Cow Poop Gasoline

November 21, 2008

While driving to town the other day I heard, on a farm report, about some great news (accordingto the report) concerning animal waste. It seems some research organization has developed a system whereby they can take animal waste (poop) and convert it into gas or alcohol that can be used in generating heat or running an automobile engine. There seemed to be a great deal of excitement over this development but it got me to thinking about what was done with all of that waste in the past.

I recall back in my high school days in Sandy, Oregon when my cousin Dick and I used to spend a lot of time working on a dairy during the summer. Even back then this dairy farmer, Mr Amsted had a conveyor apparatus that would move the waste from the barn and dump it into a manure spreader. We would then hook the tractor to the spreader, take it to the field and it would fling poop across the land. Actually this spreader was called a fertilizer spreader. So we were actually fertilizing the ground (can you say think green?).

So now we have technology to turn this poop into gasoline for our cars. What do they fertilize the crops with? Another thing Dick and I learned back then was you had to fertilize the crops that produced the hay that fed the cows that produced milk and fertilizer. The milk went on our cereal and the fertilizer? I already discussed that. So what do they fertilize with now? Commercial fertilizer. And where does this commercial fertilizer come from? If you said cows, you are wrong. Nope, that commercial fertilizer comes from oil. You know, that stuff used to produce the stuff we burn in our car. So now we will generate gasoline from poop and use oil to fertilize the crops that feed the cows. Ain’t technology great?

Ah-ha you say. We’ll make the gasoline from corn and soy beans and eliminate the middleman (cows). Great idea but corn and soy beans can’t grow without fertilizer. Can you say oil? Now of course this is an over simplification of the matter. Even back in my dairy farm days we had to supplement the poop with commercial fertilizer but the point is, is this really breakthrough technology? I venture to guess someone or many someone’s are enjoying the benefit of some sort of Government grant. Call me critical.
There is a word bandied about these days called synergy. This word refers to the combination of various elements and how they work together. There was a certain synergy between the cows, corn and milk. The corn feeds the cow. The cow produces milk and poop. The milk nourishes the farmer to spread the poop to grow the corn. So if you notice you have poured poop onto your cornflakes, there is a good chance there is milk in the corn field. Probably the result of a dyslexic farmer.

It just seems to me researching things like the suns rays (solar), wind, natural gas, nuclear and even the ocean waves would be money better spent than turning crops into gasoline which to my understanding is a net energy loss. By this I mean it takes more energy to produce that gallon of gasoline than a gallon of gasoline produces. Speaking of energy loss. Think of energy as heat. That is precisely what it is. Heat! Notice when you start and run your car it produces heat. In fact you need to run water and a fan to keep the heat controlled. So energy and heat are one and the same.

The big rage these days are electric cars. Just think if Los Angeles had nothing but electric cars there would be no smog. Nirvana in the eyes of some, but where does that electricity come from? Primarily the Northwest and it’s coal fired electric generating stations and hydroelectric dams . So the electricity is generated by burning coal (heat loss) that runs the generators (heat loss) that sends the electricity across the wires to L.A. On this trip there is heat loss all along the way. When it gets to L.A. you plug your battery charger into your electric car to charge the batteries. Did you know battery chargers give off a lot of heat (energy) while they are charging? Notice, all auto battery chargers have a small cooling fan in them. So good old L.A. is finally clean but what about that small town in Oregon or Washington with the coal plant? Soot everywhere. We have just moved the smog from one location to the other.

Back in pristine L.A. your job is 57 miles away (a short drive in L.A. and your super electric car gets 40 miles per charge so you had better plan on a couple of hours each way for a quick charge. Ain’t technology great? God forbid that we should consider anything but electric cars. Folks, the battery technology is not far enough advanced for electric cars yet. If we were to put more research into solar and have solar panels on our cars it would help. Just help. I think for now we should look into natural gas, solar and nuclear energy and put most of our research money there. Forget cow poop and electric cars.

Concerning "Green". A couple of Oregonians were traveling to California years ago. Upon entering California they saw this big sign that read "Keep California Green." One Oregonian turned to the other and said "OK, we won’t tell them anything."