Found this article on our local newspaper site, The Courier. Thought you guys would like to read it.

By MIKE SOBCZYK

Staff Writer

A possible fuel of tomorrow is being tested today on the streets of Findlay.

For the past several weeks, a couple of Marathon Ashland Petroleum (MAP) transport trucks, operating out of the Lima terminal and running on a synthetic diesel fuel, have been delivering regular fuel to various retail locations, including some in Findlay.

Made from natural gas, the synthetic diesel fuel is being tested for fuel efficiency, emissions and engine wear.

Throughout the course of what likely will be a six-month evaluation, between 21,000 and 25,000 gallons of the synthetic fuel, produced using gas-to-liquids (GTL) technology, will be used.

The project is part of Marathon Oil's ongoing integrated gas strategy.

Paul Weeditz, a Marathon Oil spokesman in Houston, explained Tuesday that a key component of the company's integrated gas strategy is examining ways to commercialize "the enormous volume of natural gas worldwide."

The synthetic diesel fuel powering the local transport trucks was produced at a $64 million synthetic fuels demonstration plant located near Tulsa, Okla.

This plant was built via a joint development agreement between Marathon Oil and Syntroleum. Since 1997, Marathon Oil has been working with Syntroleum to explore energy alternatives.

Production from the 100 barrels-per-day Catoosa GTL demonstration facility, which received about $11 million in U.S. Department of Energy construction funding, began in early 2004.

While GTL technology is not new, having first been employed in Germany in the 1930s and 1940s, it has gained new momentum in recent years.

Lary Kocher, Marathon's manager of gas utilization technology in Houston, said Tuesday that advantages of the clear, odorless synthetic diesel include that it contains zero sulfur, zero metals and zero aromatics.

He explained that Marathon, through more traditional methods, is already gearing up to meet the more stringent clean air standards which will come into play over the next few years, and the GTL technology being studied now is for the "decade down the road."

However, he did note that, among other applications, this fuel could be used as a blending stock to comply with low-sulfur standards.

By 2006, the sulfur content of regular on-road diesel must not exceed 15 parts per million, down from the now permitted 500 parts per million.

But the greatest asset of the GTL technology lies in its ability to take stranded natural gas and convert it into high-value liquid fuels. Stranded natural gas is just that, natural gas which lies thousands of miles away from demand centers. Oftentimes, this remote natural gas is either left in the ground because there are no pipelines to ship the gas to market or else it is burned off in a process known as flaring.

However, by using a three-step process further developed by Syntroleum which incorporates the GTL technology, stranded natural gas may be put to a better use.

The first step in this process is the reforming step where the natural gas is reacted with oxygen or air to produce synthesis gas or syngas. At the Tulsa demonstration plant, air is used because it is safer.

Then this syngas is processed through a Fischer-Tropsch reactor which converts it to a waxy synthetic crude oil through a series of chemical reactions using a catalyst. This synthetic crude oil then is further refined into products such as diesel and naphtha.

Besides the ongoing local evaluation of the synthetic diesel fuel, since last summer the fuel also has been tested in the public bus system in Washington, D.C. and with National Park Service vehicles in Alaska to see how it performs under extreme heat and cold conditions. This testing is scheduled to conclude this summer.

As for the local transport truck evaluation, Rob Roy, MAP's manager of transport operations in Findlay, said Tuesday that each truck runs about 550 miles daily.

He said areas being studied include miles per gallon and engine wear. The performance of the two transport trucks running with the synthetic diesel fuel is being compared with two trucks not running the test.

Roy said the drivers of the synthetic diesel-fueled trucks are seeing more power out of the engines. "They are not using as much pedal,'' Roy said of the drivers' experience. He noted that the drivers being used in the test have extensive driving experience.

Also, Roy said, the drivers report that there's "no (diesel) smell to speak of."

Asked about the market for the synthetic diesel fuel, the Marathon representatives explained that most other countries, including Europe, mostly use diesel fuel. The European truck market, for example, is diesel dominated.

Long term, it's hoped that if the demonstration project is deemed successful, larger commercial-grade plants could be built near natural gas reserves.

 

As soonas the greenies find out about it they'll start b*******.

 

Why should they care, it sounds better for the environment.
I've read that motor oil made from NG is supposed to be coming out soon and is of such high quality that it very well could put the synthetic oil makers out of business.

 

This is still a band-aid for the problem at hand. Granted there is alot more natural gas then oil out there, but there is only a limited supply of this also. I think that the oil companies need to start looking at natural diesel, like the soybased diesel. It is more expensive the regular diesel right now, but it wont take much more and it will be cheaper. I will agree that the oil companies are moving in the right direction though, away from OPEC!

