WHAT WE DO!
Think Green! | What is Green? | What is Crude Oil & Biomass?
THINK GREEN!
Environmentalism is fast becoming embedded in our culture and most Americans would do more for the environment if they only knew how.
SAVE THE EARTH – SACRIFICE NOTHING™
Save the Earth = consumers doing their part to clean up the environment for a better tomorrow
Sacrifice Nothing = consumers not having to give up performance or pay a premium when choosing to “do their part”
Green Earth Technologies is a “TOTALLY GREEN” clean-tech company that combines renewable sourced feed stocks with proprietary technologies molded around the four ideologies of being GREEN:
- Renewable
- Recyclable
- Biodegradable
- Environmentally friendly
Chemicals, when stored or transported, use a diamond shaped diagram of symbols and numbers to indicate the degree of hazard associated when a particular chemical or material. These diamond shaped symbols are for fire, health, reactivity and special hazards. The diagram identifies four color-coded categories of hazard for each material. Each category is divided in levels of hazard potential with increasing numbers indicating increasing hazards ranging form 0 (no hazard) to 4 (hazardous). Green Earth Technologies prides itself on its perfect three zero or four diamond safety rating. This means that all GET products pose no health risks to its handlers, is not flammable, has no detrimental reactivity with other chemicals and poses absolutely NO health threat.
Note: According to the NFPA the degree of health hazard of a material should indicate the degree of personal protective equipment required for working safely with the material - “0” is harmless, “1” requires safety glasses and gloves, “2” requires chemical goggles, lab/work smock and local ventilation and “3” or “4” requires a respirator or exhaust hood, full face shield, rubber apron, specialized gloves and handling tongs. Pennzoil 2-Cycle Motor Oil carries a “2” rating while GET’s G-OIL 2-Cycle Green Motor Oil carries a “0”.
We put our hazard rating on all of our packaging…ever wonder why others don’t?
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WHAT IS GREEN?
Introduction:
It seems many of us are realizing what Kermit the Frog has been telling us for years, “It is cool to be green”. Automobile manufactures are picking up on the trend as well as major retailers such as Home Depot who are touting their commitment via national ad campaigns. NBC nightly news recently ran a series on the “Greening of America”.
We now have green buildings, green household products, green automobiles, green electricity, green fuels and green tea. So what does it mean to be green? With the exception of green tea, “green” products have several things in common.
Green Buildings
Take for instance green buildings. The U.S. Green Building Council has developed the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Green Building Rating System™ which is the nationally accepted benchmark for the design, construction, and operation of high performance green buildings. This program is based on a qualitative point system that goes well beyond energy efficient building envelopes and mechanical/electrical systems. Site selection, construction waste minimizing techniques and materials of construction are also important. For example utilization of flooring products produced from fast growing bamboo is rewarded over utilization of products from slower growing hardwoods. Points are also awarded for building features such as recycling stations and parking for shared cars or even bicycle racks to promote this type of commute. In short, LEED promotes a whole-building approach to sustainability by recognizing performance in five key areas of human and environmental health: sustainable site development, water savings, energy efficiency, materials selection, and indoor environmental quality.
Green Fuels
The recent record prices for gasoline and diesel have focused attention on America’s dependence on imported fossil fuel. The additional “green” we are paying at the pump has been a catalyst for the promotion of alternative “green” fuels, namely biodiesel and ethanol. In President Bush’s recent State of The Union speech he stated "America is addicted to oil, which is often imported from unstable parts of the world. The best way to break this addiction is through technology”. Furthermore, as part of an "advanced energy initiative," Bush said the United States should reduce its reliance on foreign oil by using technology to develop alternative energy sources, such as ethanol-blended gasoline and hydrogen fuel cells to run pollution-free vehicles. The president set a goal to replace more than 75 percent of U.S. oil imports from the Middle East by 2025.
But are green fuels new? Actually green fuels are really a back to the future approach.
In the late nineteenth century, Rudolph Diesel developed a new kind of internal combustion engine utilizing high compression to raise a fuel/air mixture to its ignition temperature. This compression-ignition principle allowed his engine to use a wide variety of fuels. When Mr. Diesel demonstrated his engine at the 1898 Exhibition Fair in Paris, France, he ran the engine on peanut oil. Mr. Diesel thought that the real future of his engine rested with the use of plant oils which are renewable or sustainable resources. In 1912, Diesel said, "The use of vegetable oils for engine fuels may seem insignificant today. But such oils may become, in course of time, as important as petroleum and the coal tar products of the present time”.
