|
Go
|
New
|
Find
|
Notify
|
Tools
|
Reply
|
|
|
member |
More posts from Lyle:
http://www.biofuels.coop/blog/archives/000391.html February 20, 2006 Regarder le Soja Upon our return from the SBS and NBB conferences, Rachel and I have been on an aggressive California wrap-up tour, spreading what we have learned to everyone who will listen. First stop, Central Carolina Community College, to discuss analytics, curriculum, and the new biofuels co-ordinator position they are funding. Included were several members of the Sustainability Board which Rachel chairs. The post-California message is simple: Other states are ahead of North Carolina, and we need to get moving. While North Carolina talks about funding biodiesel startups, other states are pouring millions of dollars into the biodiesel space. Oilseed crops is one example. While we have a highly demonstrative oilseed research project going on at our "Research Farm," its value is limited to education and outreach. Other states of thousands of acres of oilseed varieties going under contract with farmers. One of our stops was with Dr. Hobbs of NC State. He was patient as he listened to us rave, and suggested that if we were interested in small scale oilseed crushing, we should go to France, to check out the canola crushing operations there. It turns out I am going to France. My daughter Jessalyn is over there studying right now. The plan was to fly to Chicago to pick up my other daughter, Kaitlin, and head for Provence over spring break. We have a rich tradition of exotic spring break travel in our family. Kaitlin is 14 years old. Her current interests include boys, going to the mall, and personal appearance. One of the reasons we are going to France is I do not believe the 2K solar array in the yard has enough output for her hair straightener. Just the same I dropped an email to Jess, suggesting that Kaitlin and I would like to visit a canola crushing operation while in France. At Piedmont Biofuels we find it best to simply doing everything Dr. Hobbs advises. And to her credit, Jess went to work. Her current field of study appears to be wine tasting and Italian men, which means mastery of the language appears lower on the list. Here is her description of a conversation she had with her host family entirely in French: Jess: Near Aix, where is it I can find canola to look at? Santa (looking alarmed): What? What is Canola? Jess: I don't know. Is it that there is soy near Aix? Santa (raised eyebrows): Soy??? Jess (starting to feel flustered): Umm... other kind of milk for people with the allergic to milk. Santa: Oh soy (correcting my pronunciation) What? You have become allergic to milk?? Jess: No, my dad... he wants to rest at a soy factory Santa: He wants to buy soy in Aix? He is allergic to milk? Jess: No, not to buy. It is that he wants to watch a facility, to look at the soy. He is very bizarre. Santa: No. This is not possible. He can look at olive oil, and he can go and taste some wine perhaps. Jess: Okay. When I explained to Jess that I was not interested in "looking at the soy, " and that I was not bizarre, she simply replied: "Oui, Il veut regarder le soja. Il est très bizarre," although she kindly added "Vous pouvez le mettre dans le blog, ce n'est pas est un problème," which made me feel better about publishing her email in the blog... Posted by Lyle at February 20, 2006 08:37 PM |
|||
|
|
member |
http://www.biofuels.coop/blog/archives/000383.html
February 11, 2006 Goodbye Scrap Sparks rained down from the top of our four story hydraulic press tonight as the salvage crew worked their magic. They removed a six thousand pound hydraulic cylinder for starters, cutting the weight of the head to around ten thousand pounds. For the past two days the control room has been awash with sparks, and large banging noises, and the sounds of chains being rigged around the mezzanine. Tami and I had date night tonight, and stopped back at the plant to see how it was going before heading out on the town. Bruce is the mastermind of the project, backed by Dean with his monster crane, and with Jared who seems to know how to operate everything under the sun. Barb had brought cheesecakes by earlier in the day. The sparks and the noise had caused us to evacuate to Building One for a meeting with Alicia, the architect. It was a civilized affair, in which we argued about whether or not we should classify both the office and the lab as "B," or leave the lab as "F1," or classify it as "H3," which is what the plant is permitted for. While we sat and dined on cheesecake, and leafed through code books and UL firewall guides, the boys in Building 2 were waging war on scrap. Tonight I cut up the remaining cheescake and walked it over to the war effort in an incredibly incongruous scene. There was Tami, in her fancy dress and pink fluffy jacket, and me in my usual garb, stepping over the crane's outrigger, with sparks bouncing off my hat, carrying a platter of cheesecake and a handful of forks. When they are finished, this building will be ready to receive some serious tankage. One of my jobs on the project is to ensure all roads, doors, and spaces are ready to go before tanks begin arriving. Call me a "Spatial Specialist." We are entering the "purchasing phase," which means the quotes are being evaluated, orders are being let, and tanks will start arriving in the spring. When assembly begins. We will assemble through the summer, and have fuel coming off the line by August. That is the plan. Earlier today I heard Dr. Hobbs tell a colleague, "Don't think of it as a chemical plant-it's an art project" But even art projects need to adhere to timelines and milestones. And I will say that Henry and his scrap crew, along with Dean, Bruce and Jared, are ensuring our first deadline will be hit just fine. This is harrowing work. Not conducive to answering phones. I've spent many an hour running a torch at the end of an extension ladder, and I have the burn scars on my arms to prove it. It's not fun. It's intense. I have done my share of harrowing torch work, and know that left over cheesecake always hits the spot. As I was leaving, the crane caught fire, and Jared put it out with an extinguisher I handed him. It smelled like wires, or hydraulic fluid burning, which cost me my appetite for cheesecake. With the fire extinguished, I pushed on to date night, in order to leave biofuels behind. We dined at Crooks Corner, in Chapel Hill, and I managed to find a space for Creampuff right next to their grease dumpster. Of course I lifted the lid. If for nothing else for a sniff of WVO quality. Tami glared at me, I took her arm and left biodiesel behind for a remarkable evening in which we talked about other things... Posted by Lyle at February 11, 2006 12:48 AM |
|||
|
|
member |
http://www.biofuels.coop/blog/archives/000382.html
February 09, 2006 Premature Fulmination The National Biodiesel Board is opening an office in Washington D.C. The folks at the Sustainable Biodiesel Summit were discussing the same thing. At one point Kimber from Biofuels Station turned to me and said, "I'm just not good at lobbying or talking to government, are you?" And I told her that I am rotten at it. I told her that we are about to celebrate our third year of no legislative success in North Carolina, that I have a hard time sitting still in the presence of bone headed ideas, and that I am not very good at holding my tongue. And I told her this true story: I once lead a tour of students through the coop. It was an unusual affair, on a weekday when class was in session, to a bunch of kids who "had to be there." Very different from our Sunday crowds. At one point the instructor said to me that she had seen Senator Atwater give a speech down in Sanford, and that he said "North Carolina could lead the way in terms of renewable fuels." I know Bob Atwater. When he was a Chatham County Commissioner I was a supporter, with both signage and money. I donated to his campaign when he ran for the NC Senate, and I have had several private meetings with him. And I like Bob Atwater. I think he is a man of integrity that went into politics to represent people, I think he is smart as a tack, and I am proud to be a supporter of his. But when I heard that he said North Carolina could lead in renewable fuels, I started fulminating. I