[Vision2020] A "Whey" Out Idea for Ethanol
Tom Trail
ttrail at moscow.com
Tue Apr 15 11:18:26 PDT 2008
>Visionaries: An interesting article on making ethanol from whey.
Tom Trail
>
>From: Mike & Brenda Schlepp <farmermike at wildblue.net>
>
>Hello,
>
>In looking over the last issue of Ethanol
>Producer Magazine there was an article on making
>ethanol from "Whey". Because Idaho has become a
>large player in the dairy and cheese industry I
>thought the work this gentleman from Wisconsin
>has done might be of some interest.
>
>Thank you,
>
>Mike Schlepp
>Mike and Brenda Schlepp
>Schlepp Seed Ranch L.L.C.
>26175 South Hwy. 3
>Cataldo, Idaho 83810
>208-689-3593
>
>
>
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>this
><'"mailto:?subject=Ethanol-Producer.com Article:
>A Cheaper ‘Whey’ to Make Ethanol&body=A Cheaper
>‘Whey’ to Make Ethanol<br>A Wisconsin cheese
>maker is expanding his bacteria-tending skills
>to include nurturing yeast to make ethanol and
>growing algae to pro>Email this
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>Van Groll has adapted cheese-making equipment.
>The small square bulk milk tank in the
>foreground is used for yeast propagation and the
>milk silo in back is used for fermentation.
><javascript:Onenext(1677)><-- Previous Image |
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><http://www.ethanolproducer.com/issue.jsp?issue_id=83>From the May 2008 Issue
>
>A Cheaper ‘Whey’ to Make Ethanol
>
>A Wisconsin cheese maker is expanding his
>bacteria-tending skills to include nurturing
>yeast to make ethanol and growing algae to
>produce oil for biodiesel in an intriguing
>energy-integrated, waste-to-power process.
>By Susanne Retka Schill, Photos by Brian Taylor
>
>People who visit Joe Van Groll’s ethanol plant
>in Stratford, Wis., typically look around and
>say, “This is it? You don’t have much here.” To
>which he replies, “Exactly, that’s why I can
>[make ethanol] so cheap.” Van Groll has
>experimented with a whey-to-ethanol process part
>time for more than a decade and full time for
>the past four years. He believes he can produce
>ethanol for less than $1 per gallon. The
>feedstock he uses is whey permeate, the waste
>product of cheese manufacturing. Although it may
>sound more complicated than producing ethanol
>from corn, Van Groll’s philosophy is to avoid
>waste and keep things simple. The energy
>integration he is targeting, however, is
>anything but simple. Besides turning the whey
>permeate into ethanol, he separates and dries
>the yeast coproduct for feed; utilizes the waste
>heat from fermentation and distillation for
>biodiesel production; and is now demonstrating
>that the waste heat, water and carbon dioxide
>can be used to raise oil-bearing algae for
>biodiesel. He can also incorporate an anaerobic
>digester that turns wastes into methane to power
>the process.
>
>While the integration appears complex, the
>machinery is rather basic. The plant relies upon
>the same kind of tanks and liquid transfer
>systems utilized in cheese plants, Van Groll
>says. “The receiving tanks for the whey permeate
>are milk silos, which become the fermenters,” he
>says. “We make a couple of pumps do a lot of
>work for us.” The major difference is the
>distillation system for the ethanol process.
>
>
>Article Continues After Advertisement
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>
>Van Groll’s whey-to-ethanol process solves a
>waste disposal problem for the cheese industry,
>and at the same time sidesteps some of the
>criticisms regarding corn ethanol. Whey permeate
>is the liquid that remains after cheese makers
>extract the protein from whey. Large cheese
>makers dry the whey permeate and sell it as a
>feed supplement. Smaller cheese plants often
>can’t justify the capital investment required to
>purchase dryers; furthermore rising energy costs
>are pushing drying costs higher. Each year the
>United States produces 10 billion pounds of
>cheese, which results in 86 billion pounds of
>whey permeate. Wisconsin alone produces about 18
>billion pounds of whey annually. Because the
>whey permeate has a high biological oxygen
>demand that requires pretreatment before it can
>be disposed of in municipal water treatment
>facilities, much of that permeate is spread onto
>farmers’ fields, with the cheese plant paying
>the cost. There is a limit, however, as to how
>much can be dumped on a given field and
>environmental regulators are beginning to
>restrict the practice, Van Groll says. “My
>process takes a cost center and turns it into a
>profit center,” he says.
>
>With 15 years in the cheese industry, Van Groll
>knows the issues cheese makers are facing.
>During that time, he was often charged with
>making arrangements for disposing of the whey
>permeate. That might have been just the impetus
>he needed to look for new uses for the cheese
>byproduct.
>
>Van Groll and a friend began to experiment by
>making ethanol from the liquid waste starting
>with batches in 5 gallon pails in Van Groll’s
>garage. Four years ago, he purchased the closed
>Grand Meadow Co-op cheese plant at Stratford,
>Wis., to scale his project up to the next level.
>He formed Grand Meadow Energy LLC to hold the
>intellectual property, and DuBay Ingredients LLC
>owns the plant.
>
>Van Groll developed the whey-to-ethanol process
>with help from Clay Boeger, his sole employee
>who contributed his skills as a stainless steel
>fabricator to make modifications as the two
>developed the processes. In their work, they
>established that every 100 gallons of whey
>permeate at 16 percent solids will produce 8
>gallons of ethanol, 8 pounds of dry yeast, 60
>pounds of carbon dioxide and 16 gallons of
>water. The energy spent to produce 1 gallon of
>ethanol is 30,000 British thermal units,
>according to Van Groll, which is a favorable
>energy balance compared with ethanol’s 84,000
>Btus per gallon.
>
>Greener than Corn
>One of the criticisms directed at the corn
>ethanol industry is that it takes about 3
>gallons of water to make 1 gallon of ethanol.
>Water isn’t an issue when it comes to Van
>Groll’s process. “Cheese whey permeate is 85
>percent water to start with,” he explains. No
>water is added, and the water leftover from the
>process is recycled and used for tank washing.
>
>Energy savings can also be achieved,
>particularly when the permeate arrives from the
>cheese plant at 90 degrees Fahrenheit. Sometimes
>the cheese plants chill the permeate to 40
>degrees for holding, in that case Van Groll says
>to keep energy costs low the waste heat from the
>distillation process should be recycled to heat
>the chilled permeate before fermentation.
>
>The expense and equipment required to carry out
>the saccharification process in a corn-based
>ethanol plant aren’t required in Van Groll’s
>process because whey permeate is primarily water
>and lactose—the form of sugar found in milk.
>While it’s considered a difficult sugar to
>ferment, through trial and error Van Groll
>discovered the right combination of yeasts,
>nutrients and conditions to make it work. “The
>existing Carberry process is a 30-year-old
>patent using a simple yeast strain, but it could
>only use 10 percent solids with lactose. I can
>use up to 20 percent solids and get a greater
>content of alcohol in a shorter period of time,”
>he says.
>
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--
Dr. Tom Trail
International Trails
1375 Mt. View Rd.
Moscow, Id. 83843
Tel: (208) 882-6077
Fax: (208) 882-0896
e mail ttrail at moscow.com
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