New North Dakota Biodiesel Refinery

[dabenz]

Will be the first US 'refinery' to use canola/rapeseed. Construction slated to start August 2005, with production in December 2006. Expected annual production is 30,000,000 gal/yr from 250,000 ton/yr of canola. The owners: North Dakota Biodiesel, owned by Biodiesel Holding (Delaware), owned by Science and Technologies Industries International (Germany).

Let's play some numbers games: North Dakota canola yield averages 0.71 ton/acre, so we'll need more than 350,000 acres/yr (550 sq. mi./yr) of canola. Using the 0.71 number, canola produces 85 gal oil/acre. North Dakota planted 756,000 acres of canola in 2004 (90% of US production - Canada produces a lot more), so Canada will be a player.

More numbers games: let's say a semi-truck gets 10mph (a low estimate) and runs 150,000 mi/yr. 30,000,000 gal/yr will keep 2,000 trucks running. That's a drop in the bucket, but I guess a start is a start is a start.

[Dana B.]

What part of ND, Grand Forks, Fargo?

[dabenz]

Will be located just south of Minot, ND. Two rail lines there. Not sure about pipeline. Tesoro might have their fingers in it too, as they were at a planning meeting. Tesoro has a petroleum refinery southeast of Minot and dedicated pipeline to the Twin Cities in Minnesota. The questions I have:
1. Will it really get built? Coal and petroleum oil rule North Dakota. Eight renewable energy bills didn't make it out of ND legislature this year.
2. If it gets built then how long will it run? There seems to be a lot of fingers in the pie, and the more fingers there are the less profit per finger.
3. Who gets the oil? If Tesoro has a finger in the pie then the oil may go to military use. Navy directed 20% of non-tactical diesel to be bio by mid 2005. Tesoro refinery is a high grade oil which military likes.

[J. R. B.]

daBenz, what town are you close to? I'm 35 miles west of Bismarck on I94.
J. R. B.

[Pete Burton]

Originally Posted by dabenz

Will be the first US 'refinery' to use canola/rapeseed. Construction slated to start August 2005, with production in December 2006. Expected annual production is 30,000,000 gal/yr from 250,000 ton/yr of canola. The owners: North Dakota Biodiesel, owned by Biodiesel Holding (Delaware), owned by Science and Technologies Industries International (Germany).

Let's play some numbers games: North Dakota canola yield averages 0.71 ton/acre, so we'll need more than 350,000 acres/yr (550 sq. mi./yr) of canola. Using the 0.71 number, canola produces 85 gal oil/acre. North Dakota planted 756,000 acres of canola in 2004 (90% of US production - Canada produces a lot more), so Canada will be a player.

More numbers games: let's say a semi-truck gets 10mph (a low estimate) and runs 150,000 mi/yr. 30,000,000 gal/yr will keep 2,000 trucks running. That's a drop in the bucket, but I guess a start is a start is a start.

Think of treating 2,997,000,000 gal/yr of ULSD with bio to keep 200,000 running by properly lubricating their fuel systems.

[seafarer12]

Saying it would only keep 2000 trucks in fuel. Remember there is a slim chance they will be running on B100. You just run B20 and you get a big reduction of pollution. Thats 10000 trucks running on B20. Hopefully it will stay domestic. I know most of the biodiesel produced in the US now gets exported to Europe.

[dabenz]

J.R.B., I'm 45mi north of Fargo.

Good math for the B10 and B20 guys. I'd like to see B50 mandated in my lifetime, at least in the warm months. I wonder who would call the shots then - oil companies or the seed and farm chemical companies?

[phantoms]

Also remember that they are not "limited" to canola. That's one of the great things about BioDiesel, that it can be made from many different oils and as newer and better alternatives come to light, making production changes are easy compared to other fuel technologies.

[Larry Delor]

All this makes me wonder which "seed" can yield the most oil.
What about nuts? I think the Brazil nut is fairly oily, is it not?

[aklim]

Originally Posted by dabenz

J.R.B., I'm 45mi north of Fargo.

Good math for the B10 and B20 guys. I'd like to see B50 mandated in my lifetime, at least in the warm months. I wonder who would call the shots then - oil companies or the seed and farm chemical companies?

Still the oil companies. Most cars are still gasoline and will probably continue to outnumber the diesel cars for the most part.

[aklim]

Originally Posted by seafarer12

Saying it would only keep 2000 trucks in fuel. Remember there is a slim chance they will be running on B100. You just run B20 and you get a big reduction of pollution. Thats 10000 trucks running on B20. Hopefully it will stay domestic. I know most of the biodiesel produced in the US now gets exported to Europe.

It gets to go there because europe will pay more for it that we do. The only way would be to pay more for it to get it to stay here. That would jack it into a price war and raise our costs.