Thomas Wagner, Associated Press
February 24, 2008

LONDON -- Virgin Atlantic carried out the world's first flight of a commercial aircraft powered with biofuel Sunday in an effort to show it can produce less carbon dioxide than normal jet fuels.

A Virgin Atlantic Boeing 747 aircraft takes off in the world's first commercial biofuel flight to fly to Amsterdam from Heathrow Airport in London Sunday. (REUTERS/Luke MacGregor)

Some analysts praised the jumbo jet test flight from London to Amsterdam as a potentially useful experiment. But others criticized it as a publicity stunt and noted scientists are questioning the environmental benefits of biofuels.

"This breakthrough will help Virgin Atlantic to fly its planes using clean fuel sooner than expected," Sir Richard Branson, the airline's president, said before the Boeing 747 flew from London's Heathrow Airport to Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport.

He said the flight would provide "crucial knowledge that we can use to dramatically reduce our carbon footprint," he said.

Sunday's flight was partially fuelled with a biofuel mixture of coconut and babassu oil in one of its four main fuel tanks. The jet carried pilots and several technicians, but no passengers.

Virgin Atlantic spokesman Paul Charles predicted this biofuel would produce much less CO2 than regular jet fuel, but said it will take weeks to analyze the data from Sunday's flight.

"It's great that somebody like Richard is willing to put some of his billions into an experiment aimed at reducing the climate change impact of aviation," said James Halstead, an airline analyst at the London stockbroker Dawnay Lochart.

"But there are a lot of unanswered questions about the usefulness of biofuels in the battle against global warming," he said.

The flight is the latest example of how the world's airlines are jumping on the environmental bandwagon by trying to find ways of reducing aviation's carbon footprint.

These efforts have included finding alternative jet fuels, developing engines that burn existing fuels more slowly, and changing the way planes land.

The experiment by Virgin Atlantic and its partners -- Boeing, General Electric and Imperium Renewables -- also comes at a time when high oil prices and the U.S. economic slowdown are promoting consolidation in the airline industry.

Aircraft engines cause noise pollution and emit gases and particulates that reduce air quality and contribute to global warming and global dimming, where dust and ash from natural and industrial sources block the sun to create a cooling effect.

About a year ago, the European Commission, the executive of the European Union, said greenhouse gas emissions from aviation account for about three per cent of the total in the EU and have increased by 87 per cent since 1990 as air travel cheapened.

Mr. Charles said Virgin's Boeing 747-400 jet and its engines did not have to be redesigned to use biofuel on the test flight.

He said CO2 emissions on a normal flight are generally three times the fuel burned, and that technical engineers on the test flight would take readings and analyze data to estimate its greenhouse gas emissions.

June 7 2007

Europe's first vegetable-fueled train begins service as part of billionaire's bid to fight global warming.

LONDON, June 7 (Reuters) -- Billionaire Richard Branson's commitment to combat global warming got on track Thursday as Europe's first scheduled passenger train fueled by vegetable oil left London for North Wales.

Branson's Virgin Trains is running one of its trains on a 20 percent biodiesel blend for a six-month trial, and the British entrepreneur said his whole fleet might eventually be converted to run on biofuels.

Britain's current finance minister and next prime minister, Gordon Brown, attended the send-off at Euston station after facilitating the trial by allowing a special tax dispensation.

"There is a possibility as the engines get changed we could go up to 100 percent biodiesel," Branson told a news conference, adding the company had been advised its current engines should run on a 20 percent blend.

Branson has committed to spending all the profits from his airline and rail business to combat global warming.

He also plans next year to have a test flight for one of his passenger aircraft using a biofuel.

Virgin CrossCountry Managing Director Chris Gibb said the biofuel for locomotives would come mainly from the United Kingdom via domestically produced rapeseed oil blended with U.S. soybean oil and palm oil from the Far East.

European first

"This is the first time in Europe a monitored trial of biodiesel on passenger trains has taken place," Gibb said.

The pilot scheme has the backing of the Association of Train Operating Companies, and Gibb said cooperation with other train operators was vital to ensure long-term success.

"There are some significant logistical issues. I think we can make this manageable if we work together," he said, noting Virgin Trains were refueled at 17 different locations that were also used by other operators.