went home that night and composed an email to him that went something like this: Dear Bob, I understand that you visited Sanford and suggested we would lead the way in renewable energy, and I thought it would be worth taking stock of where we stand: % of North Carolina on grid energy mix from solar=0 % of North Carolina on grid energy mix from biomass=0 Commerical wind development in North Carolina=0 Gallons of ethanol produced in North Carolina=0 Gallons of commercial biodiesel produced in North Carolina=0 I think it would be safe to say that our leadership lies in something else, like perhaps the number of new nuclear permits applied for. Sincerely, Lyle. I hit send, and went to bed and thought nothing of it. He never responded, which I thought was odd. It wasn't until a month later that I learned that on the occasion of his renewable energy speech he was delivering $50,000.00 dollars with no strings attached to the Biofuels Program at Central Carolina Community College. Oops. Sorry, Bob. I think I am going to mail him a copy of Biodiesel Power, with a thank you note, and perhaps an apology. I wonder if there are any pharmaceuticals out there for premature fulmination. The National Biodiesel Board is sending Scott Hughes to D.C. He's been their regulatory guy for awhile now, and I have found him to be very good. He returns phone calls, knows the subject matter cold and will be an excellent presence in Washington for the fuel. Talking to Scott last week in California, he said the NBB may be able to deliver some air support for NC House Bill 1296 when the time comes. Perhaps the "anniversary of no results party" is also premature... Posted by Lyle at February 9, 2006 09:07 PM |
|||
|
|
member |
Lyle:
http://www.biofuels.coop/blog/archives/000395.html February 22, 2006 Pace of Life As usual, life is traveling faster than the rate at which I can possibly blog. I've been to the legislature, we've poured a spill containment, and I've learned a lot about oilseed crushing since my last entry-which seems like ten years ago. A group of us met with Representative Joe Hackney in a conference room in Raleigh the other day. He had a commanding presence. Anne Tazewell had pulled together a bunch of constituencies, and it was an impressive display. The clean air folks were at the table-people from like Tobin from Triangle Clean Cities. There were actual lobbyists in the room-from organizations like Farm Bureau and Environmental Defense. Ivan was there from the North Carolina Sustainable Energy Association. He is always impressive. The head of our State Energy Office, Larry Shirley, was there-with Sharon Stroud. There was a fellow there from the Division of Air Quality-to which we have applied for grants. Hackney ran this meeting like a total pro. The simple idea (three years ago) was a tax holiday on biodiesel-which would drop the price by about twenty five cents a gallon in this state. By now it has morphed into a tax holiday for ethanol too-which is idiotic-but I bit my tongue. There was no one from ethanol at the table, with the possible exception of Anne and Tobin, who feel obligated to speak for all "renewable fuels." To say that the arguments for ethanol are the same as for biodiesel is a vast over simplification. Ethanol is complicated. That's all I said. What I know about ethanol you could put in a thimble, but unfortunately that is as much as anyone else at the table. I did not mention the fact that ethanol is reviled by the petroleum marketers for its hydrophilic nature. I did not mention its margin energy balance that causes environmentalists to cringe. I didn't even say anything about how its production is one of the most polluting industrial processes on earth (Cargill just paid record fines for violations at two of its ethanol plants). I didn't leap into the conversation and equate "enzymatic cellulosic production" with hydrogen-since it might be commercially available before 2012. Nope. I held my tongue. On my way to the meeting I called my brother Glen for some moral support. I wanted to "go off" on him, so that I would be quiet during the meeting. We missed each other, and I ended up being quiet anyway. He has had just as many lonely rides to Queen's Park in Ontario to discuss wind energy policy as I have had driving to Raleigh. Neither one of us have any luck at effecting change in the policy layer-or if we do it is so slow as to be unmeasurable. The salient difference is that he is driving a Honda Insight that gets much better mileage than Creampuff, but at the end of the day we are both wasting precious fuel. And the worst part of all is that there is still no need to mobilize the B100 Community to help get a bill passed. This tax holiday is still in back room mode. I would have loved it if I could have left the meeting with an urgent need for letter writing, and email, and phone calls, but that didn't happen. I can't wait for the day that we need biodiesel soaked torches on the lawn of the Raleigh legislature. When that day comes, I am sure the B100 Community will show up in force. But that day is not here yet. Back at the Plant, a crew arrived and built an impressive spill containment curb all around the inside of Building Two, where we currently do our fuel distribution, and where we will be doing our washing and drying of finished product. They sawed a 2" trench in the concrete floor on the inside of the building, and embedded a four inch tall piece of stainless steel in a concrete curb. Very impressive. We need to contain 110% of the largest vessel in the building-which is probably 12,500 gallons-and we can do it with this incredible curb. If that's not enough, they sawed and jack hammered out a trough and installed a drain, such that if there is a spill, we can push the liquids into a drain that runs the width of the building, and culminates in a space where we can put a sump pump. The fact that we have concrete dust everywhere-that we intend to grade into our gravel road rather than ship to the landfill-is somewhat incidental to the fact that we now have our spill containment in place. Seeing the curb makes me feel like we are at long last building a chemical plant, which means I am happy to sweep and mop and vacuum concrete dust as a harbinger of things to come. Posted by Lyle at February 22, 2006 09:13 PM |
|||
|
|
member |
http://www.biofuels.coop/blog/archives/000398.html
Energy Blog « Grain Growers | Main February 27, 2006 Squirrel Update In the heart of the unincorporated village of Moncure is Ray's General Merchandise. It's a Citgo station that has an old fashioned butcher shop in the back. Although eating meat is no longer fashionable, I am frequently drawn to the meat counter where I tend to order my bacon "skin off." While in line I reflect on a ragged sticker taped to a cooler which reads, "Vegetarian; Indian word for 'lousy hunter.'" Up at the till, Mary has long ago stopped asking me if I "want a bag for that," and merely says, "I know you don't want a bag, sugar." One time Rachel and I were quarreling about squirrel fat, and we decided to consult Kevin, the local butcher. When we entered Ray's, she noticed a "Ski Mask" display, and thought it would be fun to try one on. I was admiring the ribeyes when I saw Kevin drop his butcher knife, run to his office, and emerge with a loaded pistol pointed at Rachel. She pulled the mask off and laughed unwittingly, and I waved my arms in front of Kevin saying, "Whoa, whoa, whoa-that's Rachel, put the gun away..." Kevin was quaking with nerves, and he lowered the gun immediately upon seeing Rachel returning the ski mask to the shelf. "Take it easy, man-you are the one selling ski masks," I said. He regained his composure and replied, "I sell condoms too, but I don't expect people to try them on in the store..." No one in our community would be surprised to learn that Kevin is well armed. Ray's General Merchandise caters to the redneck crowd. It's a good place to pick up your rebel flag, or your civil war souvenir chess set, or your notice for the next Sons of Confederate Veterans meeting. We were fortunate to find some hunters standing around the day we were discussing squirrels, and we learned everything we needed to about the squirrel fat I would require to make some fuel. I should note that the same gun-packing energy that startled us the day Rachel innocently tried on a ski mask came in handy at Ray's the other day. Marni was cashing her paycheck and settling her grocery account. The transaction overwhelmed the cashier, and Kevin left the meat counter to take charge. As he was counting out the hundred dollar bills, a pair of crack heads pulled in. They were boisterous and confident, and filled the store with their presence. They were in line behind me, and when they spotted Marni's hundred dollar bills, their enthusiasms increased. "Hey Marni, you going out with us tonight?