OK Thank you.

I appreciate the invitation to

I appreciate the invitation
to speak here today.

I hope this presentation be useful to you.

We have some really important issues
in front of us as a society and

I'm going to cover some of them.

We have a lot of other ones but

just to cover a few We are OK but
I'm sort of keep going.

OK so

we're bombarded with an awful
lot of information and

mostly misinformation about energy choices
in particular regarding petroleum.

I hope to provide this
group here tonight and.

You know who will be watching this
later on with were some ways of making

rational choices between our alternatives.

So I mean I really
enjoyed the day with you.

It's a kind of a test
also a speaker stamina so

I've been speaking all day long and
then they let you down with not one but

two microphones here at the end of
your strength will do the best we can.

So why should WE CAN be concerned about
about energy and energy consumption.

Turns out there's a very strong
relationship between the amount of energy

the society has at its disposal and
the wealth of that society.

The slide plot that for you.

In terms of domestic energy consumption
B.T.U.'s per capita log log

scale appropriate for engineers right so
you can cover from from the very wealthy.

Well energy consuming society is to
the very rich energy hogs up anyway.

There is a very strong relationship
between the amount of wealth the society

has that they were out of energy society
has at its disposal and its wealth.

OK.

The point is that there are about
five billion people on the planet.

Who represent countries who have
rapid economic growth rates and

the only way they'll be able to grow
economically now we can be obviously

we can be more efficient
the way we use energy but

you simply have to have some energy
if you want to run a modern society.

You have to have in fact you
have to have a lot of it.

Where is it going to come from.

Where is that energy going to come from.

And I want to particularly
talk about petroleum.

But it includes cost coal and
natural gas and other energy carriers

having access to inexpensive energy
is great for you on the upward scale.

So what happens if it turns
around what does the.

History says of things energy
starts getting more expensive.

What happens.

These are brand new data a friend of mine
helped provide them their Morgan Stanley

there with the Morgan Stanley investment
bankers actually produce the data.

This is the delinquency rate on loans
otherwise known as the mortgage

default rate mortgage defaults.

OK for commercial banks A versus

the real gasoline price another
is adjusted for inflation and

this is for the period one thousand
nine hundred seventy two thousand and

ten twenty four month moving average is so
that you.

Can factor out some of the variability.

Gasoline prices which are a pretty
good proxy for oil prices rose sharply

starting in the early two thousand and
Pete.

A couple of years ago and the default
rate peaked a couple of years later.

But here later roughly a year and
a half later.

What you think about this data.

What it means a lot of
people live on the edge.

Economically.

And if they have their X.
their plans their economic plans

if you get a large increase in the cost
of anything but let's just say here.

It's the cost of gasoline or oil.

Your finances that used to sustain
you want one level income cannot

sustain you any more.

You have to make some hard choices.

Now many of us here in academia
are relatively insulated from some of the.

Blue collar friends people that live
much lower on the economic totem pole.

But through my church I know people who
had the specific choice to make they

could either keep commuting to their
job from a house that was quite distant

Michigan people tend to live quite distant
from their places of work they could

commute to their job or they could keep
their mortgage but they couldn't do both.

OK when gas prices doubled over

a period of a couple of years they could
keep making their mortgage payment or

they could keep going to work but
they couldn't do both.

So they walked away from their homes now.

Bad lending practices got the blame for
a lot of this and

I'm sure the lending practices have a lot
to do with it maybe people got loans that

they shouldn't have but the point was
they could sustain perhaps a high

long route at one set of
economic conditions and

they couldn't under another one of
the things that if you have tracked this.

I'll show you some of the data here soon.

Where prices are not
only higher than they've

been before they're much more volatile and
that's going to make a planning for

for people for corporations for
governments much more difficult.

OK so.

Relative reasonably priced stable
energy prices were great for

societies development on the upward trend.

They work strongly against you.

If they're high in volatile.

OK So

when you talk about I believe we're going
to time of really profound transition and

how we're going to feed the world and
how we're going to fuel the world.

We need to find changes that mutually
reinforce each other we need both food.

Which actually turns out to be animal
feed all talking about that and fuel and

we need to do it sustainably.

Now.
Engineers are acquainted with

the design criteria.

We're used to designing systems to
meet multiple objectives right.

But unless you formally lay out
those objectives for yourself and

figure out the appropriate metrics
that you want to try to meet

you kind of were all kind of stumbling.

In the dark and what's happened with so
much more energy discussion is we take one

metric and totally out of proportion
forget all the other metrics that we need

to be to be to be thinking about so I want
to talk about metrics for making these

decisions and a big a big question is out
there is can't buy a winner here biofuels.

Make an important difference
to meeting human needs or

not many people think they can't.

So the key biofuel
questions as I see it or

something called energy
return on energy invested.

How many of you have heard of this.

Don't be embarrassed but the idea of
Energy Return not not economic return but

energy return on energy invested.

OK that's actually good I'm glad to
see that that's more than I expected.

And they stick with the idea that
it takes energy to produce energy.

You have to drill for the oil you have to
grow the corner of the soybeans whatever

it is and the difference between
the energy that you put into the energy

production system and what you get back.

Is the energy return on investment and
your whole society has to operate on that

the gathering here is not producing any
energy in fact we're burning it up.

OK OK so

all education all culture all arts
all health care things that all of

that activity is aside other words almost
everything that makes life worth living.

Right.

Depends on having.

Energy sources that give us a large return
at least a relatively high return on

investment because everything else
we do operates on that surplus.

Everything else that we do.

So that's the idea of energy
return on energy investment.

It is no good talking about.

A potential large scale fuel
production system of any kind.

If it's energy return on investment
isn't greater than about five to one and

ten to one is better.

OK so I can scale now for biofuels but
it's going to be the case for

all renewables because a feature
of fossil fuels is they took solar

energy over eight months and concentrated
in a few spaces right a few spots.

But already doable.

Whether they're solar or wind or
biofuels are going to take

a larger land areas than perhaps we've
we've been accustomed to for fossil fuels.

They just will.

OK because you're gathering and
concentrating solar energy.

A point that I would like to make
because it's a very important point and

introduce need to think this way or

sorry not to get just here engineers
I soon this not just engineers.

The interesting thing about plant material
which And so biofuels or anything made for

a plant material the plant is both
the solar collector and the battery.

