>>>Many people compost the glycerine cocktail w/o any treatment. I think >>>this is best done when KOH is used as the caustic rather than NaOH. > >Tom, > >I don't believe they're actually composting it. But they think >they're composting it.
I also think I've composted it, and I'd definitely know. >The methanol fraction is toxic It's not toxic to the soil microlife nor to plants. ... "Methanol is readily biodegradable in the environment under both aerobic and anaerobic conditions (with and without oxygen) in a wide variety of conditions. "Generally 80% of methanol in sewage systems is biodegraded within 5 days. "Methanol is a normal growth substrate for many soil microorganisms, which completely degrade methanol to carbon dioxide and water. "Methanol is of low toxicity to aquatic and terrestrial organisms and it is not bioaccumulated. (It's toxic mainly to humans and monkeys.) "Environmental effects due to exposure to methanol are unlikely. Unless released in high concentrations, methanol would not be expected to persist or bioaccumulate in the environment. Low levels of release would not be expected to result in adverse environmental effects." From "More about methanol" (with refs): http://journeytoforever.org/biodiesel_make.html#moremeth It certainly won't harm a compost pile. Anyway the methanol should be removed first. >and the soap/oil fraction will smother almost everything. It depends how much of it you use. "It will need to be mixed thoroughly with other materials so that the air and bacteria can get at it, or it will just make a sticky mass -- mix thoroughly with dry, "brown" materials, use in conjunction with other composting materials as only a part of the overall mix." -- Composting http://journeytoforever.org/biodiesel_glycerin.html#compost It works. >Jason & Katie, > >At the level of home manufacture, about the best you can hope for is >to create co-/waste-products that are essentially benign, as the >amount of effort and infrastructure needed to refine the >side-streams is phenomenal and beyond the reach of the average or >above average home brewer. > >What you need are end products that can be disposed of without >threat to the environment. Rather than seeking out the million and >one possibilities and options, the suggestion would be to keep it >simple. But Tom is finding values in the uses that are well exceeding the price of the phosphoric acid needed for separation, including enhanced composting. >Potassium hydroxide and phosphoric acid are as simple as you can get >on the base side and for FFA recovery, with sulfuric acid for the >acid pre-treatment of high FFA oils. > >Other acid and caustic combinations only leave you with less than >useful, if not toxic, salts. Potassium is harmful in excess. There are no chemicals involved in the biodiesel processes we all use that are toxic to soil or plant life. Separated FFA is a contact weed-killer but once composted it will be benign, as with all the others, and composting also prevents any potential excess problems, or well within reason anyway. Chemical salts should not be added direct to the soil anyway, if you have them always add them via the compost. Phosphoric acid, sulphuric acid and hydrochloric acid can all be safely used for separation and the salts used without adverse effects on compost, soil or plant life. If you're using NaOH as the catalyst, decrease the proportion of separated salts to other compost materials. Best Keith >Todd Swearingen > > > >Jason& Katie wrote: > >>i did some reading at wikipedia, and KCl, being part of the final >>product in splitting crude glycerine(at least with KOH and HCl), is >>also used as a mineral fertilizer, and can be used to cut table >>salt (theyre about the same as far as toxicity goes, and it >>increases potassium levels and total electrolytes in the human >>body, not so bad i think) but it has many other uses in the medical >>world as antidotes to some poisons, and for food >>preparation(probably a preservative,yeech). is this an acceptible >>byproduct or should i keep looking? >>----- Original Message ----- From: "Thomas Kelly" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >>To: <biofuel@sustainablelists.org> >>Sent: Wednesday, May 31, 2006 7:21 AM >>Subject: Re: [Biofuel] more goofy questions >> >> >> >>>Jason & Katie, >>> I'm not sure what you mean when you say "clean the glycerine for >>>compost". >>> Many people compost the glycerine cocktail w/o any treatment. I think >>>this is best done when KOH is used as the caustic rather than NaOH. >>> I do separate the glycerine because I produce quite a bit of BD these >>>days. I'm concerned about pouring Kilo after Kilo of caustic, of which 70%, >>>by weight, is Potassium. Sure it's a valuable soil nutrient, but I'd like to >>>control how much is added to my garden .... which has done just fine on >>>pre-BD compost. I also am attempting to recover methanol and have uses for >>>the other components of the mix. >>> >>> I used hydrochloric acid (sold in hardware stores as "muriatic acid") >>>before I was able to locate phosphoric. >>>I did a few small test batches and got good separation. >>>The difference will be the type of mineral "salt" that will precipitate >>>out. >>>Ex: >>>Hydrochloric Acid + Lye (NaOH) forms table salt and water >>>HCl + NaOH ----> NaCL (table salt) + H2O >>>The table salt is not especially valuable; throw it out? >>> >>> The salt falls to the bottom and you get FFAs forming a layer on top and >>>the crude glycerine (+ most of the excess methanol) forming a bottom layer. >>>The FFAs and the glycerine/methanol are composed of Cs, Hs, and Os. >>>They will decompose into CO2 and H2O. They supply nothing in the way of soil >>>nutrients, but I have found that >>>they appear to accelerate decomposition within a compost pile ....... not >>>only a safe way to dispose of the mix, but some benefit to be gotten. >>> >>>KOH (during processing) and H3PO4 (split) >>>is preferred because the salt produced is Potassium Phosphate ..... >>>valuable as fertilizer. >>> >>> The point is that different acids can be used to split the cocktail >>>into FFAs and crude glycerine w. methanol. The >>>difference is in the salt (and its value) that is produced. >>> >>> Vinegar is an organic acid, which tend to be weak acids. It would take >>>a lot of vinegar to split the cocktail. >>>Probably more expensive than hydrochloric and I don't see that the salt >>>produced would have more value. >>> >>>***By value I don't mean financial, as in sell for profit. I >>>dissolve some of the potassium phosphate produced by the split in water and >>>add it to my compost piles. It has value as in ... can be put to good use. >>> >>> Sorry to get so wordy, but your "goofy question" is part of a subject >>>that is of great interest to me. >>> The splitting of the cocktail may not have the financial payoff that >>>brewing BD does, but the feeling of putting to good use what others have >>>called "waste products" is akin to the feeling I get when I fill the >>>tank(s) w. BD I brewed at home. >>> Best of luck to you, >>> Tom >>> >>>----- Original Message ----- From: "Jason& Katie" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >>>To: <Biofuel@sustainablelists.org> >>>Sent: Wednesday, May 31, 2006 12:13 AM >>>Subject: [Biofuel] more goofy questions >>> >>> >>> >>> >>>>what other, more available acids can be used in place of phosphoric to >>>>clean >>>>glycerine for compost? i have been reading for three hours, and i cant >>>>find >>>>any experiments or documentation. am i not looking in the right places? >>>>has >>>>anyone tried using vinegar? this is really bothering me. any ideas? _______________________________________________ Biofuel mailing list Biofuel@sustainablelists.org http://sustainablelists.org/mailman/listinfo/biofuel_sustainablelists.org Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Search the combined Biofuel and Biofuels-biz list archives (50,000 messages): http://www.mail-archive.com/biofuel@sustainablelists.org/
