Biodiesel Fuel Revolving Fund Expenditures Fiscal Year 2003 Report, Iowa Department of Transportation, January 2004

Report of expenditures from the biodiesel fuel revolving fund for biodiesel fuel used in Iowa Department of Transportation vehicles.

Biodiesel Fuel Revolving Fund Expenditures Fiscal Year 2004 Report, Iowa Department of Transportation, January 2005

Report of expenditures from the biodiesel fuel revolving fund for biodiesel fuel used in Iowa Department of Transportation vehicles.

Biodiesel Fuel Revolving Fund Expenditures Report Fiscal Year 2005 Report, January 2006

Report of expenditures from the biodiesel fuel revolving fund for biodiesel fuel used in Iowa Department of Transportation vehicles.

Biodiesel Fuel Revolving Fund Expenditures Report, FY 06

Report of expenditures from the biodiesel fuel revolving fund for biodiesel fuel used in Iowa Department of Transportation vehicles.

Avaliação do Potencial de Jatropha Curcas L. para Produção de Biodiesel (Santiago - Cabo Verde)

Este estudo teve como principal objectivo contribuir para a avaliação do potencial da espécie Jatropha curcas L. (purgueira) para a produção de biodiesel na ilha de Santiago – Cabo Verde. Foi efectuada uma caracterização de várias populações de plantas espontâneas ou cultivadas em diferentes regiões ecológicas da ilha de Santiago, bem como de 13 ecótipos existentes no banco de germoplasma do INIDA. Essa caracterização incidiu sobre um conjunto de caracteres morfológicos, produção de frutos e sementes, teor em óleo nas sementes e sua composição em ácidos gordos. As produções de frutos e semente foram muito baixas, com excepção da amostra Chã de Vaca, apresentando as populações espontâneas da ilha produções superiores às do banco. O teor em óleo das sementes variou entre 15,6% e 35%, o que foi inferior ao obtido em anteriores estudos. Verificou-se existir uma correlação entre o peso da semente e o teor em óleo apenas para as populações sub espontâneas/cultivadas. A composição em ácidos gordos não apresentou grandes diferenças face a anteriores trabalhos salientando-se os apreciáveis teores de ácido linolénico e linoleico. As amostras da Loura, Chã de Vacas e 17 do banco de germoplasma têm um perfil em ácidos gordos com maior teor de ácido oleico.

The Growth and Direction of the Biodiesel Industry in the United States, 2007

The biodiesel industry in the United States has realized significant growth over the past decade through large increases in annual production and production capacity and a transition from smaller batch plants to larger-scale continuous producers. The larger, continuous-flow plants provide operating cost advantages over the smaller batch plants through their ability to capture co-products and reuse certain components in the production process. This paper uses a simple capital budgeting model developed by the authors along with production data supplied by industry sources to estimate production costs, return-on-investment levels, and break-even conditions for two common plant sizes (30 and 60 million gallon annual capacities) over a range of biodiesel and feedstock price levels. The analysis shows that the larger plant realizes returns to scale in both labor and capital costs, enabling the larger plant to pay up to $0.015 more per pound for the feedstock to achieve equivalent return levels as the smaller plant under the same conditions. The paper contributes to the growing literature on the biodiesel industry by using the most current conversion rates for the production technology and current price levels to estimate biodiesel production costs and potential plant performance, providing a useful follow-up to previous studies.

Iowa Biodiesel and Ethanol Processing Plants, January 2006

Maps of Iowa's Biodiesel and Ethanol Processing Plants.

Estudo do Uso de Hidrotalcites de Mg-Al como Catalisadores Heterogéneos para Produção de Biodiesel

A transesterificação de óleos vegetais ou gorduras animais com um álcool de baixo peso molecular é o principal processo utilizado na produção de biodiesel. Actualmente os processos industriais utilizam catalisadores homogéneos para acelerar a reacção. No entanto a utilização de catalisadores heterogéneos, no processo de transesterificação, tem sido sugerido por vários investigadores pois, são amigos do ambiente e podem ser regenerados e reutilizados portanto possibilitam a utilização de processos contínuos. Neste contexto, a utilização de hidrotalcites Mg-Al, como catalisadores heterogéneos para produção de biodiesel foi investigada neste trabalho experimental. As hidrotalcites com diferentes razões molares Mg/Al (Mg/Al=1, 2, 3 e 4) foram preparadas pelo método de co-precipitação. As diversas matrizes catalíticas obtidas, calcinadas a diferentes temperaturas, foram caracterizadas por difracção de raios X (DRX), análise térmica (TG-DSC), espectroscopia de infravermelhos (MIR), microscopia electrónica de varrimento (SEM) e isotérmicas de adsorção com azoto (BET). Estes catalisadores foram testados na metanólise de óleos vegetais para produzir biodiesel. As hidrotalcites Mg/Al=2, HT2A e HT2B (preparada com metade da quantidade de NaOH) calcinadas a 507 ºC e 700 ºC, respectivamente, foram as que apresentaram melhores resultados ao catalisar a reacção com um rendimento em éster superior a 97%, utilizando 2.5% da massa de catalisador, em relação à massa do óleo, razão molar metanol/óleo igual a 12, temperatura reaccional de 65 ºC durante 4h. Foi também investigada a reutilização do catalisador e o efeito da temperatura de calcinação. Constatou-se que o catalisador hidrotalcite HT2B apresentou melhor comportamento catalítico pois permitiu catalisar a reacção de transesterificação até três ciclos reaccionais, convertendo em ésteres 97%, 92% e 34% no primeiro, segundo e terceiro ciclos reaccionais, respectivamente. A análise de, algumas propriedades do biodiesel obtido como, o índice de acidez, a viscosidade e o índice de iodo mostraram que os resultados obtidos estão dentro dos valores limite recomendados pela norma EN 14214. Em anexo apresenta-se uma comunicação à First International Conference on Materials for Energy, Karlsruhe, 2010.

