product. I like your ideas. Let me add to the list.
DDGS for livestock and ethanol are two very different products whose market value will vary somewhat independently. If you no longer sell DDGS, then you are entirely dependent on the market price of ethanol for your profitability. Granted, manufacturers are already heavily affected by ethanol prices, but this would only deepen that dependence.
Question about the TMO web site
I found this interesting quote: "This traditional approach remains uneconomical when used to make ethanol from cellulosic biomass because of the costs and time involved in preparing and pre-treating the feedstock, the energy consumed and the capital costs involved in using exotic metallurgy to build large batch reactors." http://www.tmo-group.com/technology/process.aspx
Exotic metallurgy? Perhaps I do not understand all of the aspects of building bioreactors, but I thought we were talking about steel tanks here. What exotic metallurgy might they mean?
Thanks for any help and understanding.
Mr. Rapier:
While I appreciate that you are using mathematics and good engineering principles to debunk most of the renewable energy claims, don't we need a few more facts before we can proceed here?
1. The USDA study essentially gives a credit of about 20,000 BTU/gallon of ethanol produced for the replacement value of the DDGS.
2. Don't we need a mass balance to determine what percentage of the DDGS is reduced and the increase in ethanol produced?
3. I suspect that the overall energy balance will still be improved if more of the corn is converted to ethanol, because about 1/3 of the total energy required to convert corn to ethanol are due to factors outside of the ethanol plant – energy to grow corn, transport corn, and distribute the ethanol. On a per gallon of ethanol produced basis, the energy to grow the corn and to transport the corn will be reduced if a higher percentage of the corn is converted to ethanol.
4. We wouldn't know the real energy balance until it can be determined what the reduction in DDGS quantity is, but using the USDA figures, if 15% more of the corn is converted, corn production and transportation would decrease from 13,750 BTU/ gallon to 11,700 BTU/gallon; Ethanol conversion would decrease from 49,700 BTU/ gallon to 42,300 BTU/gallon, for a total energy reduction per gallon of ethanol of about 9,500 BTU/Gallon. So if the reduction in DDGS volume is less than half, there would be a positive energy balance impact.
5. BTW: The GREET model doesn't calculate energy balance. It calculates lifecycle emissions, and is the model used by the government to determine the carbon footprint of ethanol. Which while related, is a different set of calculations.
Great site!!! Check it out-Google CEO Schmidt says punching down into the earth to capture natural and clean geothermal energy could help move the United States away from it's dependence on petroleum-Dec.16,2008-Betty http://www.geothermalquestions.net
This is why G-d invented the price signal. You don't have to make complicated and controversial calculations about EROEI or DDGS.
There is a caveat: The price signal does not capture the cost of pollution, or threats to national security.
Thhose realities can lead to messy taxes, subsidies or regulations.
Still, the price signal should be deferred to, whenever possible.
Side note to RR: You have maintained the most intelligent and open-minded energy blog going. The RR blog is an important asset to the energy community.
You bend over to accept everybody, and most of the other posters also tolerate other poeple's viepoints, even while not agreeing.
But sometimes, who knows, maybe teenagers or troubled indivduals are posting for effect. You don;t have to accept every post or gibe from ther peanut gallery.
Just one thing. Remember, when USDA published their study in 2002 most of the ethanol was produced by ADM through the very energy intensive "Wet Mill" process. The upside of their process was that they produced a lot of different co-products.
Anyway, since then, virtually, all ethanol refineries have been of the "Dry-Grind" variety. Accordng to RR's "Argonne Labs" link, the average nat gas usage in these plants is about 27,000 btus IIRC, and if you add in electricity it probably comes out to around 31,000 btue.
This makes a big difference in calculating eroei.
Of course, the important thing is, "Where we're Going," not where we've been.
Google CEO Schmidt says punching down into the earth to capture natural and clean geothermal energy could help move the United States away from it's dependence on petroleum…
Of course it could ~ for our purposes there is an infinite amount of energy inside the earth, just waiting to be tapped into.
The only problem is the technology to go down to where it's at.
If Google would just develop a magneto-hydraulic, fusion-diopter, thorium-carbide marzel-vane controlled, inverse reactive crystal drill that can go down 1,000-1,500 km using panametric modular reactive currents for guidance, we will be ready to go. Of course, they will also need an advanced algorithm to handle sinusoidal depleneration of the asthenosphere.
RR and Cliff ~
Would this be one of those biomass gasifiers? UGA licenses fuel technology to Tolero to make fuel from dead forests and agricultural waste
You bend over to accept everybody, and most of the other posters also tolerate other poeple's viepoints, even while not agreeing.
But sometimes, who knows, maybe teenagers or troubled indivduals are posting for effect. You don;t have to accept every post or gibe from ther peanut gallery.