 

Don't know if you've ever heard of The National Anxiety Center web site but it has a lot of very interesting info on several topics. One article, "The World Has More Oil, Not Less" by Alan Caruba (http://www.anxietycenter.com/energy/moreoil.htm) is quite interesting and well worth reading. There's a lot of other very interesting and thought provoking information on the site too.

[quote from article]
Globally, we need more energy, not less. The good news is, if you factor in coal as the primary source of the generation of electricity, you’re actually looking at not just hundreds, but thousands of years of electrical power. Coal is so abundant it is measured in the thousands of years of use. Abundant electrical power will free Third World nations from their poverty. It will benefit the lives of millions who are denuding the forests of their nations for fuel to cook dinner!

But we’re told we’re running out of oil. Not true! In 1973, an oil field was discovered off the coast of Louisiana in a deep area of the Gulf of Mexico. By 1989, oil production had trickled down to a daily output of only 4,000 barrels. Then, to the surprise and delight of the PennzEnergy Company, the Eugene Island field began to pump 13,000 barrels a day. Geologists tested the new crude and discovered it was a completely different geological age than the original oil of ten years earlier!

Now petroleum scientists are beginning to believe there is a whole new oil supply streaming from a vast source many miles below the surface of the Earth. The ramifications of this are obvious. There is a lot of oil as yet undiscovered and untapped.
([unquote]

If this is true, which I'm of the belief that it stands a good chance of being, then there really isn't the very limited supply of "dino" oil. If you stop to think about the logic behind the old story of how oil is actually the remnant or by-product, and apparently the only non-fossilized material left, of the dinosaurs and plant life from millions of years ago, just how much of that material could there be after the animals and plants died. But if oil is actually a natural process occurring in the earth as these scientists are thinking, then this could more easily explain why new and/or larger oil reserves are being discovered as time rolls along.

Like I said, pretty interesting reading. That said, I would also agree that exploring alternate energy sources such as natural gas and grain-based and any other new found sources of energy can only be good for the USA so we're not held hostage by foreign countries who supposedly have the largest oil/energy sources we currently need and use.

Didn't mean to hi-jack the topic but farmer dave's comments and the fact that this topic was related to alternate energy prompted me to bring this into the forum.

Steve

 

that could very well be true but as of right now there is no fuel shortage. its just the current president and his cronnies are oil mongers and bleeding the public dry. This nation produces alot of oil and coal and we use none of it ourselves. they say because its to impure. which may be true but they can get more money for it shipping it else where. Do you think that if they start making biodiesel, fuel prices will go down. not likely...he who dies with the most money wins...our farmers are paid not to farm 100% of there land and still they can produce enough food to feed the world and waist plenty. but its not economically feesable to do so so they control supply to keep the price up. A friend that just got back from the middle east said a gallon of gas over there is 35cents. now i have no idea how much food is but they cant grow anything over there so u want to eat you better crank those well up boys....

 

No SMELL????
What's next, no SMOKE either????

The greenies have taken ALL the fun out of dieseling!...


K.

 

An old Saudi saying
"My father rode a camel, I drive a car, my son rides in a jet airplane. His son will ride a camel."

 

i got to here and quit reading

Paul Weeditz, a Marathon Oil spokesman in Houston, explained Tuesday that a key component of the company's integrated gas strategy is examining ways to commercialize "the enormous volume of natural gas worldwide."

WHY DOES MY GAS BILL KEEP GOING UP EVERY YEAR IF WE HAVE AN ENORMOUS VOLUME OF NAT. GAS???????????????????????????????????????????:mad :

 

There may be thousands of years of coal for generating electricity but it is more expensive to get the sulfur out of it to meet EPA regs. Plus you get a lot more CO2 emissions from coal than natural gas which may or may not be a problem depending on whether the global warming problem is real.

Edwin

 

Coal, gas, oil -- it's not about supply. It's about processing and distribution.

 

That's very true, but we are running out of oil and alternatives will start being used. I just read an article about methane hydrates. Methane (natural gas) can be trapped in a matrix of water ice and there is a huge amount of it estimated all over the world. So much in fact that it could supply us for 10's of thousands of years. The problem is getting it out of the ice.

There are a lot of alternatives to oil, they just need to be exploited.

Edwin

 

and all of them will be more expensive than petroleum.
Seems like it's human nature to use up what's easiest first.

 

And how do dead dinosaurs turn into oil??? I have no idea.

 

Actually the majority of petroleum comes ocean dwelling micro-organisms whose dead bodies accumulated on the sea floor, got buried, underwent pressure and heat to become black goo over millions of years. Oil isn't in pools under the ground but rather mixed with rock and water like water in a sponge.

The dinosaurs and land dwelling plants that laid down and underwent heat and pressure mostly turned into coal.