blog moved to www.greenexplored.com
blog moved to www.greenexplored.com
blog moved to www.greenexplored.com
blog moved to www.greenexplored.com
blog moved to www.greenexplored.com
blog moved to www.greenexplored.com
blog moved to www.greenexplored.com
blog moved to www.greenexplored.com
blog moved to www.greenexplored.com
blog moved to www.greenexplored.com
blog moved to www.greenexplored.com
Friday, August 28, 2009
Saturday, June 27, 2009
Thank Government
The House of Representatives narrowly passed a bill to drive the US economy toward a less carbon intensive future. President Obama is pushing the Senate to likewise pass this bill that he would like to sign into law soon. The bill intends to cut US carbon emission by 17% in 2020 compared with a base year of 2005. The part of the bill that may actually accomplish its intended target is the part that steers Americans toward smaller and lighter personal vehicles. Consumers may actually save money in buying smaller cars as their first cost and ongoing operating costs are certainly lower than larger vehicles. The part of the bill that is real tricky is in electric power generation where incentives will be given to operate geothermal, wind, PV, solar thermal, biomass, and nuclear power stations and taxes will be imposed on coal, natural gas, and hydrocarbon liquid fired stations.
The least costly methods for power generation are coal and natural gas and the most costly is PV. The office of management and budget has estimated that the average consumer will pay approximately $100 extra per year for their energy as a result of this bill. I have no real data that confirms this. PV electricity is much more expensive to generate than natural gas and it is also intermittent. The power grid will need additional transmission lines and point of use energy storage to overcome the interruptible nature of PV or even wind. Nuclear, geothermal and biomass are base-load generators that can operate 24 by 7. The wildcard in all of this is whether plug in hybrid or pure plug in vehicles will be deployed on a large scale in the next decade. This hinges on the cost of lithium batteries and a good deal of government money is being thrown at this area.
My chemical engineering experience leads me to believe that the cost improvement in lithium ion batteries a decade from now will be moderate and nowhere near the rate of cost improvement in devices such as semiconductors or LCD TVs. Unfortunately a fractional Moore’s Law will hold for lithium batteries. The underlying limitation to the learning curve is that the electrochemistry requires a certain mass of anode, cathode, and electrolyte to store a certain quantity of energy and deliver a certain instantaneous amount of power. My prognostication is that ten years from now the cost of a lithium ion battery system will drop from approximately $900 per kilowatt hour of storage to approximately $650 per kilowatt hour of storage.
The Tesla Roadster has some 55 kilowatt hours of battery storage, the Prius only has 1.5 kilowatt hours of storage as the Prius is primarily powered by its gasoline engine. The Volt plug in hybrid GM is proposing has approximately 16 kilowatt hours of battery storage. Because of the high cost of the batteries my forecast is that plug in hybrids that are capable of 40 miles of electric travel will still be too expensive in ten years from now to capture more than a very small share of the market. Traditional hybrids will capture a third of the market in a decade and small lighter cars will also capture a similar fraction. Bigger cars will still be common with a similar market share to traditional hybrids. A plug in hybrid that goes 8 to 10 miles may be more commercially successful than the targeted 40 mile range battery intensive vehicle. If we do have plug in hybrids with 3 or 4 kilowatt hours of onboard batteries then it is quite plausible that one would recharge at night at home and the operating cost for the 10 miles that one would travel on the batteries will be perhaps 25 cents. If there are five million of these vehicles perhaps some 20 million kilowatt hours of night time power can be stored. Let’s assume the nightly charging last 8 hours, this means some 2.5 million kilowatts or some 2,500 megawatts of power generation capacity will be needed. This is a miniscule fraction of the approximately 800,000 megawatts of power generation that are in place presently in the USA.
The success of the whole plug in program hinges on the lightest metal in the periodic table and this is Li, which are incidentally the first two letters in my name. I wish I could help the planet by inventing a new less expensive material called Lindsayium but alas this is not possible and my suggestion to help meet the 17% reduction goal is to walk, bike, carpool or take the bus.
