Fischer-Tropsch engineers developed fuel from coal that Nazis used in the war.
Montana Governor Schweitzer claims that Montana has more energy than the middle east!!!
He also claims it can be produced for $1.00 per gallon from coal.
I am sure the granola eating, grow your own cloths, tree huggers will find a reason to stop production in the US.
(Stolen from dubsinthebuf)
how much do you think it would sell for. i mean after the cost of building the facilities, staffing, and mining. i dont think we would end up ahead of the 8 ball… but i could be very wrong.
whats the cost of refining oil into 1 gallon of gas?
Well considering we mine coal already getting pure Ore or whatever they use wouldn’t be an issue. At this point if they sold it at ~$2/gallon retail it would hurt the oil industry severly, probably causing one of two things, them droppnig prices ( :lol: ) or lobbying our wonderful elected officials with tons of money to make the cost of coal gasoline just as much a petro.
i understand that we mine it already, but you need to look at how much it will cost to build a refinery. that cost, opperating costs, and the cost of workers needs to be covered by their selling price.
you can take a guess and say it costs as much to build and run one of these joints as it costs to run a conventional refinery. so that brings us back to “how much does it cost to refine x amount of oil to 1 gallon of gas?”. without knowing that, the current cost of coal, or how much coal is needed to make 1 gallon of gas this is kinda pointless. if coal is cheap (which i am sure it is) but it takes 50 lbs to make 1 gallon of gas, then it may not be worth it.
A coal fairy takes a magic dump on the coal and it turns into hippy candy, which can then be put into your gas tank…not only is it efficient, but flowers and hearts come out of your exhaust
-Cheater-
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dont post in tech anymore
Here is the article…
LENA, Montana (Reuters) - Montana’s governor wants to solve America’s rising energy costs using a technology discovered in Germany 80 years ago that converts coal into gasoline, dieseand aviation fuel.
The Fischer-Tropsch technology, discovered by German researchers in 1923 and later used by the Nazis to convert coal into wartime fuels, was not economical as long as oil cost less than $30 a barrel.
But with U.S. crude oil now hitting more than double that price, Gov. Brian Schweitzer’s plan is getting more attention across the country and some analysts are taking him very seriously.
Montana is “sitting on more energy than they have in the Middle East,” Schweitzer told Reuters in an interview this week.
“I am leading this country in this desire and demand to convert coal into gasoline, diesel and aviation fuel. We can do it in Montana for $1 per gallon,” he said.
“We can do it cheaper than importing oil from the sheiks, dictators, rats and crooks that we’re bringing it from right now.”
The governor estimated the cost of producing a barrel of oil through the Fischer-Tropsch method at $32, and said that with its 120 billion tons of coal – a little less than a third of the U.S total – Montana could supply the entire United States with its aviation, gas and diesel fuel for 40 years without creating environmental damage.
An entry level Fischer-Tropsch plant producing 22,000 barrels a day would cost about $1.5 billion, he said.
The Democratic governor of this Republican state said he had met with Shell president John Hofmeister, General Electric’s CEO Jeff Immelt, as well as officials from the Department of Defense, and the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad to discuss his proposals.
Schweitzer added that the recently passed federal energy bill includes an 80 percent loan guarantee for a Fischer- Tropsch plant.
A former cattle rancher who lived for seven years in Saudi Arabia working on irrigation projects, Schweitzer is also seeking energy deals with other states, especially California.
California “says they need 25,000 megawatts of electricity during the next ten years,” he said. "We’ll give you a delivered price and we’ll forward contract that for the next 20 years.
“Transmission companies from England, from Canada, from all over America are coming to my office and saying 'we’ll build these transmission lines as soon as you have the contracts to build the generation.”’
it cost roughtly .24 to refine 1 gallon of gas. this does not include the cost of the oil, or distribution.
