Plastic2Oil Inc (PTOI)

[Arthur Edward Whoof]

Logistics… the killer is in the details boys

Has anyone bothered to do the simple math?

There was a picture posted a few days back that showed a truck full of bailed plastic and another picture of two tanker trucks.

From my experience I know that the bails, which are not ground plastic, (ground plastic of the desired types weighs in at around 1000lbs for a 4x4x4 container) would weigh, at best around 500lbs (that’s being very generous but lets use that to make the math easier).

So, a maximum size trailer at 60ft long can hold 60 bails (15 deep x 2 wide x 2 tall). In the picture it seems that they are using 2’ tall bails and only stacking them 3 high, but let’s be more generous and try to help the numbers out here (and hope that they can get a better handle on the situation to improve their shipping cost).

From this we can conclude- that each truck delivers 30,000lbs of plastic. (maybe up to 40,000 but not likely based on the obvious amount of voids (crushed bottles, paper and cardboard)in the picture)

Now we know that it takes 8-10lbs of plastic to produce a gallon of fuel.
But wait, 10-12% will result in off gasses,
And 2-4% will end up as char,
And unwashed, unsorted (simply not possible, but I will address that in future posts) plastic can contain upwards of 20-50% contamination… but lets be generous and only say 6% so we can again make the math easy to follow (and avoid the pumpers accusing misguided extremes).

That means that on average, 11% + 3% + 6% = 20% that will not end up as fuel. (remember, only counting 6% for the 20-50% contamination, diff of -14% to -44% but lets go with it just so you can see the more massive problems here)

But wait… there’s more…
From the picture (and personal experience) it can clearly be seen that this is mixed plastic (is there any processing equipment in the plant, or is Johnny going to cut off all those rings of different plastic from every bottle by hand?).
From the JBI website we know that they can only use #2, #4, #5 and #7 (highly doubt that #7 is true… more on that later).

Now it is clear that at least half of the plastic is unusable, only 3 of the 9 plastics are usable so it may be much more than 50% and especially since PETE #1 accounts for a large percentage of post consumer waste (soft drinks, sports drinks, water, juice and milk… usually any clear bottle or container) and #9 ABS is one of the most abundantly used plastics for consumer electronics like PCs, TVs, household items and gadgets. Lets not forget the incredibly fast growing trend of bio-plastics which is typically starch or cellulose based and would result in catastrophic consequences (really big boom) if accidentally mixed into a catalytic cracking reactor in any substantial amount.

Btw- it is estimated that the mass majority of consumer plastic will be bio-plastic by the end of this decade… (better hope Johnny boy has a secret catalyst that can take the oxygen out of bio-plastic or the days of P2O are surely numbered)

Read more: Types of Plastic Bottles | eHow.com http://www.ehow.com/about_5505346_types-plastic-bottles.html#ixzz2IjSii3gk

Also any packaging that comes from China (all those clear blister packs that are a pain to open) are so full of nasty fillers that there is no way to run them without fouling things up or producing dangerous and problematic compounds (ever wonder why all that plastic that comes from China never seems to have a recycle number on it).

So now we are down to only 30% of that 30,000lbs that will become fuel to fill the tankers… that means only 9000lbs per truckload. (probably more like 5000lbs)

Therefore; each 6000 gallon tanker requires (being very generous) 6 truckloads of plastic!

If you want to gauge output someone should start counting trucks in for delivery. (are there steady streams of trucks delivering enormous amounts of plastic every day???)

[Critical side note; If the 2 machines were actually running at full capacity that would require at minimum, 50 trucks a day. Btw, how big is the delivery bay, the warehouse, the sorting area? How many people are currently working at the plant? Do you realize how much manpower and overhead is required to manage, unload, sort and warehouse 50 truckloads? Tap,tap,tap… is anyone in there?]

This is just the tip of the iceberg… the manpower to extract the useable from the unusable plastic, the space and equipment, and the disposal (shipping and disposal cost) of the unusable plastic and the shear logistics is a considerable amount of seemingly unaccounted overhead. (plus the bad press and negative rap that will come from JBI becoming the leading contributor of plastic waste to landfills for the 750,000lbs of unusable plastic that they will have to dispose of EVERY DAY if this actually gets up and running)

Oh, that’s not a problem you say… they will just get good sources of free plastic….
Fat chance!
Good, sorted plastic, of the type that is needed is selling for $600-$1000 a ton and the price is increasing every day, the prices have doubled in the last 2 years.

Maybe we should do more math on the overhead cost of useable plastic and extrapolate the profit margin. The $10 per barrel cost assumes FREE plastic with NO overhead.
The logistics are the killer in the details.

There is so much more that you are in the dark about, why do you think the oil companies have sat on many patents pertaining to this for so long? Why is it that P2O was discovered way back when plastic was invented yet the plastics industry has ignored it?
Why aren’t the polymer chemists, the petroleum engineers and the waste management specialists doing this (the people trained in the art with knowledge, experience and expertise) but a lowly data technician comes along with some snake oil and you automatically assume that his fast talking sales pitch is the cure-all. Somehow a guy with no credibility and an obvious negative history is going to school the experts.

One last question to consider-

Why not focus on running just one machine and produce product? If it was logistically and financially sound, why not just let the chicken lay the golden eggs and not raise money to build a chicken farm?

For the savvy investor it is wise to do your homework… otherwise you are not investing YOU ARE GAMBLING! (sad part is you obviously don’t know the rules to the game).

Just heads I win, tales you lose’n