The least costly methods for power generation are coal and natural gas and the most costly is PV. The office of management and budget has estimated that the average consumer will pay approximately $100 extra per year for their energy as a result of this bill. I have no real data that confirms this. PV electricity is much more expensive to generate than natural gas and it is also intermittent. The power grid will need additional transmission lines and point of use energy storage to overcome the interruptible nature of PV or even wind. Nuclear, geothermal and biomass are base-load generators that can operate 24 by 7. The wildcard in all of this is whether plug in hybrid or pure plug in vehicles will be deployed on a large scale in the next decade. This hinges on the cost of lithium batteries and a good deal of government money is being thrown at this area.
My chemical engineering experience leads me to believe that the cost improvement in lithium ion batteries a decade from now will be moderate and nowhere near the rate of cost improvement in devices such as semiconductors or LCD TVs. Unfortunately a fractional Moore’s Law will hold for lithium batteries. The underlying limitation to the learning curve is that the electrochemistry requires a certain mass of anode, cathode, and electrolyte to store a certain quantity of energy and deliver a certain instantaneous amount of power. My prognostication is that ten years from now the cost of a lithium ion battery system will drop from approximately $900 per kilowatt hour of storage to approximately $650 per kilowatt hour of storage.
The Tesla Roadster has some 55 kilowatt hours of battery storage, the Prius only has 1.5 kilowatt hours of storage as the Prius is primarily powered by its gasoline engine. The Volt plug in hybrid GM is proposing has approximately 16 kilowatt hours of battery storage. Because of the high cost of the batteries my forecast is that plug in hybrids that are capable of 40 miles of electric travel will still be too expensive in ten years from now to capture more than a very small share of the market. Traditional hybrids will capture a third of the market in a decade and small lighter cars will also capture a similar fraction. Bigger cars will still be common with a similar market share to traditional hybrids. A plug in hybrid that goes 8 to 10 miles may be more commercially successful than the targeted 40 mile range battery intensive vehicle. If we do have plug in hybrids with 3 or 4 kilowatt hours of onboard batteries then it is quite plausible that one would recharge at night at home and the operating cost for the 10 miles that one would travel on the batteries will be perhaps 25 cents. If there are five million of these vehicles perhaps some 20 million kilowatt hours of night time power can be stored. Let’s assume the nightly charging last 8 hours, this means some 2.5 million kilowatts or some 2,500 megawatts of power generation capacity will be needed. This is a miniscule fraction of the approximately 800,000 megawatts of power generation that are in place presently in the USA.
The success of the whole plug in program hinges on the lightest metal in the periodic table and this is Li, which are incidentally the first two letters in my name. I wish I could help the planet by inventing a new less expensive material called Lindsayium but alas this is not possible and my suggestion to help meet the 17% reduction goal is to walk, bike, carpool or take the bus.
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Green Radio Show
The following is the link for the radio show on Raser the Eraser
http://alternativeenergy.com/profiles/blogs/june-15-2009-alternative
http://alternativeenergy.com/profiles/blogs/june-15-2009-alternative
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
Gallstone Capstone Posts Results
Q4 loss $0.06/shr vs yr-ago loss $0.07/shr
* Revenue up 28 pct
June 15 (Reuters) - Capstone Turbine Corp (CPST.O), a maker of low-emission microturbine systems, posted a wider fourth-quarter net loss hurt by higher manufacturing costs.
For the quarter ended March 31, the company reported net loss of $12 million, or 6 cents a share, compared with $9.6 million, or 7 cents a share, a year ago.
Revenue grew 28 percent to $11.8 million.
Analysts on average were expecting a loss of 6 cents a share, excluding items, on revenue of $13.4 million, according to Reuters Estimates.
Research and development costs rose 5 percent to $2.1 million.
Manufacturing and overhead costs increased from the year-ago quarter due to the launch of its C200 and C1000 Series systems.
Backlog for the fiscal year rose 120 percent to $61.5 million.
Shares of the company were down 3 cents after the bell. They closed at $1.15 Monday on Nasdaq.
For the alerts, please double click on [nWNAB9888] (Reporting by Biswarup Gooptu in Bangalore; Editing by Ratul Ray Chaudhuri)
* Revenue up 28 pct
June 15 (Reuters) - Capstone Turbine Corp (CPST.O), a maker of low-emission microturbine systems, posted a wider fourth-quarter net loss hurt by higher manufacturing costs.