-'cause we sure be going out with you." Marni was non-chalant. She looked at Kevin behind the cash register and said, "Kevin, you got my back?" Kevin grinned widely-winked at the crack heads and said, "Oh yeah, Marni-I got you." Marni folded her freshly nourished wad into her wallet, snapped her purse tight, and said, "Not tonight, boys, I got to go pay bills." Everyone felt safe as Marni headed for her car. Kevin had her covered. Which is our community. The same gun that can be mistakenly drawn on Rachel had Marni's back. And when cashing a paycheck, Kevin is not taking 20% off the top-like the trailers that used to pull in down by the chicken plant on payday. Why would he? His markup is in the groceries, and his store is where Marni shops. I should say that my quest for squirrel fat is ongoing. We have another Kevin in our community who is a diesel mechanic. I have tried to ignore his attempts to label me as "King Squirrel," and the fact that he has christened my Dodge "The Red Squirrel" is not a problem-especially since he helps keep it on the road. By way of a squirrel fat update, I need to report that we have struck out again this year. The head of our county's Planning Department, Keith, is a squirrel hunter. Over the years I have found myself engaged with the Planning Department on a number of fronts, and so I have come to know Keith somewhat. As everyone knows, squirrel season starts on October 17th-Tami's birthday. It closes this time of year, when the squirrels are pregnant. Keith called the other day to say he had not bagged any squirrels this year. His son is now wrestling for Northwood High School, and every weekend of squirrel season has been spent at tournaments and dual meets. That's all right. That will give me time to line up a kitchen in which to render the squirrel fat. Tami says I can't use ours... |
|||
|
|
member |
http://www.girlmark.com/blog/index.php?p=90
gas chromatograph moving along… slowly…. Well obviously it's been forever since I've posted anything to the blog. I had quite a saga with torn ligaments in my right hand, something that started back in September, and has been bothering me ever since. Spent some time a cast, and spent some time trying not to use the computer at all, which is incredibly difficult for me. Spent quite a bit of time freaking out thinking that I was going to have to get surgery. Eek. Today I made somewhat of a stride forward in the GC saga. We picked up the machines in December, we being me and Concrete Community College (and also Piedmont biofuels, to whom I shipped one). The school and I got one each. There are also several parts machines, which we've been vigorously stripping and trading off for the parts we actually need. gas chromatographs are set up for different kinds of tests, with differing kinds of equipment. My impression is that the setup that we use for biodiesel is fairly rare in the world of GC testing. So here's what has happened so far: we picked up the gas chromatographs with mostly wrong detectors and completely wrong injectors for $1000 each. (We knew exactly what we are getting, and the chances of finding one of these with the correct injector for biodiesel are quite slim) The base units that we've purchased are 1980s HP 5980's. There were actually two FID detectors on one of the machines, so me and the college each got one. The chemist at the college who's spearheading this project has managed to trade away the ECD detectors that came with their unit (nice, radioactive, expensive), so we managed to get rid of something that we didn't need and couldn't afford to run, and in trade, picked up two cool-on-column injectors- those are worth about $1500 each, and you need them for the biodiesel analysis. THey've got a little heater that looks like a micro-VegTherm attached for the temperature changes that are needed in the analysis. Then the saga with the school started. They're quite poorly funded. They have the usual multilayered financial bureaucracy of a public institution. They agreed to pay for some of the equipment needed to set up their own machine (I'm paying for mine, with some help from donations). Then they took many, many, many months to put in the order for parts that they agreed to pay for. It's taken several months to get a 20 amp outlet put in, and, in the end, they only gave us one and we needed two, so now we have to wait for a second to appear, sometime... Months ago, they green-lighted ordering the regulators for the ultrapure gases for the machine, and something got very screwy with that also so they're not here yet either. At any rate, I'm buying my own regulators so that we can charge ahead. Today, however, we cleaned the machines fully and actually started installing stuff, now that we have electricity to run at least one machine with. I started taking pictures, although all of these parts are also very well documented at the Agilent web site (don't ask me questions about these machines, I really dont know enough to answer them). We've managed to acquire a fantastic haul of stuff in this process- I was originally slightly concerned about it, as the school was buying its machines sight unseen and the lab I purchased from unloaded five machines on me (three working, two not)- but when I showed up at the school with a vanload of dusty machines, oily power cords, ancient computers, and random parts, it was obvious that the organic chemistry instructors appreciate 'salvage' just as much as I do. Out of this deal, the school's machine will have two different detectors and injectors to play with, and the machines are replacing some even older gas chromatographs they had, which were not really adequate for the experiments they wanted to do in the chem classes. Apparently one of the things they'll be doing in Organic Chem class is fatty acid analysis using GC, something that's quite interesting to me for various biodiesel experiments. |
|||
|
|
member |
I usually ignore Lyle Estill's sustainability rants, but here's a funny one he wrote today:
http://energy.biofuels.coop/2006/05/10/gas-war-idea/#more-691 Gas War Idea Goodness. Apparently gasoline prices are high and something must be done. Has anyone else been flooded by the silly “Boycott Exxon” idea that is burning up the net? At the heart of the idea is that if we boycott Exxon we will trigger a price war and with that prices at the pump will drop. When I read about this idea on my community chat list, I chuckled, and didn’t bother responding. I generally lurk on that list anyway, since I am really just curious about who has spotted a lost dog, or who is looking for a chinchilla sitter. When I started seeing the idea come to me through the solar community, in which I have dipped one toe, I started responding. My take was that Exxon controls such a small part of the retail market, that taking your gas business across the street would have zero impact on pricing. I thought this was the land of supply and demand. But apart from a few brief conversations, I ignored it. The only time I go to the gas station is to pickup some beer, after all—and even that is becoming less common as I shift to local brews. (Come on Chatham Marketplace—get open– we are cheering for you). But when the Gas War Idea started percolating up from some of the online sustainability community, I found myself unable to write emails fast enough. I can’t believe the popularity of such a ridiculous idea, and I can’t believe that the sustainability crowd doesn’t get it. Some people might be shocked stunned and amazed to learn that oil has peaked, because we are consuming it too rapidly. Others are not surprised to see upward price pressure at the pump, and I would assume that everyone would understand that increased pricing will lead to conservation, and