Photo by Wyndi Veigel

 

 

FARMERSVILLE – Imagine living in a world where recycling means collecting your newspaper, cardboard and computer paper into a pile, then putting it through a machine to convert to fuel to run your automobile.
 

For one Farmersville-based company, that scenario isn’t a dream or movie script. 

Allard Research and Development has recently completed the engineering of a small machine which converts anything with cellulose into ethanol. The process, which takes approximately four days, begins by taking anything with cellulose – leaves, grass clippings, newspapers, etc. – and adding enzymes that it to break it down into sugar.  The mixture is then run through the machine and turned into ethanol.

“This is a very new thing. We eventually have plans to build a home-size unit,” Adam Allard, president of Allard Research and Development. “The product should be ready in the spring.”

According to the Web site, www.allardresearch.com, Allard Research and Development is the first and only company in the world offering automated commercial-grade ethanol production systems in small- to medium-sized capacities.

Not only has the company been hard at work completing the cellulose-based ethanol production, but they have also been marketing a machine that will take wastes such as soda, fruit, sweet sorghum and cattails and make ethanol.

“Most people don’t realize you can get 2,500 gallons of ethanol per acre from cattails where as you only get 300 from corn,” Allard said.

 

Waste products such as expired soft drinks, corn syrup or fruit can be used to make ethanol.

“We have one client in Arlington who we get waste fruits from,” Allard said. “People don’t realize that 40 percent of all fruit is wasted.”

The development of Allard Research has been built quickly  – they have been in business for only two years. The business opened after Allard and his wife, Sharon, saw a press conference three years ago with President George W. Bush speaking on using switchgrass to make ethanol.

“It was when they first began to push alternative energy,” Mrs. Allard said. 

The company began by strictly completing research, but quickly started seeing holes in the industry that needed filling.

“We have done all of our own research, but something has come out of it,” Mr. Allard said.

The husband and wife began the research after seeing a flaw with current ethanol factories.

“Every refinery is approached as a custom plant,” he said. “The problem with this is it’s so expensive.”

So the Allards built a smaller, five-gallon modular system which can be connected and stacked to get a larger output of ethanol.

According to Mr. Allard, the smaller ethanol machines would be ideal for small businesses, municipalities and large ranch operations that need their own fuel.

“Any car can run off of strictly ethanol,” he said. “It just takes an after-market device attached to the computer chip.”

The Allards’ products are sold throughout the world.

“One customer wants to use it in Africa to make sterno,” he said.

The company is self-funded and has the intention of staying in Farmersville long-term. “When sales can justify it, we want to buy land and build a building,” he said. 

Currently the company is manufacturing in Dallas and Tyler, but the owners woud like to eventually move their assembly to Farmersville.

“This will create several hundred jobs when we eventually open it,” Adam said.

Though the company is in small-town Farmersville, their big dreams have attracted attention nationwide.

They have currently received calls from M.I.T., the U.S.D.A., Purdue University and Sante Fe College. Universities offering degrees in renewable energy are interested in the Allards’ machine because it is so compact it can be placed in science labs to be studied. According to the Web site greencaradvisor, GreenHouse Interantional, “a San Diego-based company whose investors include basketball star Shaquille O’Neal, is partnering” with Allard to convert soft-drink, beer yeast and other products into ethanol.

Though renewable resources are a huge focus today, Allard said the market for oil will always be there.

“Oil is so valuable it’s never going to go away,” he said. “We are taking something that would be waste and are turning it into something useful, but it is going to be a long time before it’s widespread.”

In between completing the research and development for their ethanol machines, the Allards are also studying hydroponics.

Hydroponics are a way of growing plants without soil using water that carries nutrients.

The result of hydroponics is larger plants in a shorter amount of time.

“It’s something I’ve been interested in for a while,” Mrs. Allard said, among her lettuce leafs which have only been growing for a couple of weeks but are already eight inches tall.

“It’s amazing what hydroponics can do,” she said.

Going “green” is not just simply a business endeavor for the Allards but also a lifestyle. The research and development being put forth by Mr. and Mrs. Allard  is focused on making a positive mark on Farmersville and the entire world.




 

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