The locomotive in the pilot scheme will be limited to refueling at one of two locations in central England.

Britain's trains currently run on red diesel, a fuel taxed at a discounted rate of 7.69 pence ($0.15) per liter, while the biodiesel blend would attract a duty of 54.68 pence.

Legislation would be required to change the rate, but Brown has agreed for the fuel to be taxed at the lower rate for the trial.

"Our indications from Gordon Brown are that he will address this problem," Branson said.

Britain offers tax incentives for motor fuels that contain biofuels in a bid to reduce emissions of the greenhouse gases believed to contribute to global warming.

The fuel will be provided by Britain's largest biofuels supplier, Greenergy.

The firm's chief executive officer, Andrew Owens, told Reuters that Greenergy was also working with three other train companies to find biodiesel blends for their locomotives.

"They all have different types of engines," he said.

from Earthrace.net
April 10, 2007

Earthrace is a bid to break the world record for circumnavigating the globe in a powerboat, and using only renewable fuels. The program includes an 18-month tour calling at 60 of the worlds great cities, promoting fuels like biodiesel, and raising awareness about sustainable use of resources.

Circumnavigating the globe represents the pinnacle of powerboat challenges, and at 24,000 nautical miles, is also the world's longest race. The current record of 75 days was set by British boat Cable & Wireless in 1998.

The Earthrace aims to smash this record by completing the voyage in less than 65 days, and will mark the first time in history that an official UIM Powerboat record will be attempted using renewable fuel.

The Earthrace will be the highest-profile powerboat in the world, as well as one of the greenest. It is a showcase of environmentally friendly technologies such as low-emissions engines, non-toxic anti-foul and efficient hull design.

Earthrace has a website at www.earthrace.net

by Christopher Leonard, Associated Press
January 3, 2007

DEXTER, Mo. -- Jerry Bagby is typical of the oil men who are prospecting for a fortune in the Midwestern biofuels boom. He's convinced there's oil in these hills -- and he's found a well that no one else is using.

Bagby and a longtime friend have cobbled together $5 million to build a new biodiesel plant on the lonely croplands outside this southeast Missouri town. They're betting they can hit paydirt by exploiting a generally overlooked natural resource that's abundant in these parts -- chicken fat.

There's a virtual gusher of the stuff at a nearby Tyson Foods Inc. poultry plant. Currently, the low-quality fat is shipped out of state to be rendered and used as a cheap ingredient in pet food, soap and other products.

Bagby and his partner Harold Williams plan to refine the gooey substance, mix it with soybean oil and produce about 3 million gallons of biodiesel annually.

Today, only a tiny fraction of U.S. biodiesel is made from chicken fat, but that seems likely to change. The rising cost of soybean oil -- which accounts for roughly 90 percent of all biodiesel fuel stock -- is pushing the industry to exploit cheap and plentiful animal fats.

The nation's biggest meat corporations have taken notice. Tyson Foods announced in November it has established a renewable energy division that will be up and running during 2007. Competitors Perdue Farms Inc. and Smithfield Foods Inc. are making similar moves.

As meatpackers enter the field, they bring massive amounts of fuel stock that could make biodiesel cheaper and more plentiful.

The shift to animal fat as a fuel stock could be key to making the budding biodiesel industry a reliable fuel source for U.S. trucking fleets, said Vernon Eidman, a professor of economics at the University of Minnesota who has extensively studied the biofuels industry.

Eidman estimates that within five years, the U.S. will produce 1 billion gallons of biodiesel, and half of it will be made from animal fat. By that time soybean-based biodiesel will account for about 20 percent of the total, he said.

For fuel refiners like Bagby, the allure of animal fat is clear. Soybean oil costs 33 cents a pound while chicken fat costs 19 cents. He only plans to include soybean oil in his blend because it adds necessary lubrication for engine parts.

"Soy bean oil is more expensive than other products, so we just use enough of it to make the system run clean," Bagby said.

Members of rock group sign autographs and fill up tour bus with biodiesel on its way to Indiana concert.

by Beau Wicker, Monticello Indiana Herald Journal
September 06, 2006

REYNOLDS - Two members of the folk-rock supergroup Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young stopped by Reynolds on Saturday to support plans for turning it into BioTown, USA.

