The big bio fuel plant?

[wd9]

Zaphod, but butanol can. CH4 as opposed to CH3.

[ado089]

We really need to be looking at field peas for ethanol. They are roughly 46% starch and 23% protein. The protein is easily stripped out via air fractioning and can be sold a high value protein supplement. The starch has been shown to pruduce simalar amounts of ethanol as corn starch. The real benefit of peas is that it frees us from the grasp of the oil companies. This big ethanol push has resulted in a 10% increase in corn acres which inturn has resulted in a 1 million tone shortage of urea in North America. As as result of this shortage NOLA urea is trading for $275/t and is expected to hit the $300/t mark. Last years high was $267/t to put things into context. So before we get too excited about ethanol we should look at the repercutions of what crops we use for it.

[cowman]

Okay I phoned my county councillor and she told me they have been "heavily involved" in trying to entice this project? Apparently they have been moving heaven and earth to get it done, here!
Her best guess(if it works out for here) Is just south of Bowden Alberta on the spur line or at Niobe(just north of Innisfail) about 8 miles south of Red Deer Alberta? The company has looked at both...and she says we are definitely on the short list!
Bottom line is both of these sites are on a railroad and both have fairly easy access to water! Hopefully this thing will go ahead?

[wd9]

Cowman, what does that Bowden refinery do?

[cowman]

wd9: It was actually mothballed for a couple of years, but is back up and running...I believe they are doing something with reconstructing used drilling mud?
That refinery wasn't really a refinery for crude. They actually refined condensate(the heavy hydro carbons in natural gas)? At a gas plant the natural gas is dried and has all the heavy hydrocarbons knocked out of it before it enters the NOVA transmission lines. The propanes, butanes, pentanes, hextanes etc. All the dried gas left enters the NOVA transmission lines and goes to either Empress or Cochrane to the cracking plants where the ethane is split off from the methane. The ethane goes to Joffre/Fort Saskatchewan to be converted into polyethalene and the methane enters the NG fuel lines, either for domestic use or export.

[rain]

What size of plant are they looking at, in bushels used per year?

[wd9]

New York – Riverstone Holdings (Riverstone), The Carlyle Group (Carlyle) and Dominion Energy Services LLC. (Dominion Energy) today announced plans to expand their existing relationship by building up to 300 million gallons of bio refining capacity in Alberta, Canada. The bio refinery will consist of a combined 100 million gallon ethanol facility, a 100 million gallon canola oil crush facility and a 100 million gallon bio diesel facility.

In Canadian speak, 100 milion gallon is 385 million litres. 10 litres in a bushel of canola, 38.5 mbu. 10% glycerine, so around a million to 1.2 million tones of canola seed.

Interestingly 1 bushel of wheat makes about 10 litres of ethanol, so 38.5 million bushels or around 1.2 ish million tonnes.

Wonder what is going to happen with about 50,000 tonnes of glycerine? Sounds like an opportunity.

[rain]

wd9 what is the glycerine used for?

[wd9]

Ahhh, the $10 million dollar question. traditionally everything from soap to cough syrup. Abundant supplies will push the value very low putting the traditional suppliers out of business.

But, on the brightside, with a cheap input product new products can and will be developed. Sugar alcohols and environment friendly anitfreeze to name a couple. ADM makes polyols (sweeterners) out of the glycerine in the US.