in the end it is only conservation that can correct ours species’ course on earth. Come on, folks. We need to get this by now. I don’t mind hearing the belly aching from the “I drive an SUV and I lost my kitten” crowd, but please, not from us too. Are we really spending so much time on our gut flora, colonics, dreadlocks and Birkenstocks that we fail to understand that high gas prices are not only here to stay but are quite possibly our salvation? The other day I heard a member of the North Carolina Utility Commission speak to a crowd, and through his thick southern drawl I heard “the high price of natural gas is what keeps me up at night.” Right. That’s because we are consuming it faster than we can deliver it. That’s because electricity is still dirt-cheap. Which is why we burn it with impunity. Just like gasoline. I wondered what part of Adam Smith he was having a hard time fathoming. But it is one thing to hear ignorant moaning from right winged, “drop the gas tax,” faux free market non-environmental pukes, and quite another to get it in the form of an email from one of our own. I would much rather be out in the garden apologizing to the corn Devas for the way we have trampled on their world than to sit at a keyboard to explain that energy prices are high for a reason. Please folks. I’m begging. Kindly either stop the silly Gas Wars emails, or drop me from your personal spam lists…. |
|||
|
|
member |
The 7 am club
http://www.girlmark.com/blog/index.php?p=93 I just got back from a two-week trip to teach two classes, with some bumming around in between. As usual, I walked my house and my heart just melts-I haven't devoted any blog time in awhile to the house, but it is just a spectacular place to live, and being there makes me regularly feel awash with ecstasy. It's the best group household I"ve ever lived in. I flew out two weeks ago to teach a class in Salt Lake City which Graydon had set up. We actually scheduled two separate classes rather than the usual two-day weekend, partially so as not to interfere with Graydon's Sunday church activities, and because of avoiding Sunday we didn't have two full days to teach since most students couldnt' take a Friday off. Friday evening was an equipment building session, and Saturday was a daytime homebrewing class in which I tried to squeeze in everything I normally do in 1 1/2 days. People came from really far away for these classes. I guess I haven't done as many of them out West as I have in the East side of the country. One guy flew in from New Zealand (yes, just to come to the class). I've had Canadians come to the classes in the US before, but never someone who's had sat on a plane for days and days (or whatever it takes to get here from there). The facility was an amazing prop building warehouse belonging to the Utah Opera. The set crew were working in one of the other warehouse rooms on Saturday, and it looked like they had the dream job. They were workign their magic in an incredible shop full of wood tools and a small metal working shop. It made me happy to see well-funded artists doing amazing things with tools (there were a few props laying around, and it's amazing what set builders can do to transform a little bit of plaster and kitty litter and paint into something that looks exactly like a rock wall from a distance. The building was about four stories tall, which was all an undivided single story with the ceiling four stories above you and a huge, sparkly clean gantry crane way up there. It made for interesting acoustics. One of the guys from the Utah Biodiesel Coop works at the Opera and helped arrange this shop access originally. Anyway, we got access to the space about two hours before the 5:30 class. The first thing we did was make giant signs that said "stay away". Actually they said "doors open at 5:15," we plastered them on all the doors so as to chase the early birds away. This was kind of good, because the early birds started showing up right about two hours prior to the class, right on cue. I could see them stumbling out of their trucks, coffee cup in hand, carrying stacks of paper that they printed off the Internet. I don't know what the deal is, but at every one of my classes, about 5% of the students show up 2-3 hours early, and then want to hang around. This includes classes that start at 9:30 in the morning-there are always several overly caffeinated, chatty, middle-aged men circling the place like sharks at 7 a.m. wanting desperately to know what you do with the glycerin and have we heard about the credit card reactor (is it an old age and insomnia thing?). Lately I've started sending out e-mails that included "don't be super early", but people seem to be ignoring that. Note to self: next e-mail for a 9:30 class will say "don't be any earlier than 9:15". It seems that if one of my hosts happens to be there (which usually means they're setting up the facilities for the class), the guy with the coffee cup zeroes in on the host and corners him. For some reason the earlybird often comes prepared with a copy of Mike Briggs' algae paper printed from the Internet. I shudder to think about what Mike himself gets to deal with. My hosts are usually way too friendly to tell the guy with a coffee cup to leave them alone (even though they are busy setting up for class, a fact that's usually lost on the early guy). I usually have to play "rescue the nice guy" and chase the Caffeinated Ones away. This reminds me of growing up in an apartment building- the gossipy neighbor lady across the hallway would always find an excuse to get my mom over there and trap her for an hour talking her head off- after a while, my mom and I worked out a plan- after 10 minutes if she didnt extricate herself, I would go over to the gossipy neighbors and claim that there was a phone call for mom. It became a lot more difficult to play this game after our phone got disconnected. Anyway, for this class they were three of us setting up-me, Graydon, and Terry Reist, who flew out there from California and has offered to be one of my interns, and who started the internship by coming to help with the class (which was hugely appreciated). We had a sort of strategy huddle where I tipped them off to the impending arrival of the inevitable early birds; this meant that when the earlybird showed up on cue 10 minutes later, Graydon and Terry were pretty good at extricating themselves. Closing and locking the doors helped too. Graydon had provided processor kits for that Friday equipment class, which meant that there was a huge line of them, neatly lined up with people's names on them. He also had a table in the back with a lot of other gizmos that he sells. As people started arriving, he said, "watch these 56-year-old men giggle like babies when they see all the stuff". Which is basically what happened in a few cases. I've started providing a table of snack food at classes, which I think makes sitting through the lectures will bit more fun. College professors should do that. There's nothing wrong with munching a celery stick while contemplating molarity and normality. This particular class was an evening session that ran through dinnertime, so the food breaks gave it kind of an informal feel to parts of it that I always like about the Friday evening classes. Graydon co-taught, which was, as usual with my co-teachers, perfect fun - tag-teaming the information. We stayed there until about 1030 in the evening, finishing up some of the more stubborn reactors. Most people stayed at the same hotel, which Graydon had thoughtfully found for us, which means that when I stumbled down to the hotel's continental breakfast at 7 in the morning there were random conversations about diesel cogeneration and oil sources floating in from opposite sides of the lobby and for once I wasn't imagining it. Saturday's class went by in a long blur. It was the homebrewing/chemistry class, and almost everybody had gone to the equipment class the day before. Frankly, I don't remember all that much about it because it was absolutely exhausting. It's useful to do these classes in a two-day session, because sometimes it takes about a day for some of the concepts to really sink in for those who have not been in school in quite a while, so Day 2 is usually a lot easier than Day 1. I think that the work