Hi Todd I agree, I can't see it - well, not for the likes of us. Nor for farmers, coops, local communities. It's corporate stuff I guess.
>Keith, > >Took a look at the mobile bio-d plant. Off the cuff, it may have an >application somewhere, but you're talking a boatload of >infrastructure and cost to move it whenever - cranes, lifts, time to >fit it all together. What would be the oil sources that would be >tapped only on occasion that would warrant the mobility? When all is >said and done it has about the same size footprint as what we've >"blueprinted" for a oilseed facility producing 550,000 gallons of >bio-d annually and some 9,000 acres. > >The only benefit I can see is the "instantaneousness" of it. But I'd >bet you dollars to donuts, if someone called both myself and their >outfit tomorrow and said they wanted a facility in place in 30 days, >I could do it with a permanent fixture for less cost. I'm sure of that - wouldn't risk my donuts. That thing's expensive! It's computer-controlled and everything's explosion-proof. >Hell, I would even bet your money on it. Not even at 10 to 1? (10 times zilch is zilch...) >In my not so always humble opinion, this is most certainly not the >wave of the future, but it does have some "instantaneous" qualities >to it. Placement somewhere that has an enormous glut of feedstock >that is killing a market or is posing a disposal problem would be >the best scenario I could think of. And I think as a corporate demo to sell plant. Hey, I'm not knocking the corporate end of things (well, not this time!). But that's not what we're about here. >Then, of course, there is always the military application - throw a >raiding party in your least favorite country of the week and they >supply the fuel to keep their own people under subjection. Isn't >tropical palm great? We don't do it that way any more Todd, voters don't enjoy the body-bags. These days we just bomb them all to hell from a dizzy height. (But it seems they end up winning anyway.) >We did consider something like this on trailers that could move from >farm to farm. (No, not the military subjection part.) Didn't take >long to stop considering it when we started thinking about the crew >it would take to move several trailers, the tractors, insurance and >maintenance cost - especially when most of the farmers have the >transportation equipment to move the grain or can contract someone >at very low cost. > >Just seems so much better to put in permanent infrastructure >whenever possible. Seems like it to me. However, it says here: "Mobile stills. In the late 1700s and 1800s, mobile stills travelled through the countryside of France. These stills, pulled by horses, visited the farms, where they would distill the products that the farmers had fermented. These mobile distilleries enabled everyone in agriculture to participate in the production of alcohol, which was and continues to be a great source of revenue to the farmer and to the government of France." No source info, I'm afraid, just a piece of paper, with a picture of one of the old stills (on two carts). In the early 1980s a company called Parallel Products Inc of Dixon, California, was running a mobile alcohol fuel plant, on a truck with a trailer. No idea what became of them. All best Keith Addison Journey to Forever Handmade Projects Tokyo http://journeytoforever.org/ >Todd >Appal Energy >[EMAIL PROTECTED] Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html To unsubscribe, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
