Posted December 11, 2009

North Carolina is converting traditional tobacco acres to other crops, so the state's Southeastern Community College in Whiteville, N.C., has initiated a program to educate farmers on the ins-and-outs of biodiesel manufacturing, anticipating producers will be growing more oilseeds in the future. Southeastern Community College will be using a mobile biodiesel processor built by Jerome, Arizona-based Verde Biofuel for this program.

Verde's Project F2F is a "self contained mobile unit" that fits into a trailer-Verde Biotrailers can make several thousands of gallons of biodiesel per month. It has the capability to take a batch of raw seeds, "such as soy seeds and press the seed, extract the oil, clean the oil and process it."

Company founder Tim McClellan launched Verde Biofuel as a subsidiary of Western Heritage Furniture, which he started in Seattle several years before. "We started taking slash and burn timber and materials from old barns and recycling it for furniture," McClellan told Biodiesel Magazine. "This was a green product we were soon delivering to dozens of states and decided we should be delivering it with a green fuel."

While the units are small, they allow students and other would-be biodieselers to view the basic components of methyl ester manufacturing including seed crushers, centrifuges, reactors, methanol recovery apparatuses, fuel polishers, fire suppression and more. "The idea is to be able to transport these units out to farms and show farmers how to make biodiesel," McClellan said.