So what's a battery store
store is the energy right.

So the plant has the leaves.

That's the solar collector and
it stores the solar

energy in the STEM store in the grain or
the roots or wherever it does.

That's a very important
distinction between.

Biologically based or
plant based renewable energy and

one of attacks which have
to have the collector and

the battery separate where wind energy
which is a collector of of energy when but

then how do you store that electricity but
you can if you can't use it immediately.

You need the battery backup.

So there are systems issues about
sustainability logistics and

integration and I'm going to
talk to you specifically about

how we're trying to meet
these kind of needs fried.

Or fuel and sustainability with some
of our pretreatment technology for

cellulosic biofuels which is the area
I've worked in for a long long time.

OK so some basic energy facts we have to
understand there's there's way too much

loose thinking and
loose talk about energy.

So I hope to help everybody
all of us tighten up OK.

We don't actually use energy or what we
don't we don't value what we value is

the services that energy provides to
us not interested in gasoline per se.

I mean as in gasoline being able to get me
to my job or to visit my grandparents or

whatever it is so OK.

So for heat to keep us warm and

particularly in Michigan this time
of year we use natural gas coal and

actually quite a bit of plant
material there is light there's so

electricity cold natural gas hydro nuclear
there's lots of sources of electricity.

But for mobility our ability to
move ourselves in our goods around.

Roughly ninety five percent or

so is petroleum based We have a few
percent of ethanol oppressed natural gas.

In other words

if you believe like I believe that
world commerce depends on mobility.

OK We're going to have a world trading
system or a system where people can

move around freely between continents
to go to school to trade to visit.

That depends on liquid
fuels almost completely and

that look if you all depends
almost completely on petroleum.

If you can trade mobility you
control the world economy.

It's another way of stating it
industrial society literally stops

without liquid fuels and economic chaos
results when the demand exceeds supply.

Now I know there's like to be economists
here say well demand never can

exceed supply that it was so self
balancing that to which I say baloney.

There's there's a much.

That I know but it's an economic
truism right that's what it says.

But what happens is if you can't
get access some access to energy.

Then I was in Africa a year ago working
to try to help introduce biofuels that

would be sustainable to that kind that
it means you can't plant your crops or

you can't irrigate them.

If you can't afford the propane
to run the irrigation.

You can't afford the nitrogen fertilizer.

OK to fertilize your crops.

These are very serious issues
having access to energy

services some reasonable price for
us in the United States liquid fuels and

not interest the key national security and
economic issues.

So how are we going to compare
energy carriers of fuels.

I've talked about the energy return on
energy invested in energy supply to

society divided by the energy input
from society to make the whole

energy production system work you
correct it for energy quality basically

one megajoules of electricity is
worth three megajoules of coal or

natural gas because that's
roughly we have to burn three B.

to use three major jewels of coal
to get a medical like Christie out.

So that's the conversion factor
the exchange rate if you will

currency exchange rate.

We're interested in scale.

OK Now there are some very interesting

energy alternatives that I
think should be pursued.

But they're only going away and
that at a percent or

less of global primary energy demand they
just won't solve the problem for us.

OK.

They won't make a big contribution they
should be pursued for their own right but

they can't solve the overall problem.

So I think that sort of
a minimum scale is about

twenty percent of global primary energy
demand just eighty quads or if you prefer.

It's roughly eighty X.
ules of primary energy.

It has to be affordable.

OK can we live with something that's
two times the cost of our current

mature energy source.

I think we probably can because
over time we'll show you the data.

We tend to get better and
better at processing systems and

we can drive the cost down over time but
can we get it to roughen roughly two fold.

Sustainability there's a whole host
of potential sustainability issues

greenhouse gases nitrates
nitrate emissions.

Things like land scarce
strategic materials.

Lots of different issues there.

And then we have to make valid
comparisons between our alternatives.

This is very rarely done.

Most of the analysis that I see whether
it's for biofuels or electric vehicles or

a focus on one metric only and
make no comparisons.

You just simply analyze system
not how it relates to system B.

or are these sort of of alternatives
critical and we have to insist on it so

I ask your help as engineers
scientific colleagues

insist that people make valid comparisons
between realistic alternatives.

We don't do ourselves any good at all in

doing analysis in a vacuum as if
the alternative to biofuels for

example was some sort of
a perfect fuel that had no flaws.

The alternative right now for biofuels or

other liquid fuels is petroleum
is that worth continuing.

OK but you don't see it the an adult
now also has never done or

really done versus petroleum.

We need to compare across a number of
relevant metrics we need the same boundary

conditions in time and space a boundary
condition is just what are you going to

consider and if you're going to consider
a certain set of boundary conditions for

one fuel then you need the same boundary
conditions for the the alternative.

This is the idea of life cycle analysis.

It should be obvious to get down
to conditions are kind of what

engineers live by.

But it's often not done.

Land use issues might be important for
some.

The point again I want to make is if we
continue the status quo which is what

the United States has done for
thirty years or more.

OK it's just did her and

never make a decision not move in the door
and define direction for very long.

We continue along the pathway of greater
and greater petroleum dependency which

has its own set of dangers
very significant dangers.

So here's what I met about the higher
price and higher volatility of oil prices.

Take a minute to walk through this
because it's worth pointing out here.

So.

This is from one thousand nine hundred
six through two thousand and ten.

And the black lines represent
the nominal or the daily oil price or

average Well price the red ones which
is the actually the important one.

Represents the inflation adjusted the real
price of oil over that same time period.

Notice how we had twenty dollars
a barrel for several decades great.

OK you can get a lot of economic growth.

You can do your planning because oil
prices are relatively stable and

quite low and then only talk to resole and
myself in this audience

are old enough to have been around in one
nine hundred seventy three right around.

OK I was two so.

I was a new father at this time
our first child just been born and

I was a master's degree student
at the University of Arizona and

this is the first oil
embargo oil prices real world

prices doubled in a matter of just a month
or so and we went through the seventy's

in a period of economic stagnation
recession very severe recession.

Just to get to nine hundred seventy
nine where the Iranian oil.

Situation Iranian oil went offline for
a while and

oil prices spiked in real terms
at one hundred dollars a barrel.

And we had a nice to set
the recession depression in

the early one nine hundred eighty S..

