E3 in the News
Cow Power at U.S. Ethanol Plant
Houston Chronicle
April 13, 2007
By Brett Clanton
Dennis Langley is the CEO of E3 BioFuels, a small firm in Shawnee, Kan., with a big plan for improving the way ethanol is produced.
At a new plant in Mead, Neb., the firm is using what it calls a "closed-loop" process to produce the corn-based fuel.
The system's main purpose is to minimize the plant's impact on the environment, chiefly by eliminating the need for fossil fuels to power it. Hint: Cow manure has more uses than fertilizer.
Langley believes the nearly self-sustaining process can help make ethanol a much bigger part of the nation's fuel supply in coming years and reduce energy used to make the alternative fuel.
He plans to bring the technology to Texas soon. Langley recently spoke with Chronicle reporter Brett Clanton.
Q: Can you explain what you mean by a "closed-loop" production process at your plant in Nebraska?
A: It's like a traditional ethanol plant with two or three variations.
The first is that it is not fueled at all by fossil fuels. One hundred percent of the fuel is from biogas. ... Manure is collected from the dairy or the feedlot and moved into anaerobic digestion along with cellulosic biomass material and you get three products out of it.
Your biggest, most significant product is you get 100 percent methane. But it's biogas methane, not fossil fuel methane, to power the entire operation. The second thing you do is you produce aqueous ammonia, which is the fertilizer advantage extracted from the manure. And the third thing it produces is a compost material that is like a peating compost that can be bagged and sold to gardening stores.
Q: Ethanol is often touted as a way to help the U.S. gain energy independence, but is that a realistic goal?
A: In a short period of time, like a year, it's unrealistic. In a period of time, over 10 to 20 years, it's extremely realistic.
I think with just corn grain you can get to 30 percent of your fuel mix, maybe as high as 40 percent. With cellulosic ethanol, add another 5 to 10 percent. With soy diesel, add another 5 to 10 percent.
So you can start to get in the ranges of 40 to 50 percent. We could move into 60 percent with any form of conservation or in a stress situation. In the 1970s, we proved that within 10 years' time, you can decrease your consumption by 30 percent if it's a national all-out effort.
Q: What do you say to those who believe ethanol's potential has been overstated?
A: Frequently, they talk about ethanol the way it was five years ago or the way it was two years ago. They talk about it as if it's static. It's kind of like talking about the efficiency of the internal combustion engines in 1920 and assuming it's going to be static and extrapolating your data from that.
Those engines look nothing like the internal combustion engines of today. They do the same thing about corn production or corn acreage. They talk about it as if it's static. It's never been static. It never will be static.
Q: But doesn't that perception affect your ability to raise capital for your projects?
A: Sure it does. Without a doubt, it's much more difficult to raise money for an ethanol plant today than it was a year ago. We overcome that by simply showing the differences. So any investor who's interested and wants to understand the differences can say, "OK, my concerns really don't apply to you." But it still doesn't mean it's not more difficult.
Q: Your plan is to add roughly three new plants a year for the next five years. Will any of those plants land in Texas?
A: Yes. I just can't talk about specifics because I have confidentiality agreements. But I would tell you that the Panhandle of Texas comes up nicely.
"I think with just corn grain you can get to 30 percent of your fuel mix, maybe as high as 40 percent. With cellulosic ethanol, add another 5 to 10 percent. With soy diesel, add another 5 to 10 percent. So you can start to get in the ranges of 40 to 50 percent. We could move into 60 percent with any form of conservation or in a stress situation. In the 1970s, we proved that within 10 years' time, you can decrease your consumption by 30 percent if it's a national all-out effort."
-- Dennis Langley, E3 BioFuels