For the quarter ended March 31, the company reported net loss of $12 million, or 6 cents a share, compared with $9.6 million, or 7 cents a share, a year ago.
Revenue grew 28 percent to $11.8 million.
Analysts on average were expecting a loss of 6 cents a share, excluding items, on revenue of $13.4 million, according to Reuters Estimates.
Research and development costs rose 5 percent to $2.1 million.
Manufacturing and overhead costs increased from the year-ago quarter due to the launch of its C200 and C1000 Series systems.
Backlog for the fiscal year rose 120 percent to $61.5 million.
Shares of the company were down 3 cents after the bell. They closed at $1.15 Monday on Nasdaq.
For the alerts, please double click on [nWNAB9888] (Reporting by Biswarup Gooptu in Bangalore; Editing by Ratul Ray Chaudhuri)
Sunday, June 14, 2009
Thank Gallstones
Today the blog is about Gallstones and Capstones. I know keystones are critical to the support of an arch but what is a capstone. Well in the world of thermodynamics, Capstone is the manufacturer of a microturbine that can produce 30 kilowatts or about 40 horsepower of power. A turbine is a jet engine rather than a piston engine and Capstone has miniaturized the jet engine to be small enough to fit in the hood of a car. They have been at this for about twelve years and blown through almost a billion dollars of investors’ money. The inventor is the brother of the founder of Compaq computers and Paul Allen of Microsoft fame has been a backer.
While the technology is elegant and sweet, the cost of fabricating a microturbine is very high. The 40 horsepower engine from Capstone that has one third the power of a Toyota Corolla, costs them more than $20,000 to manufacture. By comparison the 60 horsepower engine in a Smart Car costs Mercedes less than $2,500 to manufacture. Is the microturbine much more efficient than a piston engine? Over the full driving range that a motorist typically runs their vehicle the, microturbine will approach 30% efficiency while the piston engine will be about 15% efficient. However, when one employs a diesel engine to do the same driving, the diesel engine yields approximately the same efficiency as the Capstone turbine. The diesel engine would only cost about $3,000 to manufacture.
For the past couple of weeks I have been blogging about Raser the Eraser and today it is about Capstone the Gallstone. Capstone also wanted to lift their stock price by getting in on the plug in hybrid bandwagon. CPST is Capstone’s stock symbol and it is a small cap stock on the NASDAQ. It was once a large cap stock during the dot com boom years but it saw a low of 39 cents a share a few months back. Last week some thermodynamic wankers in the UK, fitted a plug in van with a Capstone turbine and are claiming 80 mpg for the van. http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Photo-Release-Capstone-C30-pz-15498531.html?.v=1 . On this news the CPST stock rose to close at one dollar sixteen cents yesterday.
Again the claim of the first forty miles being energy free due to the plug in lithium ion batteries propelling the vehicle without the need for engaging the engine is being made. If Raser is an Eraser then the Capstone plug in is a Gallstone. In Capstone’s case one has to add the extra cost of the turbine versus the standard piston engine and this is amounts to another $20,000 on top of the lithium ion batteries that already added more than $30,000 to the base cost of the vehicle. Therefore the Capstone Gallstone will cost you $50,000 more than the base diesel van and get no better fuel economy. I hear gallstones are very painful, the extra fifty thousand dollars per vehicle is also painful to your wallet.
Gall is a synonym for nerve or chutzpah. I really get my hairs up on my back when these gangrene gallists who have jumped on the band wagon to save the world by lowering energy consumption make ridiculous claims about their technologies that are Betamaxs and some fool then buys the stock on the hope this is the next Apple Computer. I suggest that folks rather buy shares in my new engine company Gallstone Turbine Corporation that uses rubber bands to propel a lead acid plug in. I will list Gallstone Turbine Corporation on the NYSE with the symbol GTC which also stands for Get Their Cash.On Wednesday June 17, Lindsay Leveen will be on blog talk radio at noon California time to discuss Eraser and Gallstone. 12pm PT (3pm ET) at http://BlogTalkRadio.com/AlternativeEnergyRadio The call in number for the radio show is (347) 838-8999.
