A University of Illinois researcher Yuanhui Zhang and his team have developed a method to enhance the production of fuel from pig manure.
The research, partially funded by the Illinois Pork Producers Association, has developed a process by which pig manure can be continuously fed into a reactor to produce a continuous flow of crude oil. Previous processes required converting the hog waste one batch at a time. The next step is to construct a full-size pilot reactor on a hog farm.
Professor Zhang estimates that the process could derive 3.6 gallons of crude oil a day from each pig. Given the number of pigs raised in the U.S., over 100 million annually, this process has the potential to produce hundreds of millions of gallons of diesel-like fuel per day. Currently, however, no research has been done to explore how many current commercial vehicles could run on the fuel.
Source:
Bellevillenewsdemocrat.com, April 29, 2006
Ontario Pork Industry Council