Seven out of the eight
post war World War two

recessions have been preceded by
a sharp rise in the real price of oil.

So I'm one of eight of them.

OK correlation isn't causation.

Except it is.

OK.

So some things are just they go together.

And then we had a downward trend
the Alaskan North Slope oil and

also the North Sea oil came online here
and we had a relatively benign period

through the mid eighty's to about the late
ninety's of oil once again about twenty.

Dollars a barrel.

I've been working in cellulosic biofuels.

Since one nine hundred seventy six.

OK So all this time and then in the late.

The late two thousand
certainly two thousand and

one so the real price of oil started
climbing and it's been climbing and

been volatile ever since we're on another
upward swing in volatility right now.

Why because the balance between supply and
demand for oil is so

tight that when you have
unrest in Egypt or Tunisia or

wherever else or any other excuse
any other reason people get jittery.

They don't know if they're going
to be able to get the oil.

OK I think the United States and

the world right now all the pieces
the world they're in a recession.

Are going to have an awful lot harder time
climbing out of recession with high and

volatile oil prices.

So there we are OK We're getting close to
the end of the bad news and I promise you.

Things are going to get
more cheerful here shortly.

But you need to know the background
here otherwise we can't act properly so

when alternatives do we have I'm going
to talk now about cellulosic biofuels.

This is slide maybe one of the more
important ones that I show

you this is the cost of
oil in dollars per barrel.

This is the cost of plant
material in dollars per ton.

OK biomass plant biomass talking
grasses in straws and what chips and

all kinds of plant material we
can deliver many many hundreds of

millions of tons of this stuff for
prices around seventy dollars a ton.

OK that's quite easy to do.

This heavy black diagonal
line here is where the energy

cost of oil is equal to
the energy cost of biomass

dollars per get you all of biomass is
equal to dollars to give you a boil here.

OK now you're I believe verse in
the first law of thermodynamics right.

I trust that everybody here has been
indoctrinated with that can't create or

destroy energy you can
only change its form.

The purpose of biofuel production
what we're trying to achieve is we

convert the energy content in this biomass
into something that will replace the.

Most of my career was spent with oil
less than twenty dollars a barrel.

We couldn't even afford to buy the plant
material under those conditions and

I don't have any money left
over to process it right

when a different zone now so basically
all those years I was working with oil

with the plant material oil at twenty
dollars a barrel was hopeless.

There were the it's a few idiots like that
who just simply refuse to give up and

keep at it.

So I recommend it to you at least to
some of you but one a different regime

now Oriel I think topped out a little over
a hundred dollars a barrel yesterday.

And so now we have this margin for
converting the energy content processing

the energy content of plant material
into something that will replace oil.

And a lot of investment is going
to have making that happen.

I complete confidence
will be able to do it.

Technically I'm sure we're going to be
able to do this in fact I think it's

happening more quickly
than people realize.

So why don't we have billions
of gallons of cellulosic

biofuels on the market today.

I'll tell you some of
the reasons why we don't but

it's not as easy as just
developing the technology but

at last at last we have
thermodynamic reality going for us.

So this is what and it's important to
have supposed Oracle perspective here.

This is oil's past and
future here are the early years.

I'm talking about the early
one nine hundred cost of oil

was ten fifteen twenty cents a barrel.

The cost of processing was I said.

Relatively high.

But the discipline my own discipline of
chemicals sure it was actually invented.

If you well to learn how to process or oil
that's all chemical engineering got it.

Start with Kumble.

Come from there.

But that's how we got our start now we've
been down the cost of processing so

much that it's the cost of the process the
overall is feedstock the the total cost

is dominated by feedstock That's why when

you have swings in the oil price the gas
price responds very quickly at the pump.

That's where we are OK So historically the
processing cost related in feedstock we've

dropped processing cost of medical but now
we're at the point of diminishing returns.

And you know all these issues high
price variability economic disruption

not renewable and essence not a pretty
picture for a petroleum defended society.

Right which is what we
are are this US society

industrial society generally is petroleum
dependent and this is our future.

It's you young people's
future in particular.

Unless we can figure out how to
get large amounts of liquid fuels.

The don't depend on petroleum.

I'm working on plant conversion
plant material conversion right now.

The processing costs
are relatively high and

the plant material cost is
relatively small or we will

we are learning how to drive down the
processing cost that's already happening.

The feedstock be stable or decrease the
processing costs are currently dominated

by pretreatment by enzymes and
fermentation I'm talking about

the biological prochoice the so-called
bio conversion or sugar platform there

are other platforms to make cellulosic
while fuels are mentioned those but

that's not the area I work in about five
billion have been invested in R. and D.

over just over the last three or
four years for.

The processing of so
you also materials to biofuels.

OK A lot of progress has been made.

We need to make more but

a lot of sap and you can buy a lot five
billion by the way that five billion.

Is roughly one hundred times
the previous annual rate

of investment in this research area.

Roughly one hundred times.

So in years past.

It was roughly fifty million a year and
now it's five billion or

a couple of years.

You can make progress if you put
a hundred times more funding.

Even if you're sloppy about it.

You can make progress and
we've been somewhat sloppy.

But I think this gives
us a more attractive for

the future we have
domestically produced fuels.

We have if we do it right.

Environmental improvements
if we do it right.

We have this opportunity for
economic development and

greater energy price stability.

OK What I want to talk now about possibly
in the remainder of the lecture is how

we can do biofuels right.

You can imagine an awful lot of ways
we could be stupid about it and

do them wrong.

I want to point out some ways
that we can do them right.

So why is this worth working toward Brazil

gives you one example here in one nine
hundred eighty after they had had three

billion dollars stripped out of their
economy in a matter of a few months

because of the Iranian crisis and
oil prices went up.

So if we can't keep doing this we're never
going to develop as a country unless we

can keep more of our capital at home
to invest to develop our economy and so

they they have had experience with alcohol
fuels they said we're going to have a very

large scale alcohol production our
country and we're just going to do it.

It was made easier because they had
a military dictatorship at the time.

OK I'm not suggesting that
the US take that approach.

But our society needs to get smart
about about it and make some decisions.

So anyway they learned how
to drive down the cost.

This is actually if you plot this
there's a this is a log plot of

Log on this scale and linear Here
are some I like this is more or

less linear This decrease or
linear That's a classic curve for

reducing cost by learning
over a period of time and

right now the cost of ethanol in Brazil
on energy basis not on volume but

on for energy basis is
actually lower than gasoline.

