Take MORE Action

On this page we present an outstanding example of an individual taking more action. The individual is Mark May, an SEN Sustaining Patron and its Permaculture Advisor. Below is the presentation Mark gave at the Community Based Biofuels Workshop in Milwaukee, Wisconsin on March 19, 2011. At the bottom of this page is a link to ideas for more YOU can do.

Community Projects And Small Scale Ethanol Production

Presented by Mark May

Introduction

Why Me?  Bob Brylski asked Beth Gehred and Greg David of Jefferson County Community Supported Energy to present to you today, but both had prior commitments and were unable to attend.  So, throwing caution and common sense to the wind, they asked me if I would help out.  “What do they want from a beat up old hippie like me?” Is what I think I emailed to Beth after learning of the request.  “They are expecting to hear about how we’ve been meeting and working on Mondays, where it has led us, and honestly, where it hasn’t.

I met Greg and Beth at Dave Blume’s Small-scale Ethanol conference in Madison WI in 2009.  I’d read Dave’s book Alcohol Can Be A Gas and attended the conference to meet him, and mostly I wanted to meet other like-minded people in the area who were on the same page as me.  I hit the jackpot coming out of that workshop in that I came in contact with a wonderful bunch of people.  Greg, Beth and a few of other the folks from the Sustain Jefferson group were there.  This crew had already been researching gasifiers and were on their 3rd generation prototype by the time we met.  Larry Leis, Kelly Barker, Jack Tamborino, and Scott Kemply who are a few of the guys instrumental in bringing a state of the art 6’ column still to the area for testing were there.

After the workshop I started attending the Monday Gasifire Therepy sessions at Greg’s farm.  There I met more even more like minded folks into the renewable energy scene and from there we started meeting weekly to explore the possibilities of starting a CSE or coop of some sort.  My roll in the CSE meetings was minimal.   My workload and distance from the meetings interfered with my ability to attend every meeting.  Bringing the Silvercloud 3600 up to Montello in 2010 for testing, was done by a crew of very dedicated enthusiastic people.  Thanks to these pioneers, small-scale ethanol has become a reality here in SE Wisconsin.  My role here was as an enthusiastic onlooker and unofficial wisecracker.  My class clown approach to life is what got me in front of you today.  Nothing more, Nothing less.  I want to make it clear that I’m not an expert in small-scale ethanol, but I have been studying it for the last few years and I’ve observed the efforts being championed by people in our area who are testing small-scale ethanol today.  I’ll approach my presentation here as a reporter and cheerleader of the small-scale ethanol revolution.  And we’ll review the princepals and techniques of permaculturly produced ethanol as prescribed by Dave Blume.  We’ll call it a beat up old hippie’s inside view of the small-scale ethanol scene.

Here’s my first disclaimer.  I call a lot of people hippies.  Some people might not understand it, and some might take offense to it but I like hippies.  I like to surround myself with as many hippies as I can, because I think we need them.  And here’s why.

As a young teen growing up in the late 60’s and early 70’s I witnessed first hand the struggle for equal rights and the protests’ against the war in Vietnam.  As a young boomer I watched as our generation took a look around and started to pull away from an establishment willing to send our sons to die for nothing.   The seeds for questioning authority especially the government were sown and would become part of the movement.  And as an observant young man growing up, questioning authority was a no brainer.  I watched as some of my friends dropped out and moved to the country for a more wholistic lifestyle.  Organic gardening, crafting, and do it yourself the old fashioned way became a way of life.  The oil embargo and gas shortages prompted these back to the landers’ to start spearheading renewable and sustainable energy ideas.  The Mother Earth News and the Foxfire book series would become their bibles for survival.  I loved, admired, and envied them for their bravery, ingeneuity and respect for nature.   So when I call someone a hippie, I do it out of respect for a person who is thoughtful, respectful.  I do it out respect for a person who leads by example.  I do it out of respect for people that want to leave their children a cleaner wiser world.  I do it out respect for people that question authority and make decisions based on love, common sense, and humanity.  Not profits, greed, and the bottom line.  I do it out of respect for people who just plain get it.  I do it out of respect for folks that take the time to have discussions like this today.  So when I call someone a hippie, I’m calling them my brother or sister.  So—WELCOME ABOARD HIPPIES!!! Get on board the Green Train.  We’ve got work to do, and we’re going to kick some ass.

