Tyler Durden's Biodiesel

[Tuckerfan]

[Jack] He was sucking the fat out of their asses and then selling it back to them to run their fatassed SUVs.[/Jack]

This story has it all: Beverly Hills types getting their body fat liposuctioned out, the doctor then saving that fat to make biodiesel for his SUV, and an investigation by the California public health department.

Under investigation is Craig Alan Bittner, who recently left the US to go to South America and “do volunteer work at a clinic.” While he was still in Beverly Hills, he worked at Beverly Hills Liposculpture where he sucked fat out of “pampered Los Angelenos” (as Forbes put it). He then converted the body fat to biofuel for his Ford SUV and his girlfriend’s Lincoln Navigator.

As the article points out, Lincoln never made a diesel powered Navigator, so the story seems a bit dubious.

[Least_Original_User_Name_Ever]

Interesting. Soylent SUV sounds like a gun that the Russians made in the Cold War era or some rapper.

[foolsguinea]

I heartily approve of this behavior. Beats turning it into soap.

[aruvqan]

@Tuckerfan

[Jack] He was sucking the fat out of their asses and then selling it back to them to run their fatassed SUVs.[/Jack]As the article points out, Lincoln never made a diesel powered Navigator, so the story seems a bit dubious.

aftermarket power plant.

[si_blakely]

Colour me :dubious:

You are not sucking that much fat out of people to start with, and anything you get out via liposuction will be contaminated with water and blood and all sorts of biological stuff. By the time you have cleaned it up, you would not recover enough energy to make it worth while.

With the dodgy car info, I go with suburban legend.

Si

[Boozahol_Squid_P.I]

@si_blakely

You are not sucking that much fat out of people to start with, and anything you get out via liposuction will be contaminated with water and blood and all sorts of biological stuff. By the time you have cleaned it up, you would not recover enough energy to make it worth while.

I’m not saying that the story’s likely, but the biological contaminants in the source fat isn’t the problem: most bio-dieselers use used cooking oil from restaurants: plenty of water and blood get mixed in there and then filtered out. I’d be amazed if a lipo clinic could really add that much volume to the fats that you need to have to really run pair of SUVs, but I have little doubt that you couldn’t toss it into the vats with the rest of it.

[si_blakely]

@Boozahol_Squid_P.I

I’m not saying that the story’s likely, but the biological contaminants in the source fat isn’t the problem: most bio-dieselers use used cooking oil from restaurants: plenty of water and blood get mixed in there and then filtered out. I’d be amazed if a lipo clinic could really add that much volume to the fats that you need to have to really run pair of SUVs, but I have little doubt that you couldn’t toss it into the vats with the rest of it.

Cooking oil is contaminated, but with a bit of water, some heavier fatty acids, starch/sugar, and a bit of protein. Liposuck will have far more water in it, be mostly fatty acids, contain lots of cell material and proteins as well as blood. You would need to ensure that the cells were broken down, to start with (the liposuction probably wouldn’t do that). Getting rid of the water would be next. You could get rid of some by gravity separation, but I think you would also need a chemical drying agent so you don’t have too much water in the product as you add NaOH. Then you would need more NaOH and menthanol than with cooking oil - human fats are mostly fatty acids, you need to crack these down to mid chain carbons.

Once you do this, your final product could well still be contaminated by the biological products, and these may not burn cleanly, thus eventually clogging up the engine.

Not something I would want to risk. I know people have made diesel from turkey
waste (via rendering and processing). I am pretty sure that they can’t turn a profit doing it - it costs more to do energy-wise than the value of diesel created. It only works because they are paid to dispose of the waste as well.
Si