Alternate Energy Consultants

Oak Ridge North, TX Power Plant

BIODIESEL Powers Portion of the City


	The Southwest Biofuels Initiative has begun a program to test various biofuels produced from a variety of feedstocks to determine the grade and quality of fuel produced as well as the yield and ease of production from these raw materials. Feedstocks to be tested include vegetable oils, animal tallow and waste oils from restaurant and water treatment sources.

	SWBI has developed a biofuels manufacturing plant near the Houston Advanced Research Center (HARC) in The Woodlands, Texas. This facility has a small biodiesel blending lab with a unique microwave de-emulsifying unit attached. This unit can make samples of biofuel in small quantities (up to 50-gallon batches) under identical conditions so that these can be evaluated for quality and comparison parameters as a fuel.

	One goal of the Feedstock Initiative is to evaluate the efficacy of growing vegetable feedstocks throughout the arid regions of the southwestern United States that could be used to support a renewable energy program of using biodiesel in transportation and power generation. This could greatly reduce emissions from hydrocarbons and other fuel use. Biodiesel use in Europe is more than quadruple that of the U.S. and this project can show the efficacy of biofuel power generation.