While the technology is elegant and sweet, the cost of fabricating a microturbine is very high. The 40 horsepower engine from Capstone that has one third the power of a Toyota Corolla, costs them more than $20,000 to manufacture. By comparison the 60 horsepower engine in a Smart Car costs Mercedes less than $2,500 to manufacture. Is the microturbine much more efficient than a piston engine? Over the full driving range that a motorist typically runs their vehicle the, microturbine will approach 30% efficiency while the piston engine will be about 15% efficient. However, when one employs a diesel engine to do the same driving, the diesel engine yields approximately the same efficiency as the Capstone turbine. The diesel engine would only cost about $3,000 to manufacture.
For the past couple of weeks I have been blogging about Raser the Eraser and today it is about Capstone the Gallstone. Capstone also wanted to lift their stock price by getting in on the plug in hybrid bandwagon. CPST is Capstone’s stock symbol and it is a small cap stock on the NASDAQ. It was once a large cap stock during the dot com boom years but it saw a low of 39 cents a share a few months back. Last week some thermodynamic wankers in the UK, fitted a plug in van with a Capstone turbine and are claiming 80 mpg for the van. http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Photo-Release-Capstone-C30-pz-15498531.html?.v=1 . On this news the CPST stock rose to close at one dollar sixteen cents yesterday.
Again the claim of the first forty miles being energy free due to the plug in lithium ion batteries propelling the vehicle without the need for engaging the engine is being made. If Raser is an Eraser then the Capstone plug in is a Gallstone. In Capstone’s case one has to add the extra cost of the turbine versus the standard piston engine and this is amounts to another $20,000 on top of the lithium ion batteries that already added more than $30,000 to the base cost of the vehicle. Therefore the Capstone Gallstone will cost you $50,000 more than the base diesel van and get no better fuel economy. I hear gallstones are very painful, the extra fifty thousand dollars per vehicle is also painful to your wallet.
Gall is a synonym for nerve or chutzpah. I really get my hairs up on my back when these gangrene gallists who have jumped on the band wagon to save the world by lowering energy consumption make ridiculous claims about their technologies that are Betamaxs and some fool then buys the stock on the hope this is the next Apple Computer. I suggest that folks rather buy shares in my new engine company Gallstone Turbine Corporation that uses rubber bands to propel a lead acid plug in. I will list Gallstone Turbine Corporation on the NYSE with the symbol GTC which also stands for Get Their Cash.On Wednesday June 17, Lindsay Leveen will be on blog talk radio at noon California time to discuss Eraser and Gallstone. 12pm PT (3pm ET) at http://BlogTalkRadio.com/AlternativeEnergyRadio The call in number for the radio show is (347) 838-8999.
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Thank Gazillions
Is a gazillion a real number? No it is not, but it is used euphemistically as an indefinitely large number. With our national debt standing at about ten to the power thirteen dollars I say we have reached a gazillion of debt. The French word for Gas is Gaz, so perhaps we are not out of gas quite yet as we can invent the engine that runs on gazillions of paper money.
Talking about numbers, I just read in the Sacramento Bee that in 2008 the number of new vehicles sold in the State of California totaled 1,447,460 down from 1.881,030 in 2007. This means that 433,570 fewer vehicles were sold last year than the year before. In fact the sales of new vehicles in 2008 were the lowest since 1993. The California New Car Dealers Association is predicting some 15.1% fewer new car sales in 2009 with an expected figure of 1,229,000. With all the closures of new car dealerships in Marin County I would estimate that the sales of new vehicles in our county will plunge even further.
Superficially this is good news for the environment, fewer vehicles means fewer carbon emissions, excepting that we need new more efficient vehicles and need to get those fool size SUVs off the road. Also the county as well as the state depends heavily on sales taxes collected from new vehicle sales and the diminished source of government revenue is causing all sorts of ripple effects on the level of basic services we expect from our governments. The ripple is getting so pronounced we may all have to trade down to drinking ripple. Fine wines are also no longer selling in the volumes previously produced. People are trading down to less expensive wines, however on aggregate wine consumption in California is still increasing. Production volume of wines in California increased by 2.5% in 2008. Oregon had us Golden Staters way beat by increasing their wine production by 9.3%.
