Been researching and debating making BD for a while and have seen people mention prices ranging from 50 cents a gallon all the way up to $2.50 a gallon. All of you making BD, taking into account the cost of electricity for heating and pumping, chemicals, and replacing filtering media, not factoring in the cost of making your processor, what is your closest estimate of cost per gallon to produce? I realize that a lot depends on where you live and the price of materials varies accordingly, but am just trying to get a realistic price range from a varied cross section of people across the country. Thanks in advance for your help.

Mike

 

The people advertising 50 cents a gallon are the same goofy people selling plastic processors.

Cost to make a gallon on average runs about $0.95 to $1.20 per gallon. Included is all chemicals and electricity. Price goes up for waterless wash method. Price goes up for high titrating oil, etc etc.

The price is coming back down.. most of the cost is the methanol needed and we had a big price spike late last year when one of the two major producers shut down a plant for maintenance. Last year I was making it for around 80 cents a gallon.

 

I agree. The last time I did calculation I was at 94 cents for the first batch and 46 cents for the next batch consisting of only 45 percent of the original quantity. I did not take into account the kilowatt hours nor the usage. Being in AZ with exposed black heating tanks helps in the summer months. Again with the price spike in methanol we were up to 4.08 per gallon at 55 gal purchases. Others buy in extreme larger bulk and have cost breaks.

 

I saw in an earlier post by fabman that the magnesol wash method bumps it by about .10 a gallon so even at 1.30 for the high end it's still about half the cost of dino for only a modest start up cost and probably about 2 hrs of your time per batch maximum. Doesn't sound like a bad deal at all. Will have to start collecting drums and plumbing supplies I guess and start getting ready to build. Thanks for the input and if anyone else wants to chime in i'm interested in hearing your costs.
Mike

 

If you are short on water supply, the magnasol wash is certainly a solution.. but if you have ample water supply, why bother? Why add the extra cost of all those filters and media?

This also brings up my next thought..
For those of you who use magnesol, has anyone ever thought of buying the raw product themselves instead of going to the magnesol people?

I mean, is just magnesium silicate right? IE: Baby talcum powder?

Or am I missing something?

 

Fab has been using Magnesol for some time he reports a consistently better product with Magnesol vs Water wash

 

I'd probably go the magnesol method regardless of water supply. It just doesn't seem right to me to put water into the mix after you already went through the process to get it out of your wvo in the beginning. To me it seems faster and easier to run it through a 5 micron then 1 micron bag filters and then maybe a final filter, rather than have to dry it. I don't really know, but that's just what i've come up with from all that i've read.

 

How is he coming up with these results?

I asked him once what quality testing he does and I don't remember getting an answer. Not sure if that means he just didnt see the question or if he didnt answer because he doesnt do any testing.

But I would like to know what test he does on each batch to assure quality.

 

Just a guess but I would estimate that 90% of all biodiesel producers use water and not magnesol.

You say it doesnt seem right to add water to the mix but it seems ok to add a grity crystal? (just like dumping in sand)

Don't misunderstand me, magnesol works and they filter out the grit after using it.. water works just as good and both methods meet ASTM specs on a regular basis. The only advantage with magnasol is when water supply is a problem. Magnesol does add 10% or more to the cost to make a gallon of bio and I'm guessing that's a low figure when you start having to buy filters and count the wear and tear on the pumps.

 

He has a gas chromatagraph

 

No kidding!

Any photos of it around? How long did it take for him to learn to use it?

I had my eye on an atomic absorbtion spectrophotometer a few months back but it was about two grand more than I wanted to pay..

I think the GC machines are even more money yes?

any idea what he paid for it?

 

Fab is something of a well off guy. He can afford something like that. Bio is a hobby and fun for him. Put it this way, his yacht sits in his back yard, and his historic motorcycles are in museums. He wears a suit out the barn where his mini plant is and his lab.

 

................

 

I Acquired a Lab last year that was going out of business in Seattle. 2 truck loads, and 2 trailer loads. I have a Gas chromatograph, And a Ion-chromatography, and everything you could need including spares...........total cost:



FREE!

I went to the University of Idaho last fall, and worked with Prof VonGerpin on how to get my lab up and running. Also for free!

 

Got a combustion analyzer by any chance?