I appreciate those comments Benny. I have had to clean up half a dozen posts this morning from a poster who clearly has some issues. When you write about issues that bring out strong feelings in people, that is going to happen sometimes. There is a bit of history here. I flagged his IP address a good while back because of some comments he made here. Last week he made more, including veiled threats. I have reason to believe – and not just based on what he has written – that he works for one of the hyped ethanol companies. Sad that he can't just come on here and debate his views like everyone else. Kanye West syndrome, I suppose. "Everyone look at me! I can be disruptive!"
I will use Rufus as an illustrative example here. He and I disagree on many, many things, and I am totally opposed to what I feel is his lack of objectivity. But I don't delete his posts, because he doesn't insult or use profanity. So our anonymous poster would like to have you believe that I censor views, when in fact the only thing I censor are posts that try to drag discussion off into the gutter (or people trying to advertise their businesses).
Some high school classes are reading this blog and the comments as part of the curriculum. (I addressed a class yesterday). I would ask that people keep that in mind as they make their comments. Again, it is absolutely fine (and even encouraged) to disagree, but support for your arguments would be appreciated.
The purpose of this blog is not to give you "The Truth According to RR." I use this blog to present stories of interest, as well as my opinions for debate and discussion. I am well-aware that I can be wrong, but I am also capable of changing my position as the evidence dictates. I have learned an awful lot and made a lot of interesting connections through this blog, and that is only possible because I have some really talented readers and commentors. So please keep up the good work.
Cheers,
RR
Betty says: Check it out – Google CEO Schmidt says…
At that URL I see a couple of videos of Mr. Egg advertising his geothermal installation company, but I don't see Google CEO Schmidt saying anything.
Rufus:
Just to be clear, the USDA energy balance calculation computes the average value of the wet and dry mill processes based on the mix between the number of gallons produced using the wet process vs the number of gallons of ethanol produced using the dry process at the time of the study. One reason (but not the only reason) that the energy balance for ethanol has been improving steadily is because most new plants use the dry grind process which is more energy efficient.
I think we agree on this basic point, I just wanted to point it out to people who haven't gone through the study as you and I obviously have.
Keep up the fine work, RR.
Some people learn from you, including me. I was "pro-ethanol" when I started reading your blog, but your logic was compelling, and I have lost my enthusiasm for the fuel.
My thanks also to other posters, who bring good links here, and who also read my posts, agree or disagree, but maintain good humor.
Let's do our part to preserve this corner of sanity and insight in the blunderbuss energy news world.
I was "pro-ethanol" when I started reading your blog, but your logic was compelling, and I have lost my enthusiasm for the fuel.
I think it is fine to be "pro-ethanol" as far as the fuel goes. We just have to keep in perspective that if it is to be a real contributing solution to depleting fossil fuels, the status quo is a pseudo-solution. I am just trying to sort the truth from the hype.
If we had a way to produce vast quantities of ethanol without creating all sorts of unintended consequences – and without building the platform on top of a fossil fuel base – I would be happy to put ethanol in my vehicle.
Cheers, Robert
I was "pro-ethanol" when I started reading your blog, but your logic was compelling, and I have lost my enthusiasm for the fuel.
Benny,
Nothing wrong with being "pro-ethanol." However, you do have to be careful of those who are "pro-corn ethanol" and their methods.
I'm pro-ethanol,but I would prefer sugar beets or sugar cane to corn. A major objection to ethanol seems to be the use of fossil fuel inputs. Like Optimist,I'd rather see CNG vehicles on the road. But,you can't even buy a Civic GX outside of New York or California,and it has been on the market for years. Auto manufacturers aren't going to make tham unless they're forced to,and that ain't happening.
Another objection is over the energy balance. I could live with a 1:1 balance,as long as most of the inputs are domestic. Still,congress needs to do something about those sugar price props. Sugar has a much better energy balance. And,while we don't have the growing area of Brazil,Louisiana,Hawaii,and Florida could grow an awful lot of sugar cane if the incentive was there.
Black Swans are Devastating if you're a cattle feeder. Adoption of Any "new" feed is going to be very, very slow.
The Brits can certainly vouch for that, with their experience with Mad Cow Disease. I don’t think they will be rushing to introduce anything new into the feed supply for cattle.
RR
Don't we need a mass balance to determine what percentage of the DDGS is reduced and the increase in ethanol produced?
That was the reason for the illustrative examples. Of course we would need a whole new set of energy inputs and the total ethanol output to come up with the right answer. The point was that even though this may be an improvement, having to allocate all energy inputs to ethanol may drop the energy balance lower than that based on the previous accounting method.
I suspect that the overall energy balance will still be improved
Again, that wasn’t the point. The point was to question whether there would actually be any credit given due to what it may do with respect to how they have been accounting for energy inputs.
Ethanol conversion would decrease from 49,700 BTU/ gallon to 42,300 BTU/gallon
That doesn’t follow at all. If you convert more ethanol, you are still going to have to expend the energy to purify it. You are still going to have to expend energy to transport it. Your energy inputs don’t stay constant with you simply getting an additional 15% ethanol.