All these numbers are making my head spin just as if I had drunk a jug of ripple. We are trading down on wine and we are not trading down on the size of our vehicles. My solution to this is the “ultimate stimulus package” of a free Corolla with the purchase of ten cases of Corona. My friend Dave who is my co-host on blog talk radio each Wednesday, bought a brand-new Saab now that that this GM company is in bankruptcy in Sweden. Dave is a very bright MIT engineer and he is willing to risk that parts and service will be hard to get for the substantial discount he received in buying the new Saab. I just hope Saab does not stand for Send Another Able Body when the car breaks down and I have to help push it.
It also seems that another of the Generals in the DOW Industrials has drunk too much ripple. Just this week General Electric’s market capitalization dropped to a low of 89 billion dollars and they cut their dividend by two thirds. GE had a market capitalization in excess of 500 billion dollars or almost a gazillion back in July 2000. I just remembered the Y2K ad that was “yes to KIA”, if only we had bought those small cars we would not have today’s headache.
Talking about numbers, I just read in the Sacramento Bee that in 2008 the number of new vehicles sold in the State of California totaled 1,447,460 down from 1.881,030 in 2007. This means that 433,570 fewer vehicles were sold last year than the year before. In fact the sales of new vehicles in 2008 were the lowest since 1993. The California New Car Dealers Association is predicting some 15.1% fewer new car sales in 2009 with an expected figure of 1,229,000. With all the closures of new car dealerships in Marin County I would estimate that the sales of new vehicles in our county will plunge even further.
Superficially this is good news for the environment, fewer vehicles means fewer carbon emissions, excepting that we need new more efficient vehicles and need to get those fool size SUVs off the road. Also the county as well as the state depends heavily on sales taxes collected from new vehicle sales and the diminished source of government revenue is causing all sorts of ripple effects on the level of basic services we expect from our governments. The ripple is getting so pronounced we may all have to trade down to drinking ripple. Fine wines are also no longer selling in the volumes previously produced. People are trading down to less expensive wines, however on aggregate wine consumption in California is still increasing. Production volume of wines in California increased by 2.5% in 2008. Oregon had us Golden Staters way beat by increasing their wine production by 9.3%.
All these numbers are making my head spin just as if I had drunk a jug of ripple. We are trading down on wine and we are not trading down on the size of our vehicles. My solution to this is the “ultimate stimulus package” of a free Corolla with the purchase of ten cases of Corona. My friend Dave who is my co-host on blog talk radio each Wednesday, bought a brand-new Saab now that that this GM company is in bankruptcy in Sweden. Dave is a very bright MIT engineer and he is willing to risk that parts and service will be hard to get for the substantial discount he received in buying the new Saab. I just hope Saab does not stand for Send Another Able Body when the car breaks down and I have to help push it.
It also seems that another of the Generals in the DOW Industrials has drunk too much ripple. Just this week General Electric’s market capitalization dropped to a low of 89 billion dollars and they cut their dividend by two thirds. GE had a market capitalization in excess of 500 billion dollars or almost a gazillion back in July 2000. I just remembered the Y2K ad that was “yes to KIA”, if only we had bought those small cars we would not have today’s headache.
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Thank Goats
Has the green machine lost his mind thanking old Billy for helping save the planet. I started thinking of goats a couple of weeks ago when I received this email at work that a company in Framingham Massachusetts has received FDA approval for a biological drug that was recovered from goat’s milk in genetically modified goats. The drug is a protein called Antithrombrin and is used to untangle blood clots. There are approximately one in five thousand patients in the USA that have a genetic disorder of not producing antithrombrin and are at high risk during surgeries or pregnancy. The company chose the route of using genetically modified goats rather than modifying ecoli or Chinese Hamster Ovary cells to express the protein. Ecoli and Chinese Hampster Ovary cells are commonly used to make biological drugs that Genentech, Amgen, J&J and other sell.
A herd of one hundred and fifty genetically modified goats in Massachusetts express the two hundred and twenty pounds of Antithrombrin protein that otherwise would otherwise have to be produced from every drop of blood that is donated in the USA each year. These are very special goats and I bet you they have special herders who make sure they do not escape from their farm where they are fed better food than your average goat. A female goat produces about eight pounds of milk a day and will do so for approximately three hundred day during lactation. Therefore a single goat will produce two thousand four hundred pounds of milk a year. The herd of one hundred and fifty goats will therefore produce three hundred and sixty thousand pounds of milk a year. The concentration of the Antithrombrin protein in the goat’s milk prior to purification is therefore 0.061 percent or about 0.6 grams per liter. Goats were chosen over cows, sheep and rabbits because of their productivity in producing milk. Goats also are far lower emitters of methane gas than cows.