Attendees from that workshop have since built 4 various sized distillation columns, all in various stages of testing. The above-mentioned Silvercloud 3600 saw the most action as most of the activity centered around getting it up and running.  The Silvercloud 3600 is a slick 6” diameter stainless steel still built for Larry Leis by Carl Petzold.  We met Carl at Blume’s Fall 2009 Workshop in Nashville.  He’s a cool old hippie who built an incredible wood fired ethanol still on his place in North Carolina.  He built SC3600 in the Spring of 2010 and in July the still was brought up and put on display at the MREA.  From there it was installed at Scott Kempley’s farm for testing.  By August the first test batches of Smurf blue low grade ethanol were produced.  The type of acid used to adjust the PH was the culprit.   Then a problem with the thermocouple had caused the computer to misread boiler temperatures.    Maintaining a steady temperature in the still column became an issue to deal with.  We would find that there is a direct bearing on quality of the proof of ethanol produced with the temperature maintained in the still column.  Automation of the system and sourcing an affordable digital proofer were examined.  The prospect of replacing the diesel fired boiler with a gasifier was suggested.   Greg volunteered to design a gasifier-boiler.

While testing was being performed other members of the team started looking at the legal issues like the possibility of launching a CSE and or a COOP.  How does the group organize itself?  How to continue with testing in Montello?  Need to raise money.  The princepals of the project have to ask what they wish to get out of it.  How’s the financing going to be handled?  Insurance, permitting expenses and BATF compliance would rear their ugly heads.  We were lucky enough to have Kevin Edberg of Cooperative Development Services at one of our early meetings. He directed us through an excersize were we asked ourselves the above serious questions.  He summed up our current entity.  He suggested that right now we are  The Montello Design Collaborative (his title) with two goals.  To study the technical as well as the financial feasibility of the Silvercloud 3600 ethanol production facility.  We are an offshoot of the CSE, which is a committee of Sustain Jefferson.  We have a relationship that has yet to be formalized with TCRCD, and the line to Sustain Jefferson is also somewhat unclear.  Sustain Jefferson has not offered any support by way of financial or professional contribution beyond use of insurance at events where we are likely to demonstrate the still or gasifier.  Here are five points he left us to tackle
1.      Review existing LLC.  What is Larry’s willingness to expand or share ownership?
2.     Estimate costs for the Technical and feasibility studies.  Include insurance issues.
3.     Implement fundraiser through LLC shares.  Allocate shares for past sweat equity-Have that discussion.
4.     Identify and define technical issues related to the process.
5.     Evaluate work plans and opportunities for bringing support to the collaborative.

As you can see it takes a village to pull off a project of this size and scope.  Something with this many moving parts needs a team of dedicated people with many talents.  The team should include the dreamers, the tinkerers, the engineers, the bean counters, yes and even (GULP) the lawyers.  Most of all your team should have a doer like we have in Beth Gehred.  Her drive, determination, and organizing skills were really key in our investigation into realizing a coop or CSE

One of Beth’s final reports of activities or the season reads as follows with a quote from Carl:  “There are no such things as mistakes, just opportunities for learning”.

Hold that thought in mind as I report that the Silver Cloud 3600 was retired for the season this past Friday, unable to distill waiting final fermented batches of beer due to a failure in the kettle we’ve been using.  The modified milk tank that had been heavily insulated on its exterior, leaked fermentate from its interior kettle to its outer kettle.  When we opened it up to find out where it’d been leaking, we found its inner walls had bowed in beyond repair and caused tension failures at the seams.