David Crosby of the folk-rock supergroup Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young was in Reynolds Saturday in a show of support of the BioTown, USA project. Band-mate Graham Nash also made an appearance.

For the past six years, the rock group's touring vehicles have used alternative fuels. When the group found out about the BioTown project, they decided to show their support of these fuels by making a detour on their way from Chicago to Indianapolis, where their Freedom of Speech '06 tour continued on Saturday night.

Three of the group's tour busses pulled into the Reynolds' BP Gas Station that sells alternative fuels and filled up on B-20 - a mixture of 20 percent biodiesel and 80 percent diesel fuel. Don Good, president of Good Oil of Winamac, was on hand to man the special tank and pump brought in for the occasion, since the station is still under construction.

As the tour busses pulled into town at approximately 3 p.m., David Crosby and Graham Nash were met by fans eager to get books, magazines, album covers and guitars autographed. After all the autographs were signed, Crosby and Nash went to the USA Restaurant, where they ate a meal consisting of cheeseburgers and French fries.

Crosby praised BioTown.

"I think it's a great idea," he said. "A green town, a town where they try to do everything the best way they possibly can, and create the least amount of poison in the air, the water and the land. That's a great idea. That's what we should be trying to promote all the way across the country, not just in this one town. But if you set up a good example, other people will follow it.

"One of the best parts of this thing is not just that we don't put poison in the air, is that the money goes to American farmers instead of going to a bunch of people in the Middle East who want to kill us. That really works for me. I really think American farmers need all the breaks they can get. They're having a hard road to hoe and they have for a long time. And this is something they can grow and we can burn, where we don't send the money out of the country."

Crosby added that a total of eight trucks and 11 busses the band is using on this tour are running on biodiesel.

"All those soybean fields out there, you can run all the diesels in this town off of those soybean fields. The more you do that, than the more people buy diesels and run them off soybeans. With the amount of biomass that's available to this town from the hog farms and stuff, they can make methane, they can use it just like you use natural gas."

Long-time CSNY fans Rob and Misty Bruckart, Indianapolis, made the trip to Reynolds on Saturday afternoon to meet the band and support BioTown.

"I think the bio will bring the cornfields back around and help the farmers get back in business. That's what we need," Misty said.

"And help $3-gallon gasoline go away," Rob said.

"And us not be dependent on the Middle East," Misty added.

Crosby's 12-year-old son was presented a soy biodiesel science kit by the Indiana Soybean Board. The same kit has been placed in more than 300 schools throughout Indiana, including all of the high schools in White County.

"We have a high school chemistry kit that allows students in the chem lab to make biodiesel and do some experiments from soybean oil," said Fred Henderson, Indiana Soybean Board Education Consultant.

Crosby said he learned something from visiting BioTown.

"The thing that can be learned here, that we learned here and that everyone will learn here, is that it's possible to do it all better. And they're starting to do it right here, right now," he said. "We're going to do everything we can to get the word out to people, because once you know about it, it's pretty much a slam dunk of an idea."

By Tina Amendola, Pollstar
August 07 2006

As artists such as Neil Young, Willie Nelson and others spread the word on the benefits of using alternative fuels for a greener future, a San Francisco-based touring transport company has taken that mission one step further.

Roadshow Services Vice President Sean O'Rourke said he and president David Kiely started working on a plan to modify the company's fleet of trucks to use cleaner-burning biodiesel after a conversation with Young's tour production staff about three years ago.

The CSNY Tour gets refueled by S.A. White Oil of Marietta, GA outside Philips Arena in Atlanta

"We'd been working with Neil on the Bridge School benefits for the last couple of years, so I'd been asking Neil's production if we could take a shot at the tour trucking," O'Rourke told Pollstar. "They said eYeah, with one caveat that you figure out how to power your trucks with biodiesel.'

"We came up with a plan and did the final leg of [Young's 2004] Greendale tour on B100 at the time. It had been running generators at Lollapalooza and some artists had instructed their trucking company to take on a blend like B5, but nobody had gone with what they call a eneat' product, which is straight-up, undiluted, 100 percent soy diesel."

As word began to spread, O'Rourke said artists including The String Cheese Incident and Jack Johnson adopted the same model of using transports fueled with