First Post

This is my first official post to my new blog. I am going to write about my day-to-day adventures into biodiesel, solar, and entrepreneurship. I have just graduated with a mechanical engineering degree, and I will be working on about 4 different companies that all deal with renewable energy.

My first company that started from the University of Florida Biodiesel plant in Gainesville, Florida.. Every time we would make biodiesel, 20% of our chemical reaction would make glycerin. We made this glycerin into soap bars that were in the shape of the UF Gator and UF academic logo.

I also started a solar panel company called International Renewable Energy (IRE) Solar. This company was based off of my experiences with the UF Biodiesel plant. I learned how to install solar panels, both electricity producing solar panels and the solar panels that heat hot water. I traveled to China to see how solar panels are manufactured in spring of 2010. I learned how ship cargo containers of solar panels to solar energy installers all over the world, from Florida to South Africa to Australia. Ravenwood Solar was then born from these solar endeavors. I am now designing solar flashlights and solar backbacks to be shipped all over the world.

My other company is based on of my biodiesel research with a plant called "jatropha curcas". I conducted research at UF with growing this plant. Jatropha is grown in thousands of acres in India, and the seed that is produced is high in oil content. I grew jatropha in test plots across Florida in order to turn the oil bearing seeds into biodiesel. I formed with a company with a chemical engineer I met through the former UF Biodiesel plant. Together we traveled all over Florida finding test plots for jatropha and the best places to plant jatropha. We planted jatropha in Arcadia, Gainesville, Tampa, and Lakeland, Florida. We called this company Indus Energy Solutions after the Indus River in India, a popular place to grow jatropha. I am working on growing several hundred acres of jatropha in the next year to sell the oil to local biodiesel plants. The jatropha plant is non-food crop that can grow on marginable land with very little irrigation. It is an excellent solution for the food versus fuel debate, as well as for a cheap, easy plant to cultivate for biofuel.

My newest company, DML Solar, LLC., is a company I formed to sell books and literature about alternative energy. I am writing a book about how to install solar hot water heaters and how to make small prototype wind turbines. I am also starting a book about my biodiesel experience at UF.

I want to save the world with alternative energy- that is my goal.