We didn’t spend a lot of time absorbing the tension failures ourselves, though, and used the time instead to plan how we’d go about getting another kettle, what that kettle’s properties should be, how we’ll afford it, and how we’d go about attaching it to the still column.

So as the sun set on the 2010 season the SC3600 limped across the finish line.  Undeterred from this setback our group of visionaries has been making great strides in furthering the ethanol cause.  Here’s a snapshot of the scene today:

Gasifier Boiler

Greg’s last update of the gasifier-rocketstove- pretty much finished.  Fired it up and it performed well as a rocket stove, very well in enhanced rocket stove mode, and excellent in gasifier mode.  It needs to be plumbed.  Had some problem with a leaky boiler, which has since been taken apart and attended to twice to acceptable result.   Temperature of flue gasses was fairly cool, which was good indication that the heat exchangers were working.  As temp of water heats up, temp of flue gasses will heat as well.  Operators will need lessons on how to run it.  Start a fire, coax a fire, attach hopper and feed it, etc.

Montello SC3600 & Microfueler

In Montello, the SC3600 is back in the shipyard to refit her for a sturdier boiler.  In the meantime a Microfueler has been installed at Scott Kempley’s farm.  Made by the E-fuel Corporation, the Microfueler is capable of producing 280 gallons of fuel ethanol a week.  The E-Fuel Corporation’s technological breakthrough significantly reduces the size and weight of traditional fermentation and distillation systems needed to produce ethanol.  The MicroFueler supports a variety of organic waste as fuel (among them are discarded liquids rich in sugar, waste sugar, liquids with residual alcohol, cellulosic materials** and even algae**). Processing organic waste material through the MicroFueler is the ultimate environmentally friendly solution, as it uses materials otherwise bound for landfills and converts them into fuel for your home and business.     (Explain the Microfueler here.)

Test batches of ethanol are being burned in a  tractor and a 6500 watt ethanol burning generator made by the efuel people, which powers his shop and home.  Once they have the Microfueler dialed in, they will be looking at corn, and sweet sorghum as the feedstocks for production.  At that point they’ll start researching the options for additional income streams generated form the byproducts produced.

Scott and two of buddies performed a couple of  “shot from the hip” splash blending tests done on three unconverted pick-up trucks.  The tests showed very favorable results.  Blends of 30, 50 and 100% E-85 were tested.  One truck ran through the coldest part of last winter on straight E-85 with no ill effects other then a nagging check engine light.

Necedah Charles Double 804

Jack Tamborino and son have an impressive Frankenstein set-up at his place up in Necedah.   Jack’s got two Charles 804’s running in series and an 80-gallon used dairy tank as the fermenter/boiler for testing.  He’s got a hot water boiler that produces low-pressure steam cranking out 70-gallon batches of 190 proof liquid sunshine.  Through contacts that Kelly Barker made both operations in Montello and Necedah are using waste sugar from a food processing plant to conduct their testing.   Fodder Beets and Jerusalem Artichokes are two of the feedstocks being considered as they move forward.

This past year two outside parties contacted us and showed interest in data and/or the use of these stills. They are Dr. Raj Atalla of Cellulosic Science International, and Bill Mebane of Woods Hole in Mass.  The operations in Necedah, and Montello have been actively participating in these projects.

Atalla Update of Cellulosic Science International

Dr. Atalla has invented a process to open up cellulose to accept enzymes better, and the process uses ethanol.  Met with him and made deal to go forward together.  We have equipment he needs for experimentation, which we’ll make available to him.  CSI ran experiments on corn stover.  Their ethanol enhanced enzyme; exposed cellulose so well that their conversion rates of cellulose to sugar are exceptional. The next test will be on waste paper.  The assumption is that once the cellulose conversion to sugar is made, fermenting and distillation would proceed as usual.

