Snip from item at philoneist.com:
A Nascar fuel specialist claims he has invented a way to make high-end gasoline from animal waste. Dean Gokel says he can produce 110 octane "pigoline" — gasoline made from hog waste — that is indistinguishable on a molecular level from petroleum-based additives.If other scientists confirm his technology — which they have yet to do — and can scale it up to industrial levels, Gokel hopes he can address two problems at once: addiction to foreign oil and biological pollution from commercial hog and poultry farming.
Says Frank Bell, the president of the Waste Elimination Biostill Systems (WEBS), Gokel's fledgling company: "This guy can take a gallon of piss, shit and water and turn it into a gallon of gasoline."
Link (thanks, Eric Roston). This image doesn't have anything directly to do with the story, but it's from motorcycle-web.com.
Reader comment: Shaun says,
Thanks for the article about Dean Gokel's pig-shit gas maker. I wonder,
has anyone at Boing Boing noticed that this process was the prime source
of fuel in Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome? What with Mel Gibson really going
nuts, and the world alledgedly sliding towards a fuel-driven PockEclipse,
I have to wonder if art is imitating life?
ernie says,
Um, in Beyond Thunderdome, Tina Turner's character specifically explains that its methane they distilled from the pig crap, and the cars ran on that. This article states the end result is gasoline, not methane.
Sean Ragan says,
It's great that ernie points out the distinction
between methane and gasoline, but he's abused the word
"distilled." No distillation is required to get
methane from excrement; all you have to do is put the
crap in a sealed container and collect the gas that
comes out. It's the product of natural fermentation
with so-called "methanogenic" bacteria.
