Navy powers ship on 50/50 biodiesel

[dnix71]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/oct/27/us-navy-biofuel-gunboat  I have a canal out back that full of algae. I wonder if this works on a small scale.

[willib]

Good article ,
Its about time .
They say , or i've heard that algae emit oil as a part of their life process.

[Bruce S]

That is a good article. The show Dean of invention had one on that was were they were taking to off-water from a methane power from a farm in Vermont, and using the high-bio as feedstock for growing algae, the difference I heard/saw was that  they use an electric shock to bust up the algae into oil, but said that it was totally ready for another year. Better than the 5 years we always here.

Could be done in small scale I think, but haven't yet found enough info to determine complete setup.

Thanks for the link 
Bruce S
 

[Madscientist267]

Been wondering if this is truly plausible since a documentary (unsure of title) that showed a guy with nothing but tubes full of flowing water growing algae inside. He claimed to have been able to make a fair amount of biodiesel from nothing but his works. Haven't heard anything about the 'electroshock treatment', but if it works, it works. It's amazing what can be accomplished using energy directly obtained from the sun.

I'd love to see more about this... the McGreasel was one of those oddball steps that someone just took a chance with, and this appears the same. Let's hope it really does go somewhere useful.

Unlike making ethanol from corn, it appears to have a much higher efficiency in terms of production. After all, what good is a fuel that you spend most of your yield harvesting?

Progress is progress. Can't wait to see how this turns out. Glad to see such a large scale, prominent figure doing such testing! (And apparently, it took place less than 100 miles from where I live!) 

Steve

[ghurd]

the McGreasel was one of those oddball steps that someone just took a chance with

McGreasel is a backwards move to the original design conception.
McDiesel ran his on McGreasel over a century ago.
"The use of vegetable oils for engine fuels may seem insignificant today. But such oils may become in course of time as important as petroleum and the coal tar products of the present time." - Rudolf Diesel

More than a century later... we reinvent the wheel.
G-

[Bruce S]

the McGreasel was one of those oddball steps that someone just took a chance with

McGreasel is a backwards move to the original design conception.
McDiesel ran his on McGreasel over a century ago.
"The use of vegetable oils for engine fuels may seem insignificant today. But such oils may become in course of time as important as petroleum and the coal tar products of the present time." - Rudolf Diesel

More than a century later... we reinvent the wheel.
G-

Go figure
Someone besides me (namely in gubberment) should be reading up on George Washington Carver and ALL the stuff he did with peanut and its oils.

Just think all the time those cute little algae we went yuck-o over was trying to tell us something 
What's old is new again , darn those old folks they were smart aren't they
Cheers
Bruce S

[ghurd]

I think Diesel beat Carver by quite a while.

"It was on February 27th, 1892 that Diesel filed a patent ....
It was in the year 1893 that he was successful in putting out the first model that was able to run with its own power and with an efficiency of approximately 26%. This was more than double the efficiency of the steam engines of that time...
It was in February of 1897 that he accomplished a great achievement and produced a diesel engine that ran at 75% efficiency. This was the first one of its kind that was deemed suitable for practical use and was demonstrated at the Exhibition fair in France in the year 1898. This engine in particular was run on peanut oil and in Diesel's vision was great for the small business owners as well as farmers as it used an economical fuel source that was a biomass fuel. It was his use of a biomass fuel that continued until the 1920's and is starting again today."

Sounds like Diesel wanted a better motor, and Carver wanted something better for the southern farmers to do.
Maybe they just happened to meet at the intersection of peanut and peanut?

A quick look for dates etc shows many discrepancies in whats on the internet.  Go figure. 
G-

PS-  Another history repeats itself: "By 1920, U.S. peanut farmers were being undercut with imported peanuts from the Republic of China."

[Bruce S]

I think Diesel beat Carver by quite a while.

"It was on February 27th, 1892 that Diesel filed a patent ....
It was in the year 1893 that he was successful in putting out the first model that was able to run with its own power and with an efficiency of approximately 26%. This was more than double the efficiency of the steam engines of that time...
It was in February of 1897 that he accomplished a great achievement and produced a diesel engine that ran at 75% efficiency. This was the first one of its kind that was deemed suitable for practical use and was demonstrated at the Exhibition fair in France in the year 1898. This engine in particular was run on peanut oil and in Diesel's vision was great for the small business owners as well as farmers as it used an economical fuel source that was a biomass fuel. It was his use of a biomass fuel that continued until the 1920's and is starting again today."

Sounds like Diesel wanted a better motor, and Carver wanted something better for the southern farmers to do.
Maybe they just happened to meet at the intersection of peanut and peanut?

A quick look for dates etc shows many discrepancies in whats on the internet.  Go figure. 
G-

PS-  Another history repeats itself: "By 1920, U.S. peanut farmers were being undercut with imported peanuts from the Republic of China."

OH so true. My problem is that once I jump onto those history stuff, I kinda let work flow around me  and get caught up in all the cool stuff they already knew back then.

Thanks for the update..
OP>>> Sorry for the topic drift 

Cheers
Bruce S

[Madscientist267]

Guess my point was that in terms of finding 'new' uses for this kind of thing. Meaning, the McGreasel was one of those opportunistic type moves. He saw the potential for 55 gallon drums full of waste oil going 'nowhere' and tried it as one of those $#!+$ and giggles kinda things. In the process, found himself rarely needing to visit the pumps anymore (that whole pesky cold starting thing...)

The idea for using algae to produce oil isn't exactly new either, but the idea that such a prominent figure is taking it on will help promote this kind of thing. The McGreasel wasn't all that well known at first, and neither was oil from algae. The McGreasel had it's day in the limelight, and definitely helped raise awareness that a diesel will run on almost anything but oil pan sludge.

Algae oil biodiesel is now in it's limelight, because there are a lot of eyes on what the gubment does, and particularly when they make something public.

Not new by any means for any of it, but new in terms of re-integration with recent incantations of ancient technologies.

Steve