The GREET model doesn't calculate energy balance. It calculates lifecycle emissions, and is the model used by the government to determine the carbon footprint of ethanol.
No, but the model depends on assumptions regarding the allocation of energy inputs. This is what USDA did. They allocated the energy inputs, and then used GREET to calculate emissions.
RR
Another objection is over the energy balance. I could live with a 1:1 balance,as long as most of the inputs are domestic.
There is another consideration, and that is fuel quality. You wouldn't want a 1:1 energy balance if you were inputting gasoline and getting back ethanol. On the other hand you might even accept an energy return of less than 1 if your input was coal and your output was liquid fuel (setting aside the potential environmental objections).
RR
A major objection to ethanol seems to be the use of fossil fuel inputs.
Correct Maury. No corn ethanol operation has yet shown they can grow corn and turn it into ethanol w/o using fossil fuels to do it.
And that's despite the fact that they've at times made claims they can get a return of as high as 230% of the energy invested.
Just think about that: Any process that produced 2.3 X more energy than it consumed could use some of the output as the feedstock and energy source for making more.
Back in the day, the US Patent Office had a test for all the perpetual motion machines people claimed to have invented. The USPO would simply ask the inventor to connect the output to the input and see if it kept running. Of course none ever did.
The process for growing corn and turning it into ethanol would also flunk that simple USPO test. If corn ethanol did indeed have a positive EROEI, they could "connect the output to the input" and the process would keep running, and they'd still have ethanol to sell.
Would this be one of those biomass gasifiers? UGA licenses fuel technology to Tolero to make fuel from dead forests and agricultural waste
No, they are talking about pyrolysis. However, they suggest that pyrolysis oil can be blended into transportation fuel. That is inaccurate. Pyrolysis oil requires upgrading before you can use it as transportation fuel (although it can be used as is in stationary power generation).
RR
What exotic metallurgy might they mean?
They may be referring to metals in contact with acid used in the hydrolysis step. Some by-products of the fermentation reaction are potentially corrosive as well.
RR
(Wendell Mercantile said…
RR and Cliff ~ Would this be one of those biomass gasifiers?)
No Wendell:
Apples and Oranges here.
I've briefly characterized a low-pressure, high slagging gasifier which could process tar sands and shale oil as well as woodchips, coal or corn stover without air emissions.
The end product of gasification (not pyrolysis) is CO & H2 synthesis gas which then needs to be catalyzed into either
A) a biodegradable alcohol or
B) a float-on-water synthetic oil
or
C) directly combusted to produce super heated steam
D) directly combusted to directly produce clean electricity.
Sorry,'nothing to do with the systems as outlined in the url you posted."
I'm not at liberty today to expose this particular gasification system – yet I spoke with it's designers just yesterday about maybe unveiling it and some other back-end GTL technologies as well which have been purposefully quiet.
Ciff
RR: "If we had a way to produce vast quantities of ethanol without creating all sorts of unintended consequences – and without building the platform on top of a fossil fuel base – I would be happy to put ethanol in my vehicle."
Replace "ethanol" with "gasoline" above and you get my sentiments exactly 🙂
I am surprised at the tone of discussion about DDGS here though. It's not just a mystery acronym. Distillers Grains have been fed to livestock all through the long history of alcohol, and government revenue officers often caught moonshiners by spotting the fattest hogs at the country fair. The Extra D and S in the acronym stand for "Dried" and "Soluables" meaning the end biproduct of industrial scale ethanol takes a lot more energy to ready for shipment than needed on the farm where animals are more than happy to eat moist food.
Nevertheless, the cheap and easily shippable corn DDGS could also displace fossil fertilizer if applied back to the soil as a combined fertilizer and herbicide (corn gluten is a well known organic weed control).
Now, that's not to say there aren't better crops than corn to produce ethanol, even in a temperate climate, but it is absolutely fair and appropriate to consider the value of co-products in a process. How many pounds of chicken, beef, and pork do they raise on what is left over from sugarcane ethanol production in Brazil? Not much, I suspect, but they do have sugar to export, since only the molasses is used for ethanol.
Overall, I think the premise of "vast" quantities is the problem, because it invites vast process innefficiency. The co-products of ethanol production can easily be more valuable than the ethanol itself on the small farm scale… it's just a matter of using integrated systems. See The Thermodynamics of Local Foods on the Oil Drum today for another important perspective.
I've briefly characterized a low-pressure, high slagging gasifier which could process tar sands and shale oil as well as woodchips, coal or corn stover without air emissions.
Thanks again Cliff.
Not to mention, this will stimulate even more corn planting for cattle feed to replace the loss of distiller's grain.
Not to mention, this will stimulate even more corn planting for cattle feed to replace the loss of distiller's grain.
Which will only stimulate more people in the Brazilian states of São Paulo, Minas Gerais, Mato Grosso, Mato Grosso do Sul, Goiás and Paraná to clear more land and use it for crops, which will…