OK.

They got this position by sticking
with something for thirty years.

I believe if United States had
made a similar decision in

one nine hundred eighty that we were
going to drive down the cost of oil or

to drive down the cost
of cellulosic fuels or

other biofuels we would be in the same
position today much lower cost us.

We didn't but so here we are today.

And we have to do with what we have but
that's what's available.

So what's the potential for.

So you lawsuit biofuels this analysis
we did a couple of years ago.

And this shows the fuel price
in dollars forgive usual.

Yeah so you could quibble that they
basically correspond to different.

Per barrel oil prices.

OK And what we looked at was of
the internal rate of return.

If you were able to get
your technology mature.

In other words we have a mature
technology like we showed you with

the Brazilian ethanol.

But if you think about what it
might look like if you drive

down the processing cost if you drive down
things what might it look like over time.

Looks to us like from a chemical fuels and
power the sea and gas and so forth.

Fisher trops fuels bio ethanol and
coal products.

Actually give you very
attractive rates of return at.

Prices of seventy or
eighty dollars a barrel.

OK it looks technically doable and

there's a lot more to to happen here but
it looks it looks like it's doable.

OK So talk about that.

So cellulosic materials include corn stalk
for a grasses municipal solid waste some

assets that forest residues wood chips
agricultural residues a lot of plant

material non-food plant material and
it requires a pretreatment.

To break open structures which generate
sugars you could then ferment and

there are other things you can do with the
sugars to sidestep fermentation chemical.

But I work on the sugar platform
where you could just take the biomass

through thermal chemical conversion
to heat power fuels and chemicals

my lab works with a process called
the ammonia fiber expansion process and

our objective is with the Dewey So you
know we support no support is to generate

clean sugars for fermentation and
about twelve cents a kilogram

Why do I chosen that target because
I have to beat the Brazilians

sucrose I have to meet or beat what
they can make sure go for in Brazil.

It's not.
Cents a kilogram and

refined sugar coming out
of the cane in Brazil.

OK So otherwise people will continue
to do what they're doing now and

just migrate to Brazil.

To produce their.

Their biofuels cheap sugar.

So we use a process we called effects
ammonia fiber expansion we treat plant

material with hot concentrated
about fifteen molar ammonia.

Ammonia water mix your short reaction
time about five ten minutes.

We don't get much from the biomass we get
high yields it's a dry dry process or

turns out to have some interesting.

Advantages you come in with dry plant
material here you leave with a lovely dry

material here there is no liquid separate
liquid stream coming out of the process.

The Cure.
Can be pelletized stored indefinitely and

then shipped as a dry stable
products a lot like grain switch and

just tickle advantages and this plant
material is a fixed rate a plant with your

doesn't require washing
detoxification conditioning if

you're familiar with this field and aware
of the various types of acid pretreatment.

You know that when you treat it with sort
of a base we treat with acid you get a few

rounds for all the hi it's another
decomposition products that generally

create trouble for you.

Downstream in it for imitation.

Well this the ammonia process
doesn't generate those.

And very importantly in animal feed
co-product potential turns out the same

chemical and physical feature of the plant
material that limit its digestion.

Put it by enzymes to make sure
it's also limit its conversion.

In an animal or human animal turns out Cal
is a member of self reproducing fermenter.

Ok for it carries around a forty
gallon fermentation tank that's

called the room and and the cattle is
doing this biological conversion and

the same things that keep the cow
from getting fat on on straw.

Also keep the Cal from
we keep enzymes from.

Attacking that biomass while the ammonia
process and other processes help.

Open up the structure of
the plant material so

that we get better
better yields of show so

there's this animal feed co-product
turns out that's really important.

Let me tell you something you're
not going to believe stuff to tell

you about three times.

OK And then maybe we'll see.

We don't grow food.

We don't plan to grow food we just don't.

Dr Dale you're crazy.

Of course we do know what we
actually grow as animal feed but

eighty five to ninety percent of
the total output of our agricultural and

pasture acres goes into a cow first
not to kill animals like House.

By Cal I mean a beef animal or
dairy animal.

We don't grow food or we actually use
our land for the United States and

in Europe and in Brazil and
in Argentina and those are the ones I for

which I've collected the data.

I don't know about other countries ship
at least those we actually plan to

grow animal feed so there's a couple
of lessons to take away from that.

We actually don't have a shortage
of land to grow to grow fuel.

If anything what we have
a conflict with is with

animal feed production and
we want to make a couple of points.

If we chose to eat a diet that was
much less meat heavy particularly

if every if we had a few less steaks and
a few less hamburgers.

We would almost certainly be healthier and
we can completely certainly

have a lot more plant available
do anything we wanted with.

But what we like is.

Is meat particularly red meat.

And it's has a very high land use impact.

I actually have less hope of getting
Americans in particular away from

a high meat diet than I do of helping
get them away from the Hummers and

the S.U.V.s and the high gas guzzlers
I think will be a meat cultivars

as long as we can after
after we've been gassed and

gotten off the gas have it so but
my I'm just telling you that's a choice.

That's not hard to Christian
requirement if it's a dietary choice.

We've chosen to use.

Lots of meat.

It's a dietary choice not a food need.

And so what I'm going to show you though
is how we could have our beef and

eat it to see that while book
called work on that simply

it was actually ways we can co-produce
animal feeds and biofuels that's what I

want to show you with show you so
much talk a bit more about this issue.

OK now.

I talked about the importance
of making multiple.

Metric comparisons.

I've worked with pretty treatments for
all my career.

Prevent is just a way of
breaking open plant cell wall so

you can get out the sugars turns out
there's a lot of pretreatment techniques.

OK.

Dilute acid concentrated acid hydrofluoric
acid proceeding there steam explosion.

Approaches supercritical gavels all on and
on and on and on.

OK.

There really dozens of them.

OK chemical mechanical radiation
approaches thermal approaches.

OK And what almost all that you
see though is how they do it.

Getting sugars.

OK that's the only data
that's published you think

that's the only metric that matters.

I hope not.

I have pointed out some others here
to you on the on the top line here so

ideally you would like also to get your
sugars in a highly concentrated form.

Why because it reduces
separation costs later on.

