Peterbilt goes Green & Green Pairie Grass

Peterbilt Hy-bred

Wow! Class 8 Hy-bred, who would have ever thought.

Wal-Mart has taken delivery on the first class 8 Hy-bred Truck; appropriately having a GREEN paint job.

There are claims of 25% savings; though I haven’t herd what the price tag is and how long it will take to get ROI.

I’m surer a few of the trendy owner operators will buy as soon as more are available.

If the fleets start running these, you can be assured it will pay off, as they wouldn’t buy mud flaps if they didn’t have to.

The other day a friend of mine that helps companies go public told me about a project that he was working on

For a group that is making biofuel from switch grass, saw dust paper and other carbons. Their claim is more fuel for less bucks than corn based biofuel. A couple days later I received the Oct. issue of Field and Stream.

Skimming through lo and behold an article caught my eye; “Gas From The Grass” by Bob Marshall F & S Conservation Editor. This editorial states that ethanol from corn base is not cost effective and does little to lesson greenhouse gases because of several factors.

• Fuel required to make fertilizer (petroleum based)
• Fuel required to plow, plant, apply fertilizer, pesticide, herbicide and harvest corn.
• Cost of fertilizer.( petroleum based)
• Cost of pesticide. (petroleum based)
• Cost to taxpayer ($.51 per Gal. subsidy by Fed. Gov. to blend ethanol with gasoline)
• Cost of water to irrigate (1700 gallons of water to produce 1 gallon of ethanol)
• Cost of expensive farm machinery.
• Cost of using quality crop land that could be producing food products.

The alternative suggested by the F&S Editor is native grass and other cellulose that could be grown on CRP land (Conservation Reserve Program) and land not suitable for crops.

• This would not require plowing, planting, fertilizer, herbicides, pesticides.
• Would require less expensive machinery to harvest.
• Would require less fuel to harvest.
• Would save the taxpayer by eliminating the $.51 subsidy( would not be needed)
  
• Would save the taxpayer by eliminating the CRP subsidy
• Would be more profitable to the land owner than collecting CRP payments
• Would reserve quality land for food crops.

Minnesota researchers have discovered that the 1 gallon of fossil fuel it takes to make 1.2 gallons of corn based ethanol will produce 5 gallons of ethanol from native prairie grasses.

There are many other benefits to using native grasses and other cellulose based products not mentioned here.

Article approved by Peterson Power Hood a Semi Truck Accessory