Woods Hole (Bill Mebane) & Peggy Korth Teleconference Call of 12-18-10

Through participation in an ethanol list serve moderated by author Peggy Korth, connections were made between our group and Bill Mebane of Woods Hole Research Station in Mass. about a possible project of mutual interest.  Bill is trying to get ethanol production into Haiti to stop deforestation and prevent respiratory ailments from charcoal burning for cooking.  They already have high efficiency Swedish-designed cook stoves waiting on a dock in Port-au-Prince; have 100,000gallons of ethanol from Brazil, for proof of concept.  Assuming that all will perform well, Bill wants to get ethanol production localized.  Gaia Project backing is expected.  (David Blume is also working with the Gaia Project).  Bill needs to prove all steps of process here in the US, so, once introduced into Haiti, it will perform well immediately in order to be accepted. Fermentation and distillation have to be small-scale and distributed, not dependent upon constant electrical sources, and fairly straightforward in their operation for an uneducated workforce. Peggy has a person who can convert a Charles 803 into a continuous flow operation, and that scale seemed about right.  Cattails were mentioned for their water filtration usefulness and ethanol yield.

Armageddon Blaster 5000

This is the name I gave the still that I ‘m building.  The survivalist in me has prompted me to get ready to make my own fuel in case of  impending doom.  My distillation column is a Charles 803.  I’ve converted a 60-gallon dairy tank for my boiler and fermenter.   I’ll use syngas from a gasifier to generate the Btu’s needed for mashing, boiling and distilling various feed stocks.  In the event of a power outage, the gasifier can be replaced with a rocket stove.  It’s small, portable, and ready for action.  It can be moved and setup easily.  Have moonshine will travel.  I’m playing with fodder beets for a feedstock option as they can produce up to 850 to 1000 gallons per acre.  I’d like to play with mushrooms and worm composting using the spent beet mash.  Testing to start this summer.

Look how far we’ve come!

The inspiration for this small-scale ethanol movement is brought to you by Dave Blume and his book Alcohol Can Be A Gas.  Almost all of the fine people mentioned above read this book and were moved enough by it to attend one of his workshops. [Click here for PERMACULTURE Ethanol on SEN, including video of supporter Daryl Hannah]

So what is ethanol? One of the toughest issues in front of the movement is educating the public.  And basically that means dispelling the negative press that it constantly gets.