that goes into teaching these classes is only about 1/3 lecture, and the other 2/3 is all about trying to track who is understanding what, and more important, who is not understanding what, and why they are not understanding it. It feels to me like teaching is all about tracking 30+ people's brain processes very intently for eight hours at a time, and a my job is to shepherd the ideas around when they're having trouble finding their way. I remember almost losing my voice couple times, at which point it was really helpful having Graydon there to toss the class to. Again I met several people who were farmers and were beginning to work on biodiesel systems for their land. The ones that were particularly of interest to me were some folks from Oregon whose economics were just shoving them into becoming organic farmers. Basically, the cost of fertilizer had gone so skyhigh, that they were kinda being forced to go into biodynamic farming with its heavy composting and other soil building techniques. That class ended in late afternoon, and after everybody had finally left, Graydon and I must've looked absolutely exhausted. There was a point at which he was laying on the floor, moaning, and I was in the other corner having a really hard time getting out of my chair to go pack up after the class. It was pathetic. Sometimes, I really wish I just had a couch during or after these classes. I swear, I could lecture quite well from a couch. |
|||
|
|
member |
Jello-brain, and a Lyme recovery milestone
http://www.girlmark.com/blog/index.php?p=94 Eventually everybody from the class drifted away, and even Graydon got up off the floor, regained his senses, cleaned up with me and took all the liquids and the consolidated glop to be disposed of. I had use of the space till that evening, and my brain was in no mood to go anywhere. Again, it just amazes me how tiring it is keeping track of 34 brains and intensely following just who understands what (they must be just as tired following everything I"m saying!), and trying to think on my feet, how I should rephrase it when it doesn't make sense to them. After class I enter limbo where I can barely function, the thought of getting up off the floor is agonizing, and the little observer in the back of my head is amazed that I'm still alive when my brain mostly resembles an exhausted blob of Jell-O.. Several cups of caffeine later, I can usually clean up from the class. After Graydon left and I no longer had to formulate sentences, I came to my senses, mindlessly played with lab supplies for while, spending a couple of hours sorting everything for the New Hampshire class, packed everything up to mail, and was finally out of there 12 hours after class had started. Then I went to the airport and picked up the boyfriend. Tom and I had planned a short camping vacation in Utah. This is one of the trips where I had two classes back-to-back on consecutive weekends in opposite sides of the country. Considering how exhausting a day and a half long class was, this wasn't a terribly good start to this trip. At this point, I'm so jealous of my time that I prefer to do to cross-country trips on two consecutive weekends, and fly home for three days in between. It's actually worth my time to do that, rather than spend a week on the road with two classes at either end. When I spend 12 days out to teach two classes, it often feels like the Jell-O brain never goes away the entire time-hotels, airports, waah. waah, waah. It sometimes feels like stepping into some kind of sci-fi alternate universe for while. But Utah is a world famously gorgeous place, and we wanted to do a brief scouting trip, checking it out for longer future camping expeditions. Tom used to live in Salt Lake when he was a very different person, so we floated around town the next day investigating his memory lane. Just walking around downtown with Tom on Saturday night made me very happy after the Jell-O brain finally went away, as it was finally a break from the class routine. Like, I was not rushing off to Wal-Mart to do something related to supplies for the next class. Again,waah, waah, waah, I can't really complain about traveling to teach, no one's holding a gun to my head to do it. I think tons of people would give anything to be me right now and do exactly this for a living. Our first stop was supposed to be Zion National Park, and we had originally kicked around the idea of doing a tremendous amount of driving for four days, checking out the North Rim of the Grand Canyon for a day, then some other national parks on the way north. The idea had been scouting sites for a camping trip that Tom is gonna do later this summer. Luckily, we came to our senses and nixed several of the destinations before investing too much time on the road. The whole concept of a vacation is completely bizarre to me. When I was growing up, no one in my family went on vacation. was a little bit concerned that it wouldn't feel like a break at all, considering that it's happening right in the middle of my-traveling job work week, and my traveling job does involve quite a bit of driving around between the classes.. I think I was worried that we've spent a lot of time in stores, getting outfitted, and that there'd be too much time on the interstate, or in chain stores, as we were flying in with insufficient supplies for some of what we want to do.. Too many parts of the US no longer have a local flavor- 10 years ago, car traveling involved stopping at flea markets, little tiny local junk shops, eating in little diners and shoot in the bull with the locals (well okay that was the East Coast. They don't have diners on the West Coast). Local flavor is mostly gone though. I think on this trip I realized, from the lack of junk shops in what would otherwise have been a prime cheap-rent territory for this activity, that the junk shops have all moved to eBay. Granted, that means that I sure enjoy my online time, browsing junk from across the country at 2 a.m. unfortunately, there's an awful lot of conversation that's missing with the demise of the flea markets and the goods' move to the Internet. Not to mention that the prices have gone way up. I was very pleasantly surprised to the couple of localism experiences in the next day and half. Before we left Salt Lake, we picked up some food at what we thought was going to be a health food store, but which turned out to be a weird gourmet imports store called liberty Heights market. It was amazing. They seemed like they had a direct line to some granny back in the old country (Italy, Spain, etc.). It's kind of telling that shopping there was what made me finally realize I was on vacation, rather than at work on the trip. This was definitely a place that is not found at a local mall near you. It's kind of pathetic that my expectations are so low that merely finding a unique local store is enough to make me feel like I"m having a good vacation experience. You know, it's that lack of social life thing. I don't even think about actual interesting, human interactions that I might have been having on vacation, having somehow turned into a tourist in the strip malls and big box stores. Along the same lines, we accidentally stumbled into a really bizarre little motel in a tiny old West town called beaver city. Eagles roost motel was composed of these teeny little casitas which were brought there in the 1930s after the Hoover dam was completed several hundred miles away. They had been housing for the workers at the time. They came equipped with a tiny little garage, which were sized just right for some guests Harley, no way anyone's truck or SUV could even begin to fit. I wasn't sure what Tom would think-the place could be viewed as either very charming or really run down. Again, the fact it is not a Styrofoam Motel 6 turned the whole thing into entertainment. It really helps that the proprietor, a biker guy whose wife ran the attached antique store, was exceedingly nice, obviously loved his quirky little business, and was just a downright character. Asked us how long we were staying, and told us that they sometimes have campfires and sit around singing songs with guitars with some of the residents who rent efficiencies there in the summer. And we figured all that out in about 5 minutes while he was showing us around. He