Comments on: Micro Brewed E85

By: cleek

cleek — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 04:19:22 +0000

Doesn’t ESB=Extra Special Bitter
(Blessings to the good lads at Fullers)

By: cleek

cleek — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 04:16:46 +0000

As long as I can store the excess in aged oak barrels for future err…consumption(!) I’m in.

I was just looking at flex fuel vehicle today.

By: yankinwaoz

yankinwaoz — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 00:37:38 +0000

The only problem I see with this is the fuel tax authorities getting their panties in a twist. There have already been cases where some home fuel brewers have gotten in trouble.

By: Ronnie Schreiber

Ronnie Schreiber — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 00:02:24 +0000

I don’t know if the gizmo will pay for itself. The company claims that with some carbon credit scheme if you buy the sugar and yeast from them it works out to $1 a gallon. At current gas prices and the fact that ethyl alcohol has fewer btus than gas, right now it’s a wash. The unit itself costs something like $10K. The unit makes up to 70 gallons a week. That’s 3,600 gallons a year. If you really use that much fuel and gas gets closer to $3/gal, yeah, the payback is within the life of the unit. So it makes sense for a business like the brewing company to do it. A typical car owner? Not so much.

By: Robert Farago

Robert Farago — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 22:24:11 +0000

Ronnie Schreiber:

You’re right. I was way off base on this one. My apologies to the makers of the home pump.

Headline and text amended.

By: Ronnie Schreiber

Ronnie Schreiber — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 22:15:53 +0000

Robert,

There’s no chemistry to get right. Modern flexfuel vehicles can run on just about any fuel, 100% gasoline, 100% ethanol, 100% methanol, or any combination thereof. As I understand it, there’s an infrared spectrometer that looks at the fuel to see what it’s made of, and the ECU acts accordingly. It’s a really elegant solution to the problem.

The MicroFueler produces 100% ethanol. Just dump it in the tank of your flexfuel car or truck and forget about it.

Also, I’m not sure where you see a boondoggle. It’s just a business deal made between two companies. No government money appears to be involved. The brewing company gets to recover ethanol from what was formerly sold as a waste product, and EFuel gets to sell some units. Once the alcohol is removed, I presume the residue still has animal feed value. The brewing company can then use the ethanol in making products or as a fuel.

While I’m not keen on making ethanol from corn, making it from sugar beets or even better sugar cane makes much more sense than corn.

By: David Holzman

David Holzman — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 20:52:00 +0000

And a big Thanks for the Laughs! to Robert Schwartz and Lokkii

(RS, you should try tulamore dew, which is Irish, and Gentleman Jack)

By: montgomery burns

montgomery burns — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 20:44:18 +0000

Kurt

Technically it is not illegal have a still for the production of spirits. However if you want to produce for your own consumption you must meet the same requirements of the big producers – you have to be bonded and have certain minimum equipment pay the tax on it and so on. Obviously impractical.

However you can produce spirits for fuel with just the correct paperwork. How they actually enforce this is beyond me but it can be done.

Oh and of course you can make your own wine and beer.

By: Lokkii

Lokkii — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 20:06:23 +0000

No ethanol in this house unless it has spent at least a decade in a cask in Scotland.

No corn in this car unless it has spent at least a week in a still in Iowa.
There, I fixed it for you ….

By: Robert Schwartz

Robert Schwartz — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 19:03:09 +0000

No ethanol in this house unless it has spent at least a decade in a cask in Scotland.

By: fredtal

fredtal — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 18:13:57 +0000

What ever Sierra Nevada does is fine by me. That Pale Ale is mighty fine.

By: Kurt.

Kurt. — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 17:58:21 +0000

Most breweries sell their yeast waste to farmers. It is a centuries old process and supplies the herds with feed, especially in the governement induced high cost of corn world we currently live in.

However, having a device that will take organic material and convert it to ethanol/methanol/alcohol is also nothing new. It’s called a STILL and is currently illegal in the United States except under license.

I bet the ATF will have something to say about this!

By: chaunceyjb

chaunceyjb — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 17:36:36 +0000

I like this product too. I think right now the suitable feedstuff needs to be purchased from the company (or you have to use something like the brewery waste), but if they could get this thing to use corn, I would imagine a lot of folks in the rural midwest with ready access to corn would be tempted. While there are several problems with ethanol from corn, many have to do with transporting the stuff (you need containers with stainless steel lines as I understand it), but if you have corn right on farm, it’s just a matter of filling up the Microfueler and them fill up your car when it’s done (assuming you have a flex fuel vehicle). This market is bigger than you might suspect. The annual USDA census indicates that there are over 2 million farms in the United States. In addition there were would be many, many additional households on small acreages or big small town lots where a container (wagon, bin, etc) of corn next to a Microfueler would make sense.

By: KixStart

KixStart — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 16:52:31 +0000

I like it. There’s no idea so bad that it can’t be improved.

From Sierra Nevada’s perspective, converting waste into something with value makes sense. If there’s a business case… go for it.

But it seems to me it will be an unusual homeowner who has a feedstock suitable for this gizmo and will there be any kind of useful energy gain or does it run on, say, natural gas, and converts, for example, 100 BTUs of CH4 into 85 BTUs of C2H5OH?