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Originally Posted by cmac2012
J.R.B!
Before the shifting of the earth here, you mentioned that you were maybe going to start growing rapeseed or some other seed (I forget) for fuel. I'm curious what the cost of that fuel might be. I imagine that'd be a pretty difficult question to answer, especially if you haven't done it before.
I read, now and then, claims that ethanol requires more BTUs to grow and produce it than it yields. I'm thinking that's not right but I could see the possible dilemma. Then there's the possibility that widespread growing of fuel crops -- oil or ethanol -- would be fairly taxing on farmland. I don't want to make trouble here, but neither do I want to embace false promise.
I read somewhere about a farmer raising rapeseed and running all his equipment on it. My hope is that rapeseed could be raised using an amount of bio-diesel that was a small fraction of the yield of the operation. If it can't be, doesn't look good to raise oil exclusively for fuel, as opposed to raising oil crops for restaurant use first, recycled for fuel use second. Used cooking oil is no way going to fill in for world-wide demand for petroleum (duhhh...) so if virgin oil can't be used for fuel at decent rates, oh man, what next?
I've also read that using ethanol instead of the more toxic methanol to make biodiesel is possible but more difficult. Is methanol obtainable from plant material entirely? I mean it is called wood alcohol. Hell, I should yahoo it and find out.
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At
www.journeytoforever.org is a list of different seeds and the oil yeild per bushel. According to the charts and what Bot has said I will probably have to sacrifice 15 acres to supply my needs, which I'm willing to do. This is figuring a poor to average crop. My neighbor has been farming for at least 5 years on his own fuel. He uses sunflower seeds and has a crushing machine. I'm going to try to get to see him before he makes his yearly winter exodus to Arizona and look at his set up. I will probably build my own in my machine shop. I would have seen him a couple of weeks ago but I smashed my right knee cap and have been on crutches with a lot of pain. Maybe next week I will feel better and see him. The down side of the crushing for me is the fact that I will be one year behind times and will have to farm with #2 again. I have been mixing used crankcase oil @ 10% this summer. If I can accumulate enough crankcase oil it should offset my fuel expenses this coming year so I can limp through. I'm a cheap SOB. I'll keep you guys posted on the crushing equipment and if I build my own I'll show you guys how I do it.