initially had walked up to us while we were pointing and laughing at this bizarre messed up electrical situation on the outside of the office-there was basically romex and conduit chasing each other around complete circle, not attached to anything anymore. He used the opportunity to point out the 1930s heritage of the place and tell us the whole story of the Hoover dam workers. It was obvious of the plumbing was put in prior to any concerns about water conservation-it was the a most powerful shower I've had in a long time, Kinda like playing in the fire hydrant on a hot day. Anyway, it seems like the perfect place in the middle of nowhere to go spend a few weeks writing. Well, the rest of the vacation was cut short. We got to Zion, got a campground, went on a great hike. I had a "recovery from Lyme" milestone, on the hike, when I realized that there's no way I could've enjoyed it or even had the energy to do it three weeks earlier, especially obvious when we found ourselves running the last part of the trail Zion is a park, which means that you park outside the place, or get a campground, then write a free shuttle bus from one trailhead to another, with various amenities (this keeps thousands of idling cars out of the park, a very good thing in my opinion). It was a perfect place to go for me, as I'm still very unsure of my energy, and haven't been able to go camping in two years. We had dinner at the kind of fancy lodge there- and Tom must have somehow picked up food poisoning. Climbing Angels Landing the next day was out of the question, when he unexpectedly started throwing up. He thought he'd be alright, went back to the campground to rest, and sent me on my way to do some of the other trails on my own. By the time I got back to camp three hours later, he'd been unable to keep water down, and was so dehydrated that he couldn't even move his hands properly anymore from loss of electrolytes. I threw everything in the van and drove to a random town in southern Utah to drag him into the emergency room for rehydration via IV. I've never actually seen anyone turned quite that shade of green before. |
|||
|
|
member 2009 Sponsor utahbio.com |
Mark,
Thank you so much for coming to our Workshop here in Utah. A HUGE Thank you goes out to you from me for the phenomenal success we had at our workshop. Man, I still feel for the boyfriend too getting sick, and of all places in Beautiful Zion Canyon. Major bummer. I took a ton of pictures of the workshop & did blog write ups of both days & have them posted here if anyone's interested: Day 1: http://www.utahbiodieselsupply.com/photos/events/girlmarkworkshop200601/ My blog entry for day 1: http://www.utahbiodieselsupply.com/blog/2006/05/hosting...hop-interesting.html Day 2: http://www.utahbiodieselsupply.com/photos/events/girlmarkworkshop200602/ My blog entry for day 2: http://www.utahbiodieselsupply.com/blog/2006/06/day-2-o...p-whew-what-day.html -Graydon
|
|||||||
|
||||||||
|
Member |
Graydon,
The picture file links need to carry a warning similar to '43 .jpg files. Dial-up users beware.' Now I'll just go down to the shed and rebuild my Citroen engine while they down-load.  regards dva |
|||
|
|
member |
Local Biodiesel: A Biodiesel Coops Conference, Golden, Colorado, July 14-16
http://www.girlmark.com/blog/index.php?p=96 Colorado School of Mines www.b100.org Topics to be presented include the following: -Methanol recovery for homebrewers (Maud Essen and Terri Zeman, St Louis Biofuels Club, Missouri) -Disposal of Sidestreams: Wash Water, Magnesol, and Glycerine (Matt Rudolph, Piedmont Biofuels Cooperative, North Carolina) -Cold Weather Strategies for Biodiesel Users (panel discussion) -Biodiesel Distribution Experiences (panel discussion including Kai Curry of Biodiesel Blue Distribution, Minnesota, and members of Biofuel Oasis, California) -Gas Chromatography Testing of Biodiesel (Bob Armantrout, Rocky Mountain Biodiesel) -Excise Tax and Legal Issues Affecting Small-scale Production of biodiesel (panel discussions) -Biodiesel Calculator and Batch Tracking Software demo (Rick Harrison, http://omahametropsd.org/bdcalc/Index.htm ) -Magnesol and other washing alternatives (presenter TBA) -Quality Testing and Quality Control factors (Maria ‘Mark’ Alovert, www.biodieselcommunity.org) -Involving Women In Your Biodiesel Group (Maria ‘Mark’ Alovert, www.biodieselcommunity.org) -Oil Collection Strategies (presenter TBA) -Feedstock and competion for WVO- Co-op strategies ? (presenter TBA) -Working with Volunteers (Matt Rudolph, Piedmont Biofuels Cooperative, and others) -Case Studies presentations from biodiesel educational, homebrewing, and distribution co-ops and groups : NW Biofuels Network (Washington), St Louis Biofuels Club (St Louis, MO), Berkeley Biodiesel Collective (California), Breathable Bus Coalition (Washington), Alameda Biodiesel Coop (California), Boulder Biodiesel (CO), Wilson College biodiesel group (Pennsylvania), Yoderville Biodiesel Coop (Iowa), Austin Biodiesel Coop (Texas) Biofuel Oasis (California) -other presentations and participants to be announced -In addition to the formal presentations, we’ll have some mini-workshops and lunchtime ‘discussion tables’ to assist in networking (for example, cafeteria tables labeled by region or specific topics, so you can meet others from your region or area of interest) Conference logistics: Price: $60 registration, includes breakfast and lunch on the 15th and 16th We still have a few dorm room accommodations available for $22 per night. To register for the conference please see www.b100.org. To connect with others from your area who are traveling to the conference please see www.b100.org/rideboard (Golden, CO, is near Denver) Speakers: if you would like to do a presentation at this event, or facilitate a discussion/panel/lunch table discussion, please email us. contact info: conference@b100.org Comments |
|||
|
|
member |
http://www.girlmark.com/blog/index.php?p=95
6/19/2006 At home working on the July Biodiesel Conference Theoretically my tour is over. I’m here at home, with nothing scheduled. I have a lot of possibilities for classes coming up, but none of them are super soon. HALLELUJAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It was an insane, completely frantic five months. I was rarely at home for more than two weeks. In February and March I was gone almost the entire month. And as I’ve already said, all of that involved getting on planes every few days. The day that I updated my web page with the words ‘my spring tour is over’ (a few weeks after the grueling SLC classes) I e-mailed Graydon with this great sense of ecstasy. Biodiesel Conference: Right now things are about to get insane for me again because the biodiesel co-ops conference is coming up. (www.b100.org) We have a fantastic lineup (previous post). I have the feeling that the whole thing is going to be a bit like biodiesel sleep-away camp for geeks. The co-op conference gets to use some of the dorm rooms at the college that is hosting us, which means that people will be hanging around for hours after the event chatting. A very important point of the conference is to promote networking, for people to get to know each other, for them to share ideas and for projects to cross-pollinate. Lunchtime 'discussion tables': Also, we are including breakfast and lunch in the conference registration costs, which means that in addition to eating cafeteria food at an engineering school, will probably set up specific discussion tables to encourage further networking. For example, you can come to the conference and eat breakfast at the Southwest Regional Biodiesel table, move on to catch the discussion at the ‘glycerine disposal’ discussion table at lunch, and maybe even muster up the courage to facilitate the ‘get rich quick with a commercial biodiesel plant’ discussion table the following morning. Just kidding about the getting rich quick. |
|||
|
|
member 2009 Sponsor utahbio.com |
ROTFLMAO!!! Yeah, I'm a nut w/ a camera..what can I say? I really like to take a bunch at these types of things. -Graydon
|
|||||||
|
||||||||
|
member 2009 Sponsor utahbio.com |
Yeah, I still don't know how you do all those tours that fast. I just helped out on one workshop & it wore me right out (it was a blast--an exhausting blast, but a blast none the less).
