Hi Tom >Keith, > Thanks. > Not only will your reply be helpful in the matter of the diesel >generator, but may help me in my "quest" to run a gasoline car, legally, on >homebrewed ethanol.
Our TownAce has an Elsbett system and can run on petro-diesel, biodiesel or SVO, pure or in any mix (though we never use petro-diesel). It would be an interesting option to add 190-proof ethanol (or less) at up to 50% of the blend, or even 80% maybe. Real multi-fuel vehicle. Maybe I'll have the chance to explore it a bit further soon, buy a few cans of 95% ethanol and do some tests. Or something. > If the water in 95% ethanol will not cause problems when I denature the >ethanol with gasoline (2 gallons per 100 gal of ethanol), I can, with a >permit, legally produce ethanol and run cars on it. Do a one-litre batch first? > I will pass on the information you have provided, and attempt to digest >it all myself. :-) Just a bunch of questions really, sounds good, but it'd be nice if somebody did have real on-the-ground experience of it. I agree with Fritz though, it's a risk, no guarantees, not much you could recommend to someone wanting a reliable solution. > Best to You, And to you Tom Keith > Tom >----- Original Message ----- >From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >To: <biofuel@sustainablelists.org> >Sent: Monday, January 07, 2008 10:34 AM >Subject: Re: [Biofuel] WVO in Diesel Generators > > >Hello Tom > >>Hello All, >> On 9/25/06 Pagandai Pannirselvan wrote: >>>The small co generation of electrical energy based on the bio diesel can >>>make possible the use of pure used vegetable oil and also some e 5 >>>porcent hydrated ethanol , making possible to lower the viscosity of used >>>vegetable oil in deiesel engine, removing dependence with >>>Conventional deisel. >>>Thus the blend of used vegetable oil 70 percent, hyrated ethanol 10 >>>percent and biodeisel 20 porcent can be used with less problem for >>>motor maintainence in rural areas. > >He says "with less problem", I'm not sure if that means "without problem" >but it might do. > >> I've recently been contacted by a former student who would like to >generate his own electricity for his woodworking business. He is >considering a diesel generator and asked about biodiesel. I >suggested he look into using a BD/WVO blend rather than processing >it all into BD, as he would be using about 3 gallons (11.4 L) per >hour (120+ gal/week). >> 1. Does anyone have experience using a blend such as that suggested >by Pagandai Pannirselvan in a diesel generator? > >No experience, sorry, but some thoughts might help, FWIW. > >> 2. Hydrated ethanol: What % water would be tolerated? >> In the U.S. it is possible to get a permit to distill ethanol. Only >that which leaves the premises must be denatured to prevent human >consumption. 85-90% ethanol is do-able, and used on premises would >not have to be denatured > >The maximum purity you can get straight from the still is about 96%, >190-proof (95%) should be doable. > >This is from David Blume's excellent book "Alcohol Can Be a Gas!": > >"There is a myth that anything less than 200-proof alcohol will separate >from gasoline due to the small amount of water in the alcohol. Gasoline, >alcohol, and water are miscible (stay dissolved in one another), depending >on temperature and on water and alcohol content. In fact the bottled >additive to combat water in your tank, generically known as "Dry Gas," is >nothing more than 200-proof alcohol, which causes the water to blend with >the gasoline. > >"In Brazil, they pump alcohol that contains about 4% water. In warm >climates there is absolutely no problem in mixing wet alcohol with >gasoline, but all of Brazil is not warm and balmy. When I visited there, a >General Motors engineer showed me a study that accurately outlined the >physical limits of mixing water, alcohol, and gasoline. According to the >paper, published by the Society of Automotive Engineers, at about 68 deg F >[20 deg C], alcohol with as much as 45% water will mix with gasoline and >not separate. At 4% water, alcohol will form a stable mix with gasoline >down to about minus 22 deg F! [-30 deg C] This means that those of you who >live in milder climates don't have to go through the extra step of >producing dry 200-proof alcohol to get it to mix properly with gasoline. >And if you do live in minus 22 deg F, you would generally only have to use >200-proof during the winter and only if you were going back and forth >between alcohol and gasoline in a non-flexible-fuel vehicle. Flexible-fuel >vehicles will simply adjust to phase-separated fuel." > >Pagandai was probably referring to 96% ethanol, 4% water, but I guess 95% >would do just as well. > >David Blume also refers to farmers' tests in the US using blends of >petro-diesel, biodiesel and dry ethanol in diesel engines. Most used 50% >ethanol, and 25% each of biodiesel and petro-diesel, but Blume says they >only used the petro-diesel because it was cheaper than biodiesel at the >time and 50-50 alcohol and biodiesel should be fine. He thinks a minimum >of 20% biodiesel and 80% alcohol would also be fine, but says it needs >testing (with a dynamometer and a knock-meter). > >"What % water would be tolerated?" Water in the fuel can be a Good Thing, >it improves combustion efficiency and reduces emissions - just as long as >it stays in the fuel and doesn't separate. > >This EPA paper for instance, "Bibliography of Water-Fuel Emulsions >Studies", lists 23 studies, all with diesels: "Following is a list of >studies that are being considered for inclusion in work being done by EPA >to assess the effects of water-fuel emulsions on emissions of oxides of >nitrogen (NOx), hydrocarbons (HC), and particulate matter (PM)." >http://www.epa.gov/otaq/models/analysis/emulsion/emulbibl.pdf > >David Blume also reports on the use in Brazil and other countries of >blends of 20% castor oil and 80% wet ethanol (4% water) as diesel fuel. > >Used WVO and castor oil are not the same (and the quality of the WVO >surely matters too - higher FFA probably means more water, for one thing). >But I think Pagandai's recipe might be a good one just the same: vegetable >oil 70%, hydrated (96%) ethanol 10% and biodiesel 20%. > >There's also the ACREVO study of SVO use, which mentions using 9% of 95% >ethyl alcohol with SVO: > >"The overall combustion performance of the rapeseed oil are very >satisfactory in comparison with the diesel fuel while the rapeseed oil >produces almost 40 % less soot than diesel fuel. The different volatility >of this fuel respect to the diesel fuel is responsible of the different >behaviour of the sampled gas concentrations in the base of the flames >while at the end of the flames, both attain almost the same values. It has >been established that an addition of 9 % of ethyl alcohol (95 %) bring a >great benefit regarding the pre-heating oil temperature. In fact, the >presence of alcohol allows a reduction in the inlet oil temperature from >150 °C to 80 °C. Moreover, the combustion of the emulsion produces less >soot and, at the exhaust, the amount is almost one half less than that >produced by the combustion of rapeseed oil." >http://www.nf-2000.org/secure/Fair/F484.htm >Advanced Combustion Research for Energy from Vegetable Oils (ACREVO) > >> 3. Could E-85 be substituted for the hydrated ethanol? >>I've heard of commercial suppliers adding small amounts of gasoline to >their diesel. Since the E-85 would only constitute 10% of the mix, the >total gasoline would only be .15 X .10 = .0150 (1.5%) > >I doubt the gasoline would make a difference. > >Pagandai's blend using E85 could be worth a try, IMHO, especially with a >generator, there's a case for it but no guarantees. Start and stop on >biodiesel might be safer, though from what ACREVO says it might not be >necessary. > >HTH. > >Best > >Keith > > >> Thanks, >> Tom _______________________________________________ Biofuel mailing list Biofuel@sustainablelists.org http://sustainablelists.org/mailman/listinfo/sustainablelorgbiofuel Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Search the combined Biofuel and Biofuels-biz list archives (70,000 messages): http://www.mail-archive.com/biofuel@sustainablelists.org/