1. Almost every country can become energy independent. Anywhere that has sunlight and land can produce alcohol from plants. Brazil, the fifth largest country in the world imports no oil, since half its cars run on alcohol fuel made from sugarcane, grown on 1% of its land.
2. We can reverse global warming. Since alcohol is made from plants, its production takes carbon dioxide out of the air, sequestering it, with the result that it reverses the greenhouse effect (while potentially vastly improving the soil). Recent studies show that in a permaculturally designed mixed-crop alcohol fuel production system, the amount of greenhouse gases removed from the atmosphere by plants—and then exuded by plant roots into the soil as sugar—can be 13 times what is emitted by processing the crops and burning the alcohol in our cars.
3. We can revitalize the economy instead of suffering through Peak Oil. Oil is running out, and what we replace it with will make a big difference in our environment and economy. Alcohol fuel production and use is clean and environmentally sustainable, and will revitalize families, farms, towns, cities, industries, as well as the environment. A national switch to alcohol fuel would provide many millions of new permanent jobs.
4. No new technological breakthroughs are needed. We can make alcohol fuel out of what we have, where we are. Alcohol fuel can efficiently be made out of many things, from waste products like stale donuts, grass clippings, food processing waste-even ocean kelp. Many crops produce many times more alcohol per acre than corn, using arid, marshy, or even marginal land in addition to farmland. Just our lawn clippings could replace a third of the auto fuel we get from the Mideast.
5. Unlike hydrogen fuel cells, we can easily use alcohol fuel in the vehicles we already own. Unmodified cars can run on 50% alcohol, and converting to 100% alcohol or flexible fueling (both alcohol and gas) costs only a few hundred dollars. Most auto companies already sell new dual-fuel vehicles.
6. Alcohol is a superior fuel to gasoline! It’s 105 octane, burns much cooler with less vibration, is less flammable in case of accident, is 98% pollution-free, has lower evaporative emissions, and deposits no carbon in the engine or oil, resulting in a tripling of engine life. Specialized alcohol engines can get at least 22% better mileage than gasoline or diesel.
7. It’s not just for gasoline cars. We can also easily use alcohol fuel to power diesel engines, trains, aircraft, small utility engines, generators to make electricity, heaters for our homes—and it can even be used to cook our food.
8. Alcohol has a proud history. Gasoline is a refinery’s toxic waste; alcohol fuel is liquid sunshine. Henry Ford’s early cars were all flex-fuel. It wasn’t until gasoline magnate John D. Rockefeller funded Prohibition that alcohol fuel companies were driven out of business.
9. The byproducts of alcohol production are clean, instead of being oil refinery waste, and are worth more than the alcohol itself. In fact, they can make petrochemical fertilizers and herbicides obsolete. The alcohol production process concentrates and makes more digestible all protein and non-starch nutrients in the crop. It’s so nutritious that when used as animal feed, it produces more meat or milk than the corn it comes from. That’s right, fermentation of corn increases the food supply and lowers the cost of food.
10. Locally produced ethanol supercharges regional economies. Instead of fuel expenditures draining capital away to foreign bank accounts, each gallon of alcohol produces local income that gets recirculated many times. Every dollar of tax credit for alcohol generates up to $6 in new tax revenues from the increased local business.
11. Alcohol production brings many new small-scale business opportunities. There is huge potential for profitable local, integrated, small-scale businesses that produce alcohol and related byproducts, whereas when gas was cheap, alcohol plants had to be huge to make a profit.
12. Scale matters—most of the widely publicized potential problems with ethanol are a function of scale. Once production plants get beyond a certain size and are too far away from the crops that supply them, closing the ecological loop becomes problematic. Smaller-scale operations can more efficiently use a wide variety of crops than huge specialized one-crop plants, and diversification of crops would largely eliminate the problems of monoculture.
13. The byproducts of small-scale alcohol plants can be used in profitable, energy-efficient, and environmentally positive ways. For instance, stillage (the liquid left over after distillation) contains all the nutrients the next fuel crop needs and can return it back to the soil if the fields are close to the operation. Big-scale plants, because they bring in crops from up to 45 miles away, can’t do this, so they have to evaporate all the water and sell the resulting byproduct as low-price animal-feed, which accounts for half the energy used in the plant.

Chapter 11 features a walk through a small micro-distillery model farm.  In a nutshell this model farm, which by its size should also be a cooperative, shows a healthy profit thanks to the idea of integrating some co-products into the production system.  Using corn in his model, he processes it in an eight-inch diameter column. With a distilling capacity of 9000 gallons per year, the Coop needs to buy or grow 105 tons of grain.  The by products like spent grains, stillage, support a cascading production of other valuable income streams.  Sales of Mushrooms, worm castings, live fish, fish emulsion and green house veggies eventually eclipse the sales of the ethanol itself.

This book not only guides you through the successful production of fuel ethanol.  But shows how the by products of ethanol production can be just as, or more valuable then the ethanol produced.  This is the key to small-scale ethanol production.  Setting up a system with an eye on revenue streams produced by the byproducts is critical.  No one is going to get rich making fuel ethanol on a small or micro scale. (I should temper that statement with the current unrest in the Mideast) The point is to produce it at or below the same cost of gasoline so it becomes attractive enough to want to deal with it. ($3.07 a gallon the day I was asked to present here.)  Dave Blume’s point is clear.  This isn’t Buck Rogers technology that we’re dealing with here.  It can be done.  It’s safe.  It’ll put folks back to work.  We can have real national security. And most importantly it’s a hell of a lot better for the environment!!

Click here for More YOU Can Do in your own personal life!