RE: GAS-L: Doom and gloom for gasification?

["Gavin Gulliver-Goodall" <Gavin@roseplac.worldonline.co.uk>]

David,

I think you have hit the nail right on the head-My experience in the UK
certainly concurs with your own observations.

I am certainly interested in your ideas for development of a market for
smaller biomass burners -for heating I assume- in the UK I assume?
Feel free to contact me off-list

Kind regards,
gavin


Gavin Gulliver-Goodall
3G Energi,

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-----Original Message-----
From: David Reynolds-Lacey [mailto:d.rl@virgin.net]
Sent: Saturday, August 31, 2002 20:02
To: gasification@crest.org
Subject: GAS-L: Doom and gloom for gasification?

Dear All,

Another Earth summit and the media is again full
of "sustainable development" and "aid for
developing countries" stories, well will THIS
summit finally make a difference? - You can bet
that it certainly won't

The posts of late seem to be casting a grim shadow
over biomass gasification/pyrolosis technology. We
hear folks saying that nobody making money out of
biomass, another project that becomes so many
tonnes of scrap. We hear of fears of difficulty in
raising grant funding for gasification/pyrolosis
work, low cost of fossil fuel, high cost of
transportation of biomass, biomass companies
making entire workforces redundant and the lack of
will of governments to upset polluting
manufacturing industry, etc. etc. Quite frankly,
there is not yet a real need for sustainable
energy solutions and it is NEED that drives the
market, so meanwhile, let's just shut this
discussion group down and all do something else! -
No, of course not but you can't really blame any
group observer for thinking along those lines.

I have been in "future product" orientated
businesses all of my business life. Here, in the
UK, then a telecommunications backwater (and still
is, in comparison to many countries), I fitted
mobile phones in 1968 and sold hand held (sort of)
electronic calculators in 1971. I tried to develop
and sell small business computers in the (pre PC)
early 70's, I sold Fax machines in 1982 and
satellite TV in 1983, to mention but a few. I
think I have a good idea of what it is like to
survive in a market when there is no need,
perceived or (sometimes) at all. I had to search
hard to find and target individuals and
organisations that really had a need, or even a
problem that I could solve and I suggest that this
is what we have to do in the biomass energy
market.

Large grandiose gasification projects in the
developed industrialised world are clearly a no-go
at the moment, cheap fuel and power is too readily
available, why should a business invest vast sums
in the infrastructure to use such forms of energy?
It is true that some such projects do exist but I
think that many, if not all, are either installed
by local or national government departments or
subsidised by them, or some other fund provider.
It is small, well-targeted systems that will keep
the ball rolling, there is a need for them now and
with proper location and planning I am sure they
can be cost effective without continuous subsidy.

Ready availability of poorly supervised grants
from governments and some corporations, anxious to
appear to be doing something "green", often purely
for political gain, simply creates a grant
dependent mentality amongst researchers and would
-be manufacturers. I question whether all of these
grants are spent wisely and effectively, in a
proper businesslike manner. Often, it seems that
more effort and planning is put into obtaining
grants than is put into system planning of the
project. It is only a few months ago that an
entire system with a build cost of, I think, 25M
tax dollars was up for sale for, I think, less
than 1M dollars, I believe the reason was a
failure to secure an agreement obtain a subsidy to
sell the energy. Therefore, not only was a large
amount of grant money required in order to build
the plant, but a large amount of what was
effectively more grant money was required to run
it - not good business sense in my book. Yet
another project failed because they could not feed
the fuel in, I wonder, did anybody think to carry
out extensive fuel feeding experiments, before
building the plant?  15 years work and 50M down
the pan, doesn't it just make your blood boil?
What real business would invest 25M of it's OWN
money in a project without first securing an
agreement with someone to buy the produce?
Furthermore, what real business would make the
same investment knowing that they could only ever
sell the produce at a loss?  What real business
would invest 50M of it's OWN money, developing
(say) a vehicle with an engine for which no
useable fuel existed?  Spending other people's
money is the easiest thing in the world to do.
Until governments step in and impose massive taxes
on all fossil fuels and then allocate ALL of that
revenue to STRICTLY controlled and supervised
grants, large scale biomass energy projects are
dead in the water, that is, of course, until the
fossil fuel runs out!

Another thing that will delay rapid advancement is
the greed that fuels much of the current obsession
with patents and protection of Intellectual
Property Rights in this area, this serves only to
stifle healthy competition and create monopolies.
Existence of these patents can also cause other,
probably more idealistic and less profit
orientated, researchers and would-be manufacturers
to spend valuable time looking for alternative
ways of doing the job without infringing someone
else's patent and having to pay large license
fees. I certainly believe that any and all
Intellectual Property Rights arising from any
grant aided work, paid from Taxpayers money,
belong to those Taxpayers should be in the public
domain. The environment is too important a
commodity to be left in the hands of the few that
aspire to become the global "clean hands", purely
license selling, corporations of the future,
probably with pockets bulging to bursting point
with politicians. Just look at what some of the
"Globals" have done to the environment to date.
Some of the very same corporations, that have made
fortunes over the years whilst destroying the
environment, are now putting on their fashionable
"environmental hats", hoping to make more fortunes
out of "helping" us to rescue and protect the
environment.  Of course there is nothing wrong
with making profit, I would be a hypocrite to
suggest otherwise but there has got to be a limit
when it comes to essential services and the
environment. We have seen what happens when
essential supplies and services are in the hands
of a few large, profit driven corporations -
haven't we learnt anything?

As a slightly cynical aside but perfectly
demonstrating  what I have been saying about the
folly of unsupervised and ill-researched grant
aid, there have been a couple of news stories in
my local business newspaper that are quite
topical.  Our somewhat superficial government,
that has been trumpeting it's success in reducing
CO2 emissions by closing down UK coal fired power
stations, has recently been found to have awarded
export guarantee grants to UK companies to build
coal fired power stations abroad that produce 3
times more CO2 than ours did!  Last week it was
reported that the Swaziland government is to spend
GBP 150M on an aircraft for their King, their
reason, was to allow the King to travel the world
in order to raise - you've guessed it - grant aid!
Yet I think it was Crispin that only a few weeks
ago mentioned the grave difficulties faced by the
impoverished people of Swaziland in even affording
cheap, 1-dollar fans for their stoves.  On a more
tongue- in-cheek note, it is also reported today
that a ceremony in which thousands of women
present bundles of reeds to the King is just about
to take place in that same country - could he be
building a reed gasifier, I wonder?

Now that I have got that out of my system, you may
ask, if I have a better idea - yes, I think I
have, which will, if nothing else, demonstrate
that this post is effectively (and eventually)
on-topic.  My idea, which is based on small-scale
renewable biomass gasification, may not be new but
I believe the proposed method of assisted
implementation may well be. However this post is
already a trifle too long and I will put forward
my ideas, aspirations and proposals in further
post in the near future.

Herein, I may have made what some may consider as
being somewhat idealistic and maybe controversial,
although I hope not offensive, comments. I may
also have touched nerves but there comes a time
when one simply just has to say, as politely as
possible, just what one feels. I therefore invite
and will accept constructive, polite criticism and
correction, but most of all, having nailed my
colours to the mast, I wish to identify any (if
any) like-minded people amongst you, with whom I
can have further discussions about my plans and a
freer exchange of information.

After much pondering, I now, on the advice of the
"Iron Duke", take this opportunity to "publish and
be damned!"


Kindest regards,


David Reynolds-Lacey



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