In the 1920s the developing petroleum industry began offering a low-grade fuel suitable for diesel engines. Before long, this new, plentiful and cheap fuel supply had replaced biomass fuels and led to the development of the diesel engine and fuel we know today.
Biodiesel is a renewable fuel produced from agricultural resources such as vegetable oils. In the United States, most biodiesel is made from soybean oil; however canola oil, sunflower oil, recycled cooking oils and animal fats are also used.
Why biodiesel? Biodiesel has a number of important benefits. As an alternative to diesel, it can help reduce U.S. dependence on foreign oil. Biodiesel also provides significant greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reductions. B100 reduces lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions by more than 50 percent, while B20 reduces GHG emissions by at least 10 percent. In addition, biodiesel offers several criteria emissions benefits for the existing vehicle fleet. It reduces emissions of carbon monoxide, particulate matter (PM), and sulfates, as well as hydrocarbon and air toxics emissions.
Ethanol-fueled vehicles date back to the 1880s when Henry Ford designed a car that ran solely on ethanol. He later built the first flex fuel vehicle: a 1908 Model T designed to operate on either ethanol or gasoline.
Ethanol is a renewable fuel made from plants. Essentially non-drinkable grain alcohol, ethanol is produced by fermenting plant sugars. It can be made from corn, sugar cane, and other starchy agricultural product. The cellulose in agricultural wastes such as waste woods and corn stalks (also know as "cellulosic ethanol") can also be used as a base. In the United States, most ethanol is currently made from corn, although because of rapidly developing research, cellulosic ethanol may soon become a larger part of the market.
Why ethanol? Much of the increased interest in ethanol as a vehicle fuel is due to its ability to replace gasoline from imported oil. While pure ethanol is rarely used for transportation fuel, there are several ethanol-gasoline blends in use today. E85 is a blend of 85 percent denatured ethanol and 15 percent gasoline. Another common mix is E10, a blend of 10 percent ethanol and 90 percent gasoline.
E85 also provides important reductions in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. When made from corn, E85 reduces lifecycle GHG emissions (which include the energy required to grow and process corn into ethanol) by 15-20% as compared to gasoline. E85 made from cellulose can reduce emissions by around 70 percent as compared to gasoline.
Perhaps the most efficient use of ethanol is to blend it with diesel and biodiesel and utilize this blend in diesel engines. Diesel and ethanol mix like oil and water without the use of special additives. However additives allow these fuels to blend or emulsify without separation. Blending ethanol with diesel and/or biodiesel results in a renewable, oxygenated, cleaner burning fuel suitable for off and on road use in both new and old engines. This oxygenated diesel is expected to improve diesel engine performance while cutting visible smoke and reducing hazardous emissions. In fact blends with 7.5% ethanol have been reported to: reduce particulate matter over 20 to 46%; reduce NOx 1.8 to 8.5%; reduce CO 12 to 23%; reduce smoke 50 to 70%; and improve opacity of exhaust 55 to 70%.
Green Machines
Thus green fuels are renewable or sustainable while reducing environmental impact. However, while low percentage blends of green fuel such as B10 or B20 (ten or twenty percent biodiesel blended with diesel) or E10 (ten percent ethanol with gasoline) can be used in unmodified engines, higher concentrations of these green fuels require modified engines. Most major automobile manufactures offer alternative fuel or flex fuel vehicles. And these green machines are selling. In 2003 there were 1,800 alternative fuel vehicles in London. Now: 14,000. Currently there are 10.5 million alternative fuel vehicles on American roads, a jump of 22 percent over 2005 numbers. All in all, 2006 was a banner year for auto dealers selling alt fuel vehicles: totals topped out at 1.5 million--more than 500,000 more than industry projections.
Green Power
That brings us to green power. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has established the Green Power Partnership; a voluntary program helping to support the increased use of green power among leading U.S. organizations, in order to reduce the environmental impacts associated with conventional electricity use. A key program requirement is the purchase of green power from eligible renewable resources such as: solar electric; wind; geothermal; hydropower; biomass; biodiesel; and fuel cells.