FY 2007 Biodiesel Fuel Revolving Fund Expenditures Report

The Seventy-ninth General Assembly of the State of Iowa, 2001 Regular Session, passed Senate File 465 which was signed by the Governor on April 19, 2001. This act created the biodiesel fuel revolving fund (Fund) to be used to purchase biodiesel fuel for use in the Department of Transportation's (DOT) vehicles. The act directed that the Fund receive money from the sale of EPA credits banked by the DOT on the effective date of the act, moneys appropriated by the General Assembly, and any other moneys obtained or accepted by the DOT for deposit in the Fund. The act also directed the DOT to submit an annual report not later than January 31 of the expenditures made from the Fund during the preceding fiscal year. This is the sixth annual report under the act. In FY 2007, the DOT purchased from the Fund 14,958 gallons of neat soy oil for $31,615, or an average of $2.11 per gallon. This yielded 74,791 gallons of B 20, which is 20 percent biodiesel by volume. Since the beginning of FY 2008, the Fund has received deposits totaling $59,000 which are being used for continued biodiesel purchases.

FY08 Biodiesel Fuel Revolving Fund Expenditures Report

The Seventy-ninth General Assembly of the State of Iowa, 2001 Regular Session, passed Senate File 465 which was signed by the Governor on April 19, 2001. This act created the biodiesel fuel revolving fund (Fund) to be used to purchase biodiesel fuel for use in the Department of Transportation's (DOT) vehicles. The act directed that the Fund receive money from the sale of EPA credits banked by the DOT on the effective date of the act, moneys appropriated by the General Assembly, and any other moneys obtained or accepted by the DOT for deposit in the Fund. The act also directed the DOT to submit an annual report not later than January 31 of the expenditures made from the Fund during the preceding fiscal year. This is the seventh annual report under the act.

Biodiesel Facility Regulatory Assistance Guide, 2008

This guide is a general outline for bio diesel facilities on potential regulatory requirements and regulatory agency approval times. Much of the information is related to environmental permitting by the Iowa Department of Natural Resources (IDNR). Your facility’s permit requirements may differ depending upon the specific operations planned. Information is also provided about regulatory requirements administered by the Iowa Workforce Development, Labor Services Division and the Iowa Department of Public Safety, Fire Marshal Division. Requirements established by local units of government may also apply. Be sure to contact the city in which the facility will be located or the county if the facility is not located in a city, to identify these requirements.

Iowa Biodiesel and Ethanol Processing Plants, July 1, 2008

Iowa Grain Facilities Map

Prediction of the bulking phenomenon in wastewater treatment plants

The control and prediction of wastewater treatment plants poses an important goal: to avoid breaking the environmental balance by always keeping the system in stable operating conditions. It is known that qualitative information — coming from microscopic examinations and subjective remarks — has a deep influence on the activated sludge process. In particular, on the total amount of effluent suspended solids, one of the measures of overall plant performance. The search for an input–output model of this variable and the prediction of sudden increases (bulking episodes) is thus a central concern to ensure the fulfillment of current discharge limitations. Unfortunately, the strong interrelationbetween variables, their heterogeneity and the very high amount of missing information makes the use of traditional techniques difficult, or even impossible. Through the combined use of several methods — rough set theory and artificial neural networks, mainly — reasonable prediction models are found, which also serve to show the different importance of variables and provide insight into the process dynamics

Application of a support system to the design of wastewater treatment plants

This paper presents a case study that explores the advantages that can be derived from the use of a design support system during the design of wastewater treatment plants (WWTP). With this objective in mind a simplified but plausible WWTP design case study has been generated with KBDS, a computer-based support system that maintains a historical record of the design process. The study shows how, by employing such a historical record, it is possible to: (1) rank different design proposals responding to a design problem; (2) study the influence of changing the weight of the arguments used in the selection of the most adequate proposal; (3) take advantage of keywords to assist the designer in the search of specific items within the historical records; (4) evaluate automatically thecompliance of alternative design proposals with respect to the design objectives; (5) verify the validity of previous decisions after the modification of the current constraints or specifications; (6) re-use the design records when upgrading an existing WWTP or when designing similar facilities; (7) generate documentation of the decision making process; and (8) associate a variety of documents as annotations to any component in the design history. The paper also shows one possible future role of design support systems as they outgrow their current reactive role as repositories of historical information and start to proactively support the generation of new knowledge during the design process