HOW to MAKE BIODIESEL at HOME - The Ultimate Sourcebook

Reviewed by >Stafford "Doc" Williamson
Stafford "Doc" Williamson is the world's foremost commentator on matters related to biofuels (click the link of his name [above] to see mulilple years worth of this weekly columns). August 29, 2008

BIODIESEL? YOU WANT TO KNOW ABOUT BIODIESEL? Do you really want to UNDERSTAND the process of making biodiesel from ALGAE? Yes, people are doing it on a small scale, and companies around the world are rushing to get a commercially viable version up and running. Then I've got a source for you.

BUT DON'T RUSH OFF to BUY a KIT just yet. A GOOD kit, even a small one will run you about $1000, a semi-auotmated setup [do you really want to turn into a cauldron stirring "witch" brewing all night to save a few bucks?] will likely set you back $3,000 to $4,000 just for the included parts, and that usually doesn't include any big storage tanks, or the cost of a certified electrician to set up the power, city permits, and more. DO NOT RUSH INTO THIS WITHOUT ALL THE KNOWLEDGE you'll need! GET THE EBOOK. READ the EBOOK, then decide if you are willing to risk the serious amount of investment of both time and money to do this right and safely.

Making Algae Biodiesel at Home is a comprehensive guide to biodiesel making for the benefit of the planet, the benefit of your wallet, the betterment of your diesel engine, and for hobbyists, penny-pinched people, and farmers and ranchers, or even small construction companies.

If you think that "comprehensive" is an overblown, over-used adjective, I grant that there MAY be some detail you want to know that isn't available in this e-book.

However if you read it all of it (author David Seig revises the "book" every month, one of the advantages of being an e-book in the first place) (not that you can't print it out for yourself, if you need to do so) you will find almost any answer you need. I was able to discover, for instance, that a fairly typical cell of Nannochloropsis is 2.5 microns in diameter.
Now, admittedly I had to take the "scale" on the micrograph, and actually measure the cell shown to find that it was 5 times the 0.5 micron legend strip, but the information was there for the taking. The version I read (from late July of 2008) included some 667 pages, which also included a "review" of the Aquatic Species Program of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (the complete text), and a very informative Honors Undergraduate Thesis from an Ohio State student, copies of portions of several patents and much, much more. This "book" (ebook) is actually a collection of several smaller books by the same author, including Book 5, Harvesting and Oil Extraction , which, although it is only a little over 30 pages in length, details how to make a home-made algae oil press using a common hydraulic jack and (mostly) 2"x4" boards and bolts. Just as a "clue" to the author's attention to detail, the 2x4's looked like no 2x4's I have ever used, and I discovered, on closer examination of the many photos, that, in fact, the wood had been very nicely chamfered and rounded to soften the edges for a more attractive end product.

Algae is also in the news these days because it is filling the harbor in China (Qingdao) where they plan to hold the Olympic sailing events. While there has been a lot of negative talk about never being able to grow enough "crops" to convert to biofuels, I think when you see the pictures of 10,000 people and too-many-to-count trucks and skiploaders trying to clear this away a reported 100,000 tons of algae from this one harbor, that the "growth potential" for algae is pretty much unlimited.



6,970,000,000 that's number of gallons of biofuel that some scientists estimate can be produced by cultivating energy crops on degraded or abandoned farm and pastureland. Elliot Campbell, Robert Genova and Christopher Field of the Carnegie Institution's Department of Global Ecology, in partnership with David Lobell of Stanford University, say that by using abandoned crop and pastureland one could expect to produce some 2.1 billion tons of energy crops, amounting to 41 exajoules (one exajoules equals 1,000,000,000 billion joules) (yes, 1,000,000,000 billion joules, which they estimate to approximately equal 170 million barrels of oil), but they claim that this would only amount to about 8% of worldwide energy needs. This assumes the use of 4.7 million square kilometres of land, half the total of all 50 U.S. states. The same scientists estimate that renewable energy sources will NEVER be able to supply more than about 10% of the energy needs in highly industrialized countries like the United States, France, Britain, and Germany. I was going to express incredulity that Carnegie and Stanford are destroying all sense of creativity and imagination as they turn out scientists, but I will be charitable and say that presumably these gentlemen have not seen Qingdao Harbor recently.

Love and warm wishes,

Stafford "Doc" Williamson

http://waterislife.psyrk.us/