-Graydon
|
|||||||
|
||||||||
|
member |
Farm Plant here I come
http://www.girlmark.com/blog/index.php?p=106 I'm just coming down off of several weeks of hell and mental anguish that revolved around finishing up the farm biodiesel plant design. I got commissioned to design a system for some farmers, exactly what I've been wanting to do all year. We have decided to put together a really tiny little pilot plant, with the idea being that it would be mobile, and that the farmers could sell it off when they wanted to upscale. There were a variety of reasons why 'tiny little' made sense for them, although it was not what they ultimately intend to install. I decided to change everything around 100% after what I learned on my last trip out of town. I'd gone out to Asheville to teach a class and to do some consulting for Blue Ridge Biofuels. They have designed a teeny little pilot plant very similar to one of my designs, which I think means that I get to leapfrog that teeny little pilot plant stage in the pursuit of our farm plant, as they have one on-line exactly like what I would have built. BRB were having some very minor problems, which we were able to troubleshoot pretty quickly, and I learned a tremendous amount from seeing the thing in action. I have a few friends in the small producer world right now who all have similar size little systems, all of which were set to go online this summer, and being able collaborate amongst ourselves has been phenomenally helpful. I actually modified my theoretical system when I met Rob Del Bueno and talked about systems earlier this winter, bringing mine more in line with what he's building, so that we can collaborate over troubleshooting if problems come up. of course the other side of that is that if the designs turn out to be mistakes, then we have two people with the same problem in their plant, and the same problematic equipment to replace- it's kind of an 'all eggs in one basket' approach. I've been thinking about codifying the sort of informal friendly collaboration that I've been involved in, into a farm-scale plant listserve- no one who is in the process of building a system seems to want talk about their progress in public, partially because of the regulatory/code compliance issues involved, and partially because they don't want to look foolish if they make mistakes, so unfortunately there's not a very detailed public discussion going on, even though the technology involved is very simple and there aren't the major issues with competitive disadvantage that exist with larger systems that use proprietary technologies. I decided that there is no reason for me to put another tiny little plant into the world. I'd assigned myself a series of different design constraints, and spent a couple of weeks designing two different kinds of plants that fit those differing constraints. One of the design constraints was that I wanted to make sure the system fit inside of a shipping container. That's what Rob has done as well. In fact, I think there are an awful lot of theoretical plants sketched out on Whiteboards out there in the world, all designed around fitting the process equipment inside of a shipping container, and plunking the shipping container down next to a tank farm full of oil. Mine is no different. Shipping containers are fantastic little portable buildings, but they have extremely limited dimensions which makes a plant an interesting design challenge. Of course with a big enough tank farm and continuous process technology (not something I'm interested in tackling), you can squeeze a million gallons a year out of one of these things, but that requires a few million dollars also. I stared at graph paper for weeks trying to figure out how to squeeze the maximum gallons out of a 40 for shipping container using commonly available equipment. I came up with a rough estimate of a theoretical 250,000 gallons a year, still pilot plant sized but large enough for the niche projects I"m interested in. Next project is seen how well it works in reality. |
|||
|
|
member |
Public Speakers Anonymous
http://www.girlmark.com/blog/index.php?p=108 I went to this great event at Biofuel Oasis today. The Oasis, our local worker-owned biodiesel distribution co-op, has been running a series of events every Monday night in June called Driving Still Sucks. The events all promoted different aspects of alternatives to driving. The ladies at Oasis started this project because they got sick of hearing customers talk about the fact that now that they’re on biodiesel it was all perfectly OK and there was no guilt associated with driving. Somewhere around that time this phenomenon was happening, somebody in the press did a write up about Berkeley Biodiesel Collective, and somewhere in the usual mistranslation that the press does, the biodieselers were quoted as saying that the collective’s unofficial motto is Driving Still Sucks. Everybody in the collective found that absolutely charming and adopted it fully afterwards, even though it was of course not really true at the time of the interview. The Driving Still Sucks series included the following events: Monday June 12, 5 - 8 PM: Everything You Wanted to Know about Biodiesel but Were Afraid to Ask: which included “answers to burning questions about biodiesel” (they must’ve had the mystical answer to “what do you do with the glycerine” printed up in giant letters in the back) Monday June 19, 5 - 8 PM: Rearrange Your Life to Drive Less: Creative Strategies * City CarShare * Public Transportation & Bike options * Telecommuting: How to convince your boss to let you work from home * Live near where you work, Work near where you live: Drive l day per week! * Yummy food and drink And tonight’s event focused on “Do It Yourself". What this meant was that the speakers were primarily from the city gardening and farming community, and there was a cute potluck of tasty treats from people’s gardens, and homemade alcohols, at the end of which the Oasis collective toasted their newest full worker-owner members, two women who’d just passed the truck driving examination and would start doing Oasis fuel deliveries locally. Urban farming really means a lot in our area. I recently heard about someone who was moving here from the East Coast to get a job as a school gardens instructor, which is one of those typically wonderful Berkeley progressive institutions that you take for granted until you find out that someone has moved from East Coast to come do it. The school garden programs movement is just one small aspect of the powerful urban farming movement in this town (considering the price of real estate here, it’s a challenging thing to do, by the way). In fact, there are several food businesses which have grown out of the school gardens and youth gardening movement-it’s entirely possible to eat fresh produce all year round and for all of its have come from one quarter mile away, grown by teenagers in one of the programs. Anyway, Jennifer solicited me to come talk about beekeeping. Jennifer, who knew that I’m not crazy about going to biodiesel 101 events around here anymore (I’m sick of talking about beginning homebrewing and ‘have I heard of diesel secret’ at the moment), suggested that I could even be anonymous. Jennifer and I have this kind of funny thing going on about the oasis. My