You would like to have this happen quickly
a reaction rate because time is money

you would like to share versus In my case
to be fermentation compatible without

any clean opportunity and you'd like to
be able to do the fermentation quickly.

You'd like to be able to scale this
process some processes are easily scalable

others are not if there is a problem
as as bad as our energy problems for

water problem areas of the world
are shortage how shortage of fresh water.

I had a very distinguished family member
from Ken Jenne University visit me.

Not too long ago.

And he said Bruce we've compared.

Treatments you look at
her treatments in China.

He said we cannot use dilute acid.

It has uses too much water.

We simply rejected it.

Not that it doesn't have other nice
features he said the water use is too high

and we don't see how to reduce the water.

He was so
we just took it off the criteria list.

There is input cost as it
is a lot of chemicals.

They've been preserved waste us.

I'm actually going easy on you if these
are only nine criteria I have another nine

eighteen going out here but
they won't fit on one slide.

OK things like expensive materials
of construction process control

all these kinds of things that matter
when you want to do something at scale.

They don't matter much in the laboratory.

But if you want to do hundreds of
millions of times a year they matter

if you want to make billions of gallons
tens of billions of gallons of fuel.

They all matter.

OK so I've been working with a process
we call it effects we think that house.

Most of these features are desirable and
we're working to try to to.

On issues of scale ability and
input costs.

Anyhow.

So one of the features of
the effects process is that it

takes Lebanon which is part of the plant
material and brings it to the surface.

OK so some of the lake minutes in
the plant material is dissolved and

brought to the surface as a part of
the pretreatment and that's the reason for

the starker color.

This is the effects treated cornstalk over
a fixed treated just switchgrass this

material has a book density of
about six pounds per cubic foot.

It's not very easy to move around.

OK So a couple of years ago after
working on this for a long time.

It just hit me.

Bruce the ligaments are natural that.

It's a natural glue.

So why don't you take advantage of that
feature and run your plant your see

if it pellets easily if you can
make it into a cheap pellet and

you can probably almost anything you want
if you run it at higher temperature and

you put binders in but we have a binder.

So we don't need to add a binder.

There's a lot of it.

So we can run it through a fairly
low pressure pelletised and

we get a material that has support density
of about forty five pounds per cubic foot

roughly eight hundred kilograms
per cubic meter flows

like corn on a book sense and we handle
in conventional solid him like material

the cost of pellets about
five to ten dollars per ton.

This is the kind of logistical issues that
haven't been paid much attention yet in so

you know so biofuels that we
have to pay attention to it.

We're going to have this
industry be a large scale one.

So I've done this
comparison again of energy

sources in the carriers and
try to compare the pure energy return on

investment scale cost can they replace
petroleum and sustainability issues and.

Again not all of the ones
that you might summarize but

whether it was discovered around
one thousand thirty the new or

which is more tends to be deepwater or
offshore oil tar sands shale oil Christie

sort of full that takes bio diesel corn
ethanol came out than all and so forth and

where some energy return on investment and
read indicates very unfavorable.

In energy return on investment of of

these five to want to should
be more like ten to one.

To really to make progress here.

Can you get to scale.

Well either biodiesel or

corn ethanol is going to allow you to
get to the scale to solve problems.

They might help.

They might be a part of the solution
they can't be the whole thing.

The cost shale oil very high.

Car sense quite high.

Turns out to our sense have a terrible
energy return on investment.

Used lots and lots of natural
gas to convert the basement.

OK.
People are doing quite well it's a measure

of how much we need liquid fuel that's
why the tar sands are going on while

the investments flowing there can
never replace petroleum again.

I think we need all of the sustainably
produce electricity we can get but

battery operated vehicles are limited.

In their ability to sort of supply
transportation needs at a maximum I

think we'll be able to provide
about half of our mobility needs or

mathematics not being very generous.

For example we're never going to
have a battery operated jet plane

just isn't going to happen.

Ok us roughly thirty billion gallons
a year of jet fuel both commercial and

military aviation and
in this country that's a lot of fuel.

So we absolutely have to have liquid fuels
there and then issues of sustainability.

So let me walk you through the analysis
we've done we think that we know that

the biofuels have the potential for
large scale and low cost.

They can replace petroleum and
in general if

we do it right the sustainability
issues part walk you through.

So when I say biofuels for
the energy return on investment.

I want to hurry up a little bit because
I want to assure we have enough time to

get to scale.

Yes twenty percent of world energy
there's at least sixteen cause

of crop residues available.

And then if you just used a fraction
of world not food land at all.

Well past your land.

And increased its yield from about two
tons per acre to four tons per acre

would have been more than enough
biomass you can get even more

if you have a Gratian which I'm going
to show you in a moment or two.

Can we get to cost no more
than two times current

oil fuels shook in
ethanol is already there.

It already is better than oil but
so once again and all.

Should be able to be produced for under
two dollars a gallon done the analysis

a number of different ways
convinced we can get there.

Sustainability there's a lot of
potential for carbon dioxide reduction.

If you strictly manage nitrogen
you can improve the energy

return on investment this greenhouse gases
and also in leeching which is a major

Carlos of the Anarchs examined in the Gulf
of Mexico the so-called dead zone.

Then there's integration issues energy
return on investment estimates in energy

supply to society by
the energy input from society.

We jested for
energy quality by this three to one.

It's I estimated at twelve today
twelve to one today for so

you know six and
about ten to one for sure.

Again ethanol with the potential to be
thirty to one or so in the near term

the next five or ten years we ought
to be able to get so biofuels

to around thirty to one energy return on
investment show you how that's possible.

We used to.

Publish studies this is
an actual field study for

the agricultural this is a net energy of
cellulosic ethanol from switchgrass and

what these folks did was to estimate or to
measure the amount of energy input to grow

switchgrass in the American great plants
and this is a paper that I wrote that were

brought in by a group that I'm involved
with on the battery finding So

you take this product and you buy refine
it and what's your what does your energy.

Look like there.

So here's the switchgrass locations
these were large field trials dozens

of scores of Hector's at each place for
ten different places so that it's a very

good field study a couple of interesting
things I want to point out to you here.

There have been three previous studies
based on modeling for the energy return

on investment for switchgrass there's
three studies referenced in the paper.

Now these folks were honest and I think
capable but a model can only tell us so

much in this case the model is really
wrong because what the model said.

