warming the workshop

here's what keeps me warm these days: GROND runs on waste-waste plant oil, in fact the part of the chipfat that was too polluted, sludgy or watery to turn into fuel for vehicles.

When I was recycling chipfat into fuel (I've given up on that, as the truck needs to be warm to take it and I'm hardly ever going anywhere these days) I always ended up with about 5% of oil that was plainly too disgusting to run it through the filter, as all the water and sediments acumulate on the bottom of the containers. I'm glad I've saved it, now I've got a carbon neutral heater which is well satisfying.

the design is quite future proof: the (in my opinion deliberately) misleading debate about the consequences of large scale biofuel production distracts from the facts that:

- there is still a huge potential for locally and sustainably grown biofuels

- there is an imminent quantum leap in biofuels: fuel producing algae require nothing else than sunlight, water (which can be contaminated or even sea water) and a few basic nutrients to produfe fuel while pulling carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. Algae reproduce by cellular
division, hence they'll grow exponentially as long as the conditions are right, which cuts out the hassle of getting a whole crop of plants through the year

- all biomass can be burned, if there is an adequate process of drying or decomposing it. On that level, research on bacteria holds another series of breakthroughs

Higher quality fuels can be used in vehicles and generators, the bottom end of the production can go thru devices as the GROND, which is rather primitive, but could probably be the heart of a system with up to 90% fuel efficiency. In my case, a long section of rippled stackpipe makes sure I'm getting most of the heat out of the exhaust fumes and there is zero smoke, hence a quite complete combustion.