“A barrel contains 42 gallons. After refining, it makes about 19.5 gallons
of gasoline in addition to numerous other products such as heating oil”
but we are only looking at gasoline for this discussion.
the cost is about 68 per barrel today. that gives us 19.5 gallons (lets say 20 to make it easier) so thats 20 * .24 = $4.80 to refine 1 barrel of oil to 20 gallons of gasoline.
then you need to add the cost of the barrel. here is a snip “Texas or Arabian crude yields about 30% gasoline” so we will add 30% of the barrel cost to the cost of gas (i assume the other crap is used for heating oil and what not). thats $25.20 to make 20 gallons of gas, or 1.52. now add in all the taxes, distribution costs, and a little profit, and you pretty much get our current gas prices.
based on mike’s post, it will cost 1 dollar to make 1 gallon of gas from coal. is this with todays price for coal, or the price from 1923, or is that just the cost to refine it?
btw, all my numbers came from sites ending in .gov except for the current price ber barrel.
EDIT: we were typing at the same time.
so thats 32 to produce a barrel of oil, then there is the mark up, the company doing this needs to make a buck… and what happens after 40 year? granted it will last much longer since we wont be using only coal fuel, but still; thats not a large supply.
coal is also not a renewable resource, and in the end we’ll still lose out with the oils now. Instead of making a “quick fix” we should look into alternative, “renewable” fuel.
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agreed
here is some more interesting oil related poop
"For example, we import oil from Canada that is derived from shale deposits. Canada has invested heavily in tar sands technology to reap oil from Alberta. Clearly it has paid off, but did you know that Utah, Colorado, and Wyoming “sit on a massive fortune in untapped oil–maybe more oil than in the Middle East”? An April 13 news article in the Deseret Morning News reported that the Senate Energy Committee held hearings on the “vast reserves of oil found in tar sands and oil shale located in eastern Utah, western Colorado, and southern Wyoming. ‘The amounts of oil,’ said Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, ‘are mindboggling’, but this oil is not regarded as part of our nation’s oil reserves because it has not yet been developed commercially.”
I wouldn’t say “instead of”, I would say “in addition to”.
High prices will stall the economic growth very quickly.
We need a quick fix.
One of the many benefits is competition; increased local supply may drop foreign prices.
Besides converting coal to oil there are other potential methods that have been proven, though they may not produce the most cost effcient oil out there. However, they are making oil and may turn into a much more viable alternative in the near future.
Ethanol imo would be the way to go. its renewable, and would have our farmers making money again. i havent read much into it as far as the cost of refining it, so i am not sure what it would cost per gallon. 1 major down side is that you are at the mercy of the weather. if we have a dry season, or a flood, the price of fuel would sky rocket.
but there are a lot of countries that could bennift from this… any country that can farm can produce fuel.
edit:
that was interesting
im all for it. i work for the coal mining industry…talk about job security. 
http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel_library/ethanol_drane.html
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how to convert a car to ethanol
i want to by a beater and try it out
Good points.
I wonder if the US leaders are hording our supply because they have the foresight to see where the world is headed without oil.
After all you can’t be a world power without fuel for the war machines.
Some people may see that as evil but the alternative is a million times worse.
Do you think that alternatives have been developed and we just don’t know it yet?:snky: (the best use for that smiley)
If bio-diesel can made why can’t bio-gasoline be made?
Is it because of the purity requirements?
yes, and yes it is.
can bio-diesel be made from organic oils like corn oil? if so, thats just one more reason to agracutural fuel.
http://running_on_alcohol.tripod.com/id26.html
here is an interesting link about making your ethanol 100% pure. then run E-85.
15% gas 85% ethanol (102 octane)
diesel was develped with Peanut Oil. It wasn’t until Petrol based diesel was cheaper than Peanut Oil that we started using that instead. Now, Petrol is a lot more expensive… so the smart move would be to go back to organic oil…
If you watch Powerblock, more specifically Trucks… Stacey made a Dodge Diesel run off of vegetable oil… used vegetable oil from a restaurant that he got for free (he could have probably been paid to take it). He bought some Lye from a hardware store… the more you buy the cheaper, then he bought 2.5 gallons of Methanol. He already had the machine to convert the veg/meth/lye mixture into Bio-Diesel… so that was probably a grand or more… it took a couple hours to make it (a lot of mixing) but 20 gallons of veg oil, 2.5 gallons of meth and a couple cups of lye… netted him 20 gallons of Bio-Diesel Fuel… for $0.70 / gallon. I’d assume if you mass produce it in a larger mixer you can produce it much cheaper. If he bought the methanol by the barrel and the lye by the case… I’m sure it could have gone down to about $0.50 a gallon for fuel… and this fuel was better than the petrol fuel that came out of the truck.