So there's only two energy
inputs that matter.

There is a diesel fuel required to
point out and harvest the crop and

the haul it to process then and
then there's the fertilizer.

Those are the two dominant energy
inputs for growing anything.

OK they overestimated the diesel fuel
required by about factor of five in

the modeling efforts and
they and lot of the studies over

estimated the nitrogen fertilizer
requirement by a factor of two to one.

OK this is the real data.

This is actually what it takes.

And that's what we used to calculate or
estimate the energy return on investment.

So.

Be appropriately skeptical about modeling
studies in an area where very little

field work or
actual data has been gathered

you don't have any way of calibrating
yourself along with them are so realistic.

So we looked at the by
refinery energy efficiency and

looked at these three different
conversion scenarios ethanol and

some powered by ranking cycle the current
cycle if you got the ranking in the cycle

of more mature and then ethanol with
gas through and combined cycle power.

This is the overall conversion
efficiency sixty eight percent for

forty three percent.

OK thermal efficiencies of oil
refinery right now are running.

What is it seventy five eighty percent.

Ron so many so many I don't know that we
can certainly get the power refineries

to do the same thing with some effort.

So all that means is what's the as a
fraction of the heating value of the more

heating value of the fuel coming in.

How much of that you recover in products.

So look at three scenarios today.

You know I calculations for

cellulosic ethanol is about
three tons per acre of grass.

Fertilizer from the study and
switchgrass the.

Labor and materials and

then the Seafish forty percent rule of law
efficiency for ethanol nineteen cycle.

This is today at hand double or
triple the grass fields but

don't double the fertilizer triple
of fertilizer just double it.

And then certain amount of diesel fuel for
hogs and

the potential increase the grass
fields but not nitrogen fertilizer.

I did for the lies there is
the big the biggest one there.

The biggest single energy input and
then higher gas turbine

combined cycle higher efficiency something
more approaching current oil refineries.

So those are the three scenarios
I investigated the question is

are there plants that don't need.

Nitrogen fertilizer.

This is an engineering school and
the body here know anything about plants.

OK you need to know something about
plants the plant called alfalfa

the best clover comes with the best
clover honey comes from it.

It turns out of school
a so-called legume and

it does not require nitrogen
fertilizer it fixes its own nitrogen

has bacteria that live at its
root on it does that for us.

Perhaps more importantly from a biofuel
production point is a plant called

miscanthus.

This is the results of a long
term study fourteen years.

Conducted in Great Britain
in the United Kingdom and

they did three different fertilization and
I did fertilization trials on this

on these plants nitrogen sixty pounds
of Russian fertilizer predictor.

So it's sixty eight kilograms for
perfecter and

one hundred twenty kilograms for Hecker
they saw no difference in the yield at all

this product is apparently very
efficient in the way it uses nitrogen

you have to have nitrogen to
make the proteins that that

produce the enzymes that capture solar
energy right foot for photosynthesis.

But this plant is very efficient about
breaking that was forty thousand sending

the nitrogen to its root structure
is actually called rhizomes and so

it when that the plant dies in the fall or

some masses it translocate its nitrogen
to the roots where it's ready.

The next year when things warm up.

It will move that nitrogen back up to
the to the leaves produce the leaves and

away you go again.

OK so if one plant can do this night
Miscanthus or if you have plants

like alfalfa certainly we can learn how to
improve the nitrogen you see efficiency of

plant material over time and so
with that with that kind of information.

I did this calculation of energy return
on investment for cellulosic ethanol.

The agricultural face today is about
twenty three at hand if you double

it increase the.

The biomass deal but
only double triple the the crop yield but

only double the amount of
fertilizer this is what you get and

potentially if you have no nitrogen
fertilizer just the fuel for

harvesting this is what be the true
nature investment on the face.

We multiply that by a fraction a percent
for the better refinery efficiency and

we get the system energy return
on investment twelve to one

thirty to one hundred sixty to one
hundred sixty one would be better than

Then in the very early days of oil
production you just stuck a hole

a pipe in the ground in the oil jumped out
of roughly one hundred to one back then.

That's what.

And it's because you have solar energy
the sun providing the energy for you and

even right now offshore oil production
is probably in the fifteen to one ratio.

So we're already at or better than energy
return on investment for offshore.

That isn't counting in
the cost of a gulf cleanup.

If you have a blowout.

OK so.

So.

Energy return on investment.

I think that so
you also fuels meet all those metrics.

But we have to insist
on valid comparisons.

So the last issue I want to deal with
briefly is the food which is fuel issue

boss people believe that we're using
all our agricultural land efficiently.

OK without knowing anything about it.

That's what they believe.

And if we can't change agricultural
significantly again without know

anything about it.

That's what they believe.

The other is true.

What's happening is that we're not asking
the right questions in our lot of our

analysis of biofuels.

We're asking.

Can we impose a large new
demand on agriculture and.

For biofuels and
help that not cause any problems.

OK that's what we're asking we're not
saying so explicitly that just we're

saying what will happen if I just ramp up
biofuel production on existing ag land

without doing anything else differently
to start using more of that material.

And you you get problems.

What we should be asking is can we
redesign an engineering word right

sort of cause all the engineers
here to reach us design.

Yes that's what we do right.

So you have a system design.

Can you redesign the system produce
both biofuels and food and feed.

The question a couple questions to ask you
when you enter the in Apple's five hundred

driving a golf cart.

Anybody do here.

Would you do that or
would you be competitive.

Now.

OK why it's a perfectly good vehicle.

I rode over to lunch on a golf cart.

OK it's not designed to compete
in the Indy five hundred is it.

How about an Indy five hundred vehicle
would you drive that around a golf course.

Not unless you want to
pay a really expensive

variations to the green
right when you will.

It's not designed to go on a golf course
to be a little bit more crude but

hopefully pointed in example would
use a toothbrush to sweep the floor

with brushes perfectly good for
sweeping the inside of your mouth right.

Not so good for sleeping the floor
wasn't designed to do that.

The point is you have to design the system
to accomplish the things that you want to

have it accomplish and what we need
to do is think about redesigning

how we use land to produce food which
is actually animal feed in fuel

change before it can
certainly change again.

And as I mentioned earlier
we don't use land for

animals for not really for direct human
consumption it's not really for food.

