• March 7, 2024

  We got the good stuff!

  Welcome, Ethan Hall, to Rogers Hall. Tapping the Canadian Rockies, our new friends at ClearSolv shipped 99.9% pure (199.8 proof, non-denatured) ethanol, via Nashville, to Queens after a series of exhaustive tests of local suppliers and safety contemplations of whether to drum, or not to drum? That is truly the question when undertaking a project such as ours. A 55 gallon (208L) drum of the same ethanol from ClearSolv costs $385 USD and the 5 gal (19L) pails pictured above go for about $225 each. Neither prices include shipping. With safety as our prime concern, and a drum requiring a grounded pump for dispensing, special storage and transport protocols, as well as empty drum requirements due to inherent residual flammability of ethanol vapors, we opted to purchase the pails. They are now be stored in flammable safely cabinets in a locked laboratory as we develop methods for removing the 0.1% water claimed on the SDS.

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  Oct. 27, 2023

  Does it really work?

  The plan: make 5 gallons of biodiesel. Pour said biodiesel in car. Drive said car to Mt. Mitchell (the highest mountain east of South Dakota) to witness first hand any engine problems, lack of power during the climb, leaks! With dog as our witness, we prevailed! Note – this trip was planned as a team-building kick off to the EPA grant project which was slated to start Nov 1. Though the announcement of the funding was delayed until Jan 2024, the trip went as planned, and the Chemistry Cultural Exchange Expedition was born!

  

  Jan. 3, 2024

  A plan begins to take shape!

  For a while, several of the students and I have had the idea to retrofit a beer brewing vessel as a biodiesel reactor due to its ideal conical drain, insulated SS walls and low cost relative to glass or other chemical reactors of similar volumes and designs. Enter The Grainfather (and the Grainfather’s father Jess the owner of Alternative Beverage in Belmont, NC…). The first purchase of the project was a 7 gallon brew/reactor, a similarly sized separator funnel and accompanying hardware. See the full parts list and some images here. If you haven’t yet visited Alternative Beverage, and you’re into beer, I recommend taking the trip. It’s quietly located on the Catawba river and has a massive inventory of beer brewing booty.

  

  Jan 19, 2024

  We started building the reactor today with a trip to the hardware store!

  Blackhawk Ace Hardware in Charlotte, NC to be exact. Before leaving campus, we knew we needed a few barbed pieces of pipe and 4-5’ feet of 3/4” tubing compatible with biodiesel and alkali (neoprene, Viton…). The place was STOCKED with all the valves, Ts and elbows we needed, so we did a mock up of the pump input and output lines on the floor of the plumbing aisle.

  Here is the full parts list for today’s haul, FREE POPCORN and all!

  

Feb 18-28, 2024

Stage 1 Reactor is up and running and producing some fine biodiesel ethyl esters! After a series of setbacks using denatured ethanol, it seems we’ve settled on a supplier and our glycerol is settling to the bottom of the separatory funnel! Acid neutralization and water washing of our first 4L batch worked, and a suite of analytical tests can be found on the Real Time Analysis page. Look out Exxon Mobile, here comes Alkylyst!