I recently co-authored an article in Biopharm International that compared the carbon and water footprints of traditional stainless steel biological drug manufacturing facilities with single use plastic alternates. The single use plastic systems had significantly lower water usage and moderately lower carbon footprint. Now that the goat method is FDA approved I will have to research the data, but my hunch is that this method will be hard to beat as goats thrive in arid climates even though they have sweat glands. Goats are raised for their meat as well as their milk. Goat’s milk is naturally homogenized and the cream remains suspended in the milk and does not rise as does cow’s cream, hence we do not have goat cream but we can produce goat butter.
The meat from young goats is called kid, while older animals yield mutton or chevon, not to be mixed up with Chevron. Goat meat is low in cholesterol and is comparable to chicken. The digestive system of goats is able to breakdown just about any organic fodder but they do prefer the tips of trees and woody shrubs. Their favorite hay is alfalfa and therefore goats would vote for Gore over any other politician. As global warming starts to convert Texas into Sudan we may have to start eating more chevon and chevre. If Texas does become Sudan, its capital will be called car-tomb and the state name will change to Sedan. Has the green machine lost his mind thanking old Billy for helping save the planet. I started thinking of goats a couple of weeks ago when I received this email at work that a company in Framingham Massachusetts has received FDA approval for a biological drug that was recovered from goat’s milk in genetically modified goats. The drug is a protein called Antithrombrin and is used to untangle blood clots. There are approximately one in five thousand patients in the USA that have a genetic disorder of not producing antithrombrin and are at high risk during surgeries or pregnancy. The company chose the route of using genetically modified goats rather than modifying ecoli or Chinese Hamster Ovary cells to express the protein. Ecoli and Chinese Hampster Ovary cells are commonly used to make biological drugs that Genentech, Amgen, J&J and other sell.A herd of one hundred and fifty genetically modified goats in Massachusetts express the two hundred and twenty pounds of Antithrombrin protein that otherwise would otherwise have to be produced from every drop of blood that is donated in the USA each year. These are very special goats and I bet you they have special herders who make sure they do not escape from their farm where they are fed better food than your average goat. A female goat produces about eight pounds of milk a day and will do so for approximately three hundred day during lactation. Therefore a single goat will produce two thousand four hundred pounds of milk a year. The herd of one hundred and fifty goats will therefore produce three hundred and sixty thousand pounds of milk a year. The concentration of the Antithrombrin protein in the goat’s milk prior to purification is therefore 0.061 percent or about 0.6 grams per liter. Goats were chosen over cows, sheep and rabbits because of their productivity in producing milk. Goats also are far lower emitters of methane gas than cows.I recently co-authored an article in Biopharm International that compared the carbon and water footprints of traditional stainless steel biological drug manufacturing facilities with single use plastic alternates. The single use plastic systems had significantly lower water usage and moderately lower carbon footprint. Now that the goat method is FDA approved I will have to research the data, but my hunch is that this method will be hard to beat as goats thrive in arid climates even though they have sweat glands. Goats are raised for their meat as well as their milk. Goat’s milk is naturally homogenized and the cream remains suspended in the milk and does not rise as does cow’s cream, hence we do not have goat cream but we can produce goat butter.The meat from young goats is called kid, while older animals yield mutton or chevon, not to be mixed up with Chevron. Goat meat is low in cholesterol and is comparable to chicken. The digestive system of goats is able to breakdown just about any organic fodder but they do prefer the tips of trees and woody shrubs. Their favorite hay is alfalfa and therefore goats would vote for Gore over any other politician. As global warming starts to convert Texas into Sudan we may have to start eating more chevon and chevre. If Texas does become Sudan, its capital will be called car-tomb and the state name will change to Sedan.