It's for animal feed.

So I want to prevent to analysis we did
thinking about using land efficient animal

feeds to provide biofuels and
if you haven't still don't believe me.

Here's some basic numbers.

Engineers are to believe the numbers
numbers gathered you know properly.

So what we did is we looked at
the herd size for the different

animals that mystic animals and thousands
fifteen million dairy animals and

about seventy two million be found almost
roughly one hundred million cows out there

that's one for
every three Perth people in the country.

Off a lot of cows over.

Because they don't live where people live.

But they require a certain amount of
protein and they require a certain

amount of calories are food energy animals
like people require two major food

items they need protein and
they need calories so just well energy.

Well we know how much they need and
this is how much in total.

Well supplied their individual
requirements tied the herd size

that's the total requirement
then hardship and so forth.

Human requirements are heard saw
as about three hundred million

people in the country.

And we would acquire this much protein and
this many calories

probably want to make here is that
the we're feeding our animals.

Ten times as much protein as
human beings actually need.

As we could meet the human demand for

protein with about one tenth of
what we're feeding to animals.

My point is that we don't
grow food we grow animal feed

we can meet the human demand for

calories with about one fifth of
the calories that we feed to our animals.

So what we've done here is to look at take

a portion of our crop land
we think how we use it.

We redesigned the system to
produce more winter double cross.

Let me call the protein concentrate and

then appreciated biomass be
digestibility from human animals and

we saw the way the set of linear equations
to solve the crop and use the products

to maximize that more production and
minimize greenhouse gas emissions.

To give you an idea of what I mean by a
winter double cross the idea here is that

you go across the grass or Legume over
the winter and spray on corn or soy and

what are you still grow corn or soy and
if you're not quite good with agriculture.

We plant corn when it's already warmed
up early summer like early early to

maybe even to mid June and
it grows really fast for

two or three months and
then we harvest it by early September.

There is growing season before you plant
the corn and there's growing season after

you plant the corn and so the idea is
after you've harvest the corn in the fall.

You plant a grass and
like winter rye or close.

Something that grass grows up a few
inches in the fall day over winters and

then the spring it grows like crazy.

OK because it's a cool season so
called C three or cool season grass.

And then you go back and

you harvested in late May and
your corn crop right afterwards.

OK So this is what early May This
is about a mile from my house.

This fellow has a dairy and this is
the first green feed that his animal gets

in the spring he plants a winter rye and
feeds us to his dairy heard of this rain

turn one hundred eighty degrees
this is the adjacent field.

This guy doesn't have a direct he has no
use for this grass he can't sell it so

he doesn't plan anything and
you have where this

land that could be fixing solar
energy could be producing biomass.

But it's not being used for
that because there's no market for it.

So if you provided a market
more of it would be grown and

so what we see is this is how we currently
use land to produce these products this

is the materials we get from energy and
I don't know if we have protein and

so forth.

We're saying is take this corn and
the corn store which is the crop residue

the double crop and some energy grasses
and use them to meet the same needs and

then have as much biomass as
you can battle over to produce.

To boost fuel and again the papers
available in Environmental Science and

Technology in November.

But on the same using the same amount
of land the total biomass increases by

two and a half clients total amount of
plant material increases by two and

a half times we can displace fifty percent
of US gasoline with that material of five

percent of our electricity we would reduce
U.S. greenhouse gases by ten percent but

the food in feed production
would remain the same or so

getting the same amount of food or
feed out.

But we were meeting
those needs differently.

Using the land differently more
efficiently to get an awful lot of fuel

versus not so much fuel from
existing where we do existing

we've done a sensitivity analysis
on this to see how robot.

The system is to our assumptions we
looked at maximum ethanol production.

If there is no constraint on the role
crops turns out the most important

thing you can do is grow as
much of double crop as possible

uses double crops much as possible.

It gives you over five hundred if you did
one hundred percent double crafted get.

Well over five hundred gave the leaders
of like one hundred ten one hundred

one hundred forty or so
billion gallons of fuel and

greenhouse gas reductions
on the order of ten percent

ten to twelve percent of the TOLD US
greenhouse gas production.

So again it's resilient
over a variety of scales.

So some last thoughts here.

Bring our scale while fuel production is
possible through better managed plans

without disrupting food production
provoking indirect land use change

has a favorable inventor's
return on investment.

Lots of fuel produced and significant
reductions in total greenhouse gases

the double crop is actually
the most important feature here.

Finally an opportunity for
farmers and biofuel producers and

government agencies to stop fighting and
work together to solve a real problem and

kind of a quick parting
point you want to make.

It's not hard to plant grass.

OK this is technology we
have figured out right.

OK so it's more a matter of our choice.

I believe that biofuel production is
not really limited much by technology

constraints or by resource constraints
it's more a matter of our choices

we have some choices to make.

And so we have to understand
what we're choosing between and

how we're going to do that and

just leave you with the challenge if we
don't do something to provide alternatives

to petroleum How's the developing
world going to continue to develop.

The stone age to not end for

the lack of stone in the oil age when
long before the world runs out of oil

what I mean by ending the oil is not
that petroleum is going to go away.

We're going to have it around for
a long time.

But that it stops being.

A strategic commodity something that is so
pivotal to politics and prosperity and

just becomes another product that we
buy like salt or potatoes or whatever.

OK which is what it should be so

again I invite you to think
about grass only in your tanks.

This is the you know that very well
that professors don't do anything.

We just go out and talk about it.

Well this is the group of students and

technicians that actually make this is my
passion version research lab team and.

Thanks very much for
the chance to talk with you today.

Well my plane doesn't
leave till eight thirty.

And I'm so
you can feel what I want to spend it all.

If you need to leave.

Just please go here.

But if you want to stay around.

I'll stick around as long
as people want to do that.

Yeah OK Yeah bye bye bye that time so.

Yes.

Yes OK.

Right.

Actually that's that's
a very good question and

you probably would have provide
additional fertilizer but

one of the things that somebody needs to
do I can't do any more than room somebody.

See if we want to fuel right.

We want as much carbon much hydrogen as
much carbon as you can as little oxygen

as possible and not magnesium and
no nitrogen in the fuel.

So we want to recycle those elements we
need to figure out how to do that but it

turns out that with corn in particular we
root farmers routinely over fertilize corn

they do it not because they're stupid or
malicious but because you want it matters.

