Back Yard Micro Refueling Station for Ethanol - 350 gallons of Sugar create 35 gallons of fuel per week.

E-Fuel Corporation, a Silicon Valley startup, has created a backyard refueling station that looks about as difficult as making beer. Okay - maybe easier than making beer as it doesn’t require all the vessel transfers. It uses water, sugar, and yeast to create ethanol. It takes ten gallons of sugar (unusual measurement for a dry product) to create one gallon of ethanol. Over a week, the system can create 35 gallons of fuel. This means you’d have to have 350 gallons of sugar on hand on a weekly basis to create the ethanol. Where do you store all that sugar? What I do really like about this though is that this is set up for the individual to create their own fuel. They are selling these now, but delivery is not until fourth quarter this year. For just $9995 you can have your own ethanol back yard refueling station.

I love the name of this one - the Freedom Fueler. It’s the home biodiesel maker. You just need to collect waste oil from your local fry house. They have several different models - the entry level one is $3495 and can produce 40 gallons of fuel with just 30 minutes of effort. With 80 gallons of waste oil and 22 gallons of methanol, you produce 80 gallons of biodiesel with a by product of 22 gallons of glycerin. Glycerin is used in hand lotions, and in creating nitroglycerin (the explosive). Additionally, biodiesel has a high clouding temperature and is not suitable for use in cold climates without putting in a winterizing additive or blending it with diesel oil.

My ideal is to have an algae biofuel system that can create 35 gallons per day of algae biofuel from a small back yard system. In my ideal system, you grow your own algae and have the compressor set up to automatically create the fuel. Considering algae doubles in size every day, you’d have to get the right strain that would grow the best for your area. The ability to do this is much further away than fourth quarter this year so I might go with this micro fuel system first while the algae biofuel technology becomes more developed.   There are varying levels of success so far with algae biodiesel, yet tremendous research is happening on this front - Ames Laboratory is testing out an idea that would produce 10,000 gallons of algae biodiesel per year on just 1 acre of land.  If they are successful, a smaller scale back yard operation producing the amount of fuel a small family needs to heat their home and fuel their vehicles is possible.