Green Products
Other green products are in demand. After all why should we wash our clothes in products made from petroleum?
Green claims can be found in many advertisements and labels today. They are the direct response to consumers' increasing interest in protecting the environment. Institutional consumers also care about buying "green”. Indeed, the President of the United States has issued Executive Orders encouraging federal procurement officers to purchase recycled and environmentally preferable products. Such purchases are required by Executive Order 12873, Federal Acquisition, Recycling, and Waste Prevention. The Executive Order also directed the EPA to develop guidance to help federal agencies incorporate environmental preferability into their purchasing procedures. Environmentally preferable products are products and services [that] have a lesser or reduced effect on human health and the environment when compared to other products and services that serve the same purpose.
Mass marketers are beginning to ride the “Green Wave”. After battling over prices for decades, so-called big-box retail chains in the United States are set to fight it out in a new arena: the environment. Home Depot will introduce a line of 3,000 products, like fluorescent light bulbs and natural insect killers, that promote clean water and energy conservation. The product line - expected to reach 6,000 products by 2009, or 12 percent of the chain's total - would become the largest "green" labeling program in American retailing and could persuade competitors to speed up similar plans. And it signals that Home Depot, the second-largest U.S. retailer, is joining the first, Wal-Mart Stores, in trying to educate shoppers about issues, like climate change, that stores have traditionally left to the government and environmental groups.
Executives of Home Depot said that as the world's largest buyer of building materials, the company had the power to persuade thousands of suppliers, home builders and consumers to follow its lead. “Who in the world has a chance to have a bigger impact on this sector than Home Depot?" said Ron Jarvis, the head of environmental sustainability at the retailer, which is based in Atlanta. Jarvis said Home Depot had found that, "given the option of a product that performs just as well, we are seeing the consumer would rather buy something that has less of an impact on the environment, adding, "We are just making that easier”. Suppliers who earn the Eco Option label will be rewarded with prominent shelf space in Home Depot's 3,000 stores and aggressive marketing in weekly advertising supplements.
Conclusion
So what is green? Green is renewable, recyclable, biodegradable, earth friendly, environmental friendly and a host of other adjectives. But “Green” is simply sustainable.
Sustainable is defined as the ability to continue a defined behavior indefinitely. One of the most often cited definitions of sustainability is the one created by the Brundtland Commission which states sustainability as “meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”.
So move over John Deere, we all want to be green.
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WHAT IS CRUDE OIL AND BIOMASS?
Crude oil and Biomass
What is crude oil and how is it formed?
Crude oil is a mixture of hydrocarbons that exists in liquid phase in natural underground reservoirs and remains liquid at atmospheric pressure after passing through surface separating facilities. These were produced when tiny plants and animals decayed under layers of sand and mud millions of years ago.
What is biomass?
Biomass is recently generated plant material and can be used either as a source of energy or for its chemical components. It includes trees, plants, wood and wood wastes, agricultural crops and residues, aquatic plants and algae, animal wastes and industrial wastes. Biomass can be considered as a form of stored solar energy. The energy of the sun is captured through the process of photosynthesis in growing plants.
Science behind biomass
Biomass can be described as a chemical carbohydrate. It has a complex structure of glucose polymers known as cellulose and hemicellulose and it also contains structurally important lignin. Basic composition of biomass chart and the structure of glucose polymer are given below.
Biomass conversion
There are two key reactions in biomass conversion.
Hydrolysis is the chemical reaction that converts the complex polysaccharides in the raw feedstock to simple sugars. In the biomass to bio Ethanol process, acids and enzymes are used to catalyze the reaction.
Fermentation is a series of chemical reactions that convert sugars to ethanol. The fermentation reaction is caused by yeast or bacteria, which feed on the sugars. Ethanol and carbon dioxide are produced as the sugar is consumed. The simplified fermentation reaction equation for the 6-carbon sugar, glucose is
Advantages of biomass over crude oil
- Biomass feedstocks are renewable unlike crude oil
- Produces oxygenated fuel
- More reactive than coal
- Positive energy balance – net energy gain. The net energy gain is the difference between the energy in the fuel product (output energy) and the energy needed to produce the product (input energy)
- Reductions in Greenhouse gas emissions
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