Everything for them so they were to me put
on more nitrogen fertilizer than they need

just to make sure they get high heels.

If you plant a grass after that you
take up that nitrogen that otherwise

would be why.

Now there are still phosphorous and
potassium to deal with but but

we you know we can figure
out how to do that.

I think and
figure out how to recycle those elements.

It turns out though that the that
the roots of the grass would leave behind

the soil but

over time build up the carbon content
would make the soil more fault fertile.

In fact that's what farmers tend to grow
cover crops right now for is for enhanced

soil fertility because there is the the
carbon that's left behind in the roots.

Yes

yes.

That's incorrect.

It's but it's not very well it's been
because it's been published widely and

repeated by the media ever since about one
thousand nine hundred to one where press

or chemical first published the study
he might have been correct back then.

But he hasn't updated his numbers since
one thousand nine hundred two and

The Wall Street Journal continues this The
Wall Street Journal editorial page runs

this out every few years that they
hate ethanol from corn basically and

they say it doesn't even get the energy
back investment in the wrong.

It's about two to one but
it's not very favorable certainly not

large enough to make a huge industry
out of but it's slightly positive.

Yes.

I'm

sorry I'm a little bit hard of hearing
I tried to understand what you please

repeat what you said most of us not.

All well as these plants that grow and
that's part of the world.

They're not like these
weak Southern plants.

You know.

Sorry.

Isn't that they're not actually what you
want is to the snow to fall on them and

to cover them that way at the roots
don't get thawed and frozen and

thawed and frozen so
you want the insulating blanket of snow.

The worst one of the worst things
is to have a freeze thaw cycle.

So these grasses that I'm talking about.

Come back in this in the summer
in the spring very well and

particularly if they if they have
a blanket of snow over them.

One is that there's two major energy
inputs for for crop production.

One is nitrogen fertilizer
that's a very important one and

the second one is the diesel fuel required
to plant and harvest the material.

So corn needs a lot of nitrogen.

But grasses not so much.

And this grass Miscanthus needs hardly
any at all and that was be the basis for

having a high energy return on investment
if you could reduce the fertiliser.

Amount of fertiliser requirement
the day that I showed you.

Indicated that about.

The energy inputs to produce grass.

Something like seventy percent of
that's the nitrogen for visor.

So if you can cut that down and you
take out a huge amount of energy input.

OK And then if you have higher healing
crops so you can get more stuff.

Every time your Harvester goes through
then that increases the or decreases

the amount of energy required per ton of
Harmison almost nothing else matters.

Just close to the fertilizer and
the diesel fuel for

harvesting Did I answer your question.

OK thank you so it turns out for

corn corn needs a lot of harvesting
only half the plant and it needs a lot

of fertilizer grass you harvest the whole
plant it doesn't need as much for wiser.

That's the very simple short answer.

Yes Rachael.

Yes.

Right.

Yes but we don't have we're not
producing much sight altogether and

all right now there's a.

Twenty or thirty million gallons of
capacity that's operating but so

it was a projected future price for
science also getting all.

That's that's right yeah.

There's actually a couple
of ways to do it.

One is to assume that you would
get to the efficiency and

so you also biofuels as we have for
oil refinery today so.

If seventy percent of the cost of
producing gasoline is tied up in the oil.

Just the raw material the oil cost
the Rangers thirty percent protein

if you apply that rough ratio if you
assume that we can get that far with

with the refining biomass I think we
can then that racial take you there but

also much more anger analysis will take
you to under two dollars a gallon.

Right.

I mean.

When you look at different times

that me.

OK.

Right.

When I say cellulosic ethanol
it's a kind of shorthand for

saying well convert
the carbohydrate part of biomass.

To ethanol or or another biofuel So
that's beside the loss and heavy sales

which account together for roughly two
thirds of the planet weight the leg man.

Unless you do.

A fish or traps or
other type of thermal conversion.

That should be burned in the processing
facility to bright the steam and

electricity you need to run the facility
so be the residual fuel and we'll

recover the protein for animal feed and
figure out how to recover the minerals.

So that it probably is part of that
ash from the from the fuel cell itself

to get those back on the land and
not deplete the soil somebody to do that.

OK no dramas here I'll have to go up to
one side maybe that school up in Athens.

Yeah.
Thank you.

That's a good question.

You may have heard if you follow
this you thought that well but

if you also use a lot of water.

Well gee.

So there's two ways that
they can use water one is

growing in the field and the other is the
rubber use in the processing facility in

the processing facility to mouse about
two or three gallons of water per

gallon of fuel which actually is
less of what we're using for or

comparable or less than we have or
the refinery uses to produce.

To produce gasoline.

Where people get the high numbers is is

they assume that these biofuel
crops will be irrigated.

And they say that that's the amount
of water that's going to be used but

but again this is this is not
about plant physiology right.

A plan that is a is nature's
water recycling device.

OK So water fall snow or rain falls or

is on the ground the plant roots take
that up and use the solar energy in

the leaves to transpire it evaporated
through the leaf to clear up.

Again it's water vapor pure
vapor this time to fall again

it's rain someplace else and other words

pirates are a natural part of the of
the eco ecological cycle for for water.

Petroleum fuels aren't OK.

Oil has no place in a natural
ecosystem and water recycle and

so you have to make the appropriate
comparison which is what I've been

haranguing people on here for
the last hour right.

So you can get to how people the people
that claim high water he was for

biofuels are assume he will irrigate them.

Nobody's proposing that we are a gator
biofuel You probably can't afford it.

Anyway.

And number two is that they are totally
missing the distinction between

what plants do with water.

If there are a friend of mine.

Rob an X.
University Wisconsin did a study and

it turns out if we planted large areas
of switchgrass in cancer of a home.

What would happen was they do
use general circulation models.

It looks like Indiana would get more rain.

OK So again weather moves
from west to east right.

So those Carboniferous come
off the plants in Kansas

rise up into the atmosphere form clouds
and the rain comes down in Indiana.

That's OK.

Maybe you think India has
too much rain as it is all

I'm doing OK I've heard that one.

Please please leave if you feel
like you need to I'm not good.

I want to be anybody.

I want to keep anybody
here against their will.

But who knows I might say something
really outrageous and funny.

And it be.

But beautiful.

Thank you

thank you.