A herd of one hundred and fifty genetically modified goats in Massachusetts express the two hundred and twenty pounds of Antithrombrin protein that otherwise would otherwise have to be produced from every drop of blood that is donated in the USA each year. These are very special goats and I bet you they have special herders who make sure they do not escape from their farm where they are fed better food than your average goat. A female goat produces about eight pounds of milk a day and will do so for approximately three hundred day during lactation. Therefore a single goat will produce two thousand four hundred pounds of milk a year. The herd of one hundred and fifty goats will therefore produce three hundred and sixty thousand pounds of milk a year. The concentration of the Antithrombrin protein in the goat’s milk prior to purification is therefore 0.061 percent or about 0.6 grams per liter. Goats were chosen over cows, sheep and rabbits because of their productivity in producing milk. Goats also are far lower emitters of methane gas than cows.
I recently co-authored an article in Biopharm International that compared the carbon and water footprints of traditional stainless steel biological drug manufacturing facilities with single use plastic alternates. The single use plastic systems had significantly lower water usage and moderately lower carbon footprint. Now that the goat method is FDA approved I will have to research the data, but my hunch is that this method will be hard to beat as goats thrive in arid climates even though they have sweat glands. Goats are raised for their meat as well as their milk. Goat’s milk is naturally homogenized and the cream remains suspended in the milk and does not rise as does cow’s cream, hence we do not have goat cream but we can produce goat butter.
The meat from young goats is called kid, while older animals yield mutton or chevon, not to be mixed up with Chevron. Goat meat is low in cholesterol and is comparable to chicken. The digestive system of goats is able to breakdown just about any organic fodder but they do prefer the tips of trees and woody shrubs. Their favorite hay is alfalfa and therefore goats would vote for Gore over any other politician. As global warming starts to convert Texas into Sudan we may have to start eating more chevon and chevre. If Texas does become Sudan, its capital will be called car-tomb and the state name will change to Sedan. Has the green machine lost his mind thanking old Billy for helping save the planet. I started thinking of goats a couple of weeks ago when I received this email at work that a company in Framingham Massachusetts has received FDA approval for a biological drug that was recovered from goat’s milk in genetically modified goats. The drug is a protein called Antithrombrin and is used to untangle blood clots. There are approximately one in five thousand patients in the USA that have a genetic disorder of not producing antithrombrin and are at high risk during surgeries or pregnancy. The company chose the route of using genetically modified goats rather than modifying ecoli or Chinese Hamster Ovary cells to express the protein. Ecoli and Chinese Hampster Ovary cells are commonly used to make biological drugs that Genentech, Amgen, J&J and other sell.A herd of one hundred and fifty genetically modified goats in Massachusetts express the two hundred and twenty pounds of Antithrombrin protein that otherwise would otherwise have to be produced from every drop of blood that is donated in the USA each year. These are very special goats and I bet you they have special herders who make sure they do not escape from their farm where they are fed better food than your average goat. A female goat produces about eight pounds of milk a day and will do so for approximately three hundred day during lactation. Therefore a single goat will produce two thousand four hundred pounds of milk a year. The herd of one hundred and fifty goats will therefore produce three hundred and sixty thousand pounds of milk a year. The concentration of the Antithrombrin protein in the goat’s milk prior to purification is therefore 0.061 percent or about 0.6 grams per liter. Goats were chosen over cows, sheep and rabbits because of their productivity in producing milk. Goats also are far lower emitters of methane gas than cows.I recently co-authored an article in Biopharm International that compared the carbon and water footprints of traditional stainless steel biological drug manufacturing facilities with single use plastic alternates. The single use plastic systems had significantly lower water usage and moderately lower carbon footprint. Now that the goat method is FDA approved I will have to research the data, but my hunch is that this method will be hard to beat as goats thrive in arid climates even though they have sweat glands. Goats are raised for their meat as well as their milk. Goat’s milk is naturally homogenized and the cream remains suspended in the milk and does not rise as does cow’s cream, hence we do not have goat cream but we can produce goat butter.The meat from young goats is called kid, while older animals yield mutton or chevon, not to be mixed up with Chevron. Goat meat is low in cholesterol and is comparable to chicken. The digestive system of goats is able to breakdown just about any organic fodder but they do prefer the tips of trees and woody shrubs. Their favorite hay is alfalfa and therefore goats would vote for Gore over any other politician. As global warming starts to convert Texas into Sudan we may have to start eating more chevon and chevre. If Texas does become Sudan, its capital will be called car-tomb and the state name will change to Sedan.
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