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Fuel of the Future? Indiana’s Contribution

March 8th, 2009 · No Comments


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by Ian Kleine

Biofuel is tagged the ‘fuel of the future’.

Basically, it is fuel added with organic components that do not belong to the category of ‘long dead, prehistoric biological material.’ There are many types of biofuels, though most of them are still deemed too expensive and inefficient. The two most current profitable and feasible are the generic ‘biofuels’ and ‘agrofuels’.

Biofuel is usually derived from ‘biomass’ a big heap of decomposing material from recently living (and now dead) organisms, usually plant life after harvesting. Animal refuse (like manure, slaughterhouse parts) can also be used and added to the biomass gunk. It usually consists of animal waste, construction materials, leaves and tree refuse, and crop stalks (usually wheat, oats, and rice stalks).

Agrofuels are basically specialized plants whose produce has a good composition that could be assimilated into a pseudo-fuel source. Usually, these plants have to have a very high sugar content (like sugar cane, beet, and sorghum) or starch (sweet potatoes and corn do fine) and have yeast extract the alcohol. The other one is to have plants that create high amounts of oil that can be used to support the main fuel (like palm, soy, jatropha which is fast becoming the crop of choice for oils among biofuels.) Sooner or later, these plants may be raised and cultured just for this purpose.

We have vegetable oil, used in its distilled form (rid of water and particulates) that is used by older diesel engines, as they are most compatible with the engine. Biodiesel which is produced from oil and is chemically similar to diesel. The oils are used to replace a part of the fuel. Bioalcohols are of the same value, except instead of oil, they use alcohols.

Indiana is the proponent of most of the biofuels in the country. With this move, hopefully, the state will become the leader in the green revolution.

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