boyfriend lives around the corner from the oasis, which means that I’m constantly stopping by when I need to find Jennifer and she’s too busy to return phone calls. Unfortunately for me, the Oasis sometimes has a fairly large crowd of customers hanging around, including the types that are there just to talk people’s head off, and I"m always wary of the possibility of getting ensnared by one of the talkers. I was over there one day when Jennifer was off shift, and she was trying very hard to escape her own customers as well, while someone else was actually working the shift. We’re having some intense conversation in front of a few customers who seemed interested in chatting, and she kept announcing to everyone in the room that she was offshift and trying to leave. That was either wishful thinking or some kind of superstitious warding off of the evil eye. Anyway, as we were on our way out the door, the person was actually working the shift called out, “Bye, Jennifer, Bye, Mark". At that point a chatty customer turned around and said,"wait, is your name girl Mark"? Jennifer and I shot a glance at each other, and I turned around with an obviously lying tone of voice and said “no, I have no idea what you mean!", and we ran out the door laughing. Ever since then, it’s always this joke with her about not mentioning me by name when I’m at the Oasis in front of customers. Anyway, the event tonight meant that I showed up with a small empty beehive to show and tell, and a jar full of honey, and there right in front of the oasis was Jim, who has goats in North Berkeley, along with a small portable pen with two adult nannies and several adorable baby goats. Someone else was there to talk about keeping chickens in the city, someone else was talking about water systems and recycling gray water, Chris Schein had a truck full of plants for sale, there is a natural plaster and nontoxic painting company with some inspiring speakers telling us all about getting petroleum out of the inside of your house and cutting down on indoor air pollution, and I fit right in. I got up in front of everybody, announced loudly that my name was Stellar (an actual nickname from the past), and said something like ‘I don’t know anything about this biofuel stuff but I’m here to talk about bees’, which solicited laughter from the one third of the audience who was in on the joke. It was awesome thing to do public speaking about something completely unrelated to biodiesel homebrewing for once. |
|||
|
|
member 2009 Sponsor utahbio.com |
Man, I would've paid good money to hear you say that....
"I don’t know anything about this biofuel stuff but I’m here to talk about bees" I could imagine the roar from the crowd... -Graydon
|
|||||||
|
||||||||
|
member |
wow, I havent' updated this thread in a while. Been too busy with the conference organizing.
In the meantime, Lyle Estill wrote this: Cancel the Party http://energy.biofuels.coop/2006/07/19/cancel-the-party/ I was about to throw a party to celebrate our third year of zero results at the NC Legislature, but upon reading this year’s North Carolina budget, I’m inclined to cancel the party. We have been trying to get a “tax holiday” in place for biodiesel for a long time, and many of our members and readers are familiar with HB1296 that has been languishing about in Finance year after year. It’s been a wild ride. But it is now included in the state budget. And for this, we have Joe Hackney to thank. Joe went to work on a “tax holiday” for biodiesel (like the one they have in Illinois) years ago, and he has now managed to fold the idea into our state budget. Sort of. Starting in 2008, producers and distributors of biodiesel in North Carolina will qualify for a tax credit that is equal to the amount of state road tax. Here is the language: § 105-449.103. Credit for biodiesel providers. (a) Credit. – A biodiesel provider or refiner who imports or produces biodiesel is allowed a credit against the tax imposed by this Article on that portion of the biodiesel that is derived in whole from agricultural products or animal fats or wastes from these products or fats. The credit is equal to the amount of taxes paid under this Article on the applicable portion. In order to be eligible for the credit allowed by this section, the taxpayer shall be licensed as required by G.S. 105-446.65 and shall file a return reporting fuel movement information as required by G.S. 105_449.96. That’s it. In my mind there is a big difference between simply eliminating the state tax portion at the pump (around .19 today), and providing a tax credit. But if we assume that producers and distributors are accumulating a tax liability, it makes sense that this legislation should lower pricing at the pump. I’m going to be optimistic for a moment, and say that come January 2008, the price of B100 in North Carolina is going to drop by about twenty cents. Hello subsidy. Thank you Joe. While I am ready to cancel the “no results” party, I’m not inclined to pop champagne at this point. Because when it comes to legislation, I find myself muttering to myself the same thing I usually say to the kids, which is “We’ll see.” But at the end of the day, this appears to be a giant legislative victory. Joe Hackney got it done. Anne Tazewell, who has been working tirelessly in this arena for years helped tremendously. So did Tobin and everyone over at Clean Cities. And Piedmont Biofuels did its part, by staying in the game, and sticking to a single idea. One time after a hot day in Raleigh, when it appeared that another legislative session would draw to a close without a mention of biodiesel, Leif and Rachel suggested we put a “Lobbyist wanted” sign down by the road. I hung up my suede elbow patched jacket, and traded my Gucchi’s for a pair of steel toed boots, and headed out back to lift some drums. And another year went by. I watched the idea get offered to the petroleum industry, bounce back, get married to ethanol, and divorced, and reconciled, and I watched the opposition rise and fall. I wrote comments, and blog entries, and made calls, and traveled to the capital to discuss the idea, and I was dying for the day when Joe Hackney would ask me to light up the B100 Community and get every legislator in the state called. It didn’t happen. When I talked to him from Canada, he suggested we keep our powder dry, and behold, our idea is now the law. Or at least it will be, if it survives until 2008. Tonight I received an email from Matt Rudolf, about a meeting with a member who is interesting in lobbying. He offered the “fun fact” that when you punch “biodiesel lobbyist” into Google, we make the front page. Hooray. Google uses “time on the net” as one of its metrics for relevance—and what it displays is an old blog entry. Just the same, it feels good. I would prefer to announce a .20 a gallon price drop to all of our members effective immediately, but we can wait. We’ve waited this long. We’ll blink and 2008 will be upon us. Or maybe next legislative session we can get it moved up a year.—and better yet, I might be able to lend my Gucchi’s out to someone else who wants to walk around the Legislative Office buildings in Raleigh… |
|||
|
| Powered by Eve Community | Page 1 ... 7 8 9 10 11 |
 | Please Wait. Your request is being processed... |
|
© Maui Green Energy 2000 - 2009