North Dakota: Oil, Nuclear Missiles, Honey, Winter Wheat; Ducks Unlimited; Now ... Straw -- September 29, 2018

Updates

Later, 2:37 p.m.: from a reader --

There happens to be a smaller coal fire power plant in Spiritwood. My guess is it would be burned in that plant.

Original Post

 
The only question I have: how do readers find these "bizarre" stories?

From biofuelsdigest and from MarketWatch: North Dakota straw to fuel California cars -- data points:

• NewEnergyBlue, based in Massachusetts
• six months away from groundbreaking: a cellulosic ethanol refinery
• will be sited in Spiritwood Energy Park near Jamestown, North Dakota
• $170 million financing to be finalized (no mention of Elon Musk)
• 280,000 tons of North Dakota wheat straw/year --> 16 million gallons of fuel/year
• this will be the only cellulosic ethanol capable of exceeding California's rigorous air-quality standards
• will also produce clean lignin
• will not require any fresh water in the proprietary process
• 20,000 miles / year / 40 mpg = one car = 500 gallons of fuel per car
• 16,000,000 / 500 gallons = 32,000 cars (0.2% of cars registered in CA)
• number of cars in California: 15 million 
• one small step for North Dakota straw; one giant step for Governor Moonbeam

Lignin?

Global commercial production of lignin is a consequence of papermaking.

In 1988, more than 220 million tons of paper were produced worldwide. Much of this paper was delignified;

Lignin comprises about 1/3 of the mass of lignocellulose, the precursor to paper. It can thus be seen that lignin is handled on a very large scale.

Lignin is an impediment to papermaking as it is colored, it yellows in air, and its presence weakens the paper. Once separated from the cellulose, it is burned as fuel. Only a fraction is used in a wide range of low volume applications where the form but not the quality is important.

Sounds like there is already an over-abundance of lignin, but a bit more on the market probably won't hurt.

Because lignin reduces stack emissions in coal-fired power plants, it's a cleaner replacement than wood chips. Lignin is also a lightweight binder for composites that replace metal parts in automobiles and other products.   

After its Spiritwood refinery is up and running on Dakota straws, NewEnergyBlue says it expects to double capacity of future biomass refineries and also process corn stalks.

Corle envisions a series of refineries throughout the grain belts of the U.S. and Canada, each producing 32 million cellulosic gallons a year and attracting escalating support from capital markets keen on catching the next wave of renewable energy. "California alone could easily absorb production from 70 of our refineries to reach their goal. Other states and Canada are following California's successful low-carbon model."