Sierra Nevada Beer Brews Ethanol, Says Wazzup?
Sierra Nevada Brewing Company and E-Fuel Corp have joined forces to create a high-grade, inexpensive ethanol fuel.
They plan to make fuel from discarded beer yeast using the Efuel 100 MicroFueler. The first-ever home ethanol systems will be housed at the brewery in Chico, California.
- » See also: Biofuels Breakthrough: Making Fuel From Air With Engineered Microbes
- » Get Gas 2.0 by RSS or sign up by email.
“The plan is to have a machine here on site that would distill the ethanol that’s remaining in the yeast slurry,” said Cheri Chastain, Sierra Nevada Sustainability Coordinator.
“We could make it available for employees. If we have a lot of it we could end up selling it. We could use it for our shop vehicles and company vehicles,” said Chastain.
Currently, production waste is sold as dairy feed to local farmlands. In fact, Sierra Nevada sells 1.6 million gallons of beer yeast waste annually. But not once this system is in place. Testing will start in Q2 of this year with a goal of full-production by q3.
The beer yeast contains between five and eight-percent alcohol content, but the MicroFueler is expected to raise the level to 15-percent.
“Creating ethanol from discarded organic waste is an excellent example of how the MicroFueler can help eliminate our reliance on the oil industry infrastructure. This is especially true when considering Americans reportedly discard 50% of all agricultural farmed products,” said Tom Quinn, E-Fuel founder and CEO. “Using a waste product to fuel your car is friendlier to the environment and lighter on your wallet, easily beating prices at the gas pump.”
Of course, Sierra Nevada has a history of being a bit eco-friendly: they are home to one of the largest private solar installations in the US.
“We are excited to partner with E-Fuel to develop an efficient way to recover waste ethanol from our spent yeast,” said Ken Grossman, Founder and President, Sierra Nevada Brewing Co. “This has the potential to be a great thing for the environment and further our commitment to be becoming more energy independent.”
And yes, I know that “wazzup” is a Bud thing. But who drinks that stuff?
Photo: EFuel.com
[...] needs a gas station to fill your tank with ethanol? Not you. GreenHouse has just announced the E-Fuel MicroFueler, a portable in-home micro-refinery system that turns organic waste into ethanol. The first [...]
Asshole American Logic
Americans stuff what-ever, into their low compression, inefficient , spark ignition engines and expect miracles they never get! Goddammit! Fools! Euro- diesels gave them 40 % more miles per gallon, and they shrugged and walked away! An “Ethanol-Specific”, high compression engine gives extra-ordinary miles per gallon advantage over gasoline engines! Adding Ethanol to gasoline is idiotic! and reduces miles per gallon in a gasoline engine. We need an engine designed for burning the superior home grow Ethanol, in pure form! Ethanol can give better performance, miles per gallon, when burned in an Ethanol engine! Build a high compression engine designed to get best performance from pure Ethanol, then get the American hot-rodders to “tweak” this motor for high mileage and watch gasoline sales fall! We are being “Hoodwinked” by Exxon into diluting a very good home grown fuel with their gasoline, which prevents high compression engines to screw us and keep us at the foreign oil pumps! I want a Smart car with an Ethanol-Specific turbo-high compression Ethanol only engine! and a 45 gallon bbl of Pure American Ethanol delivered to my garage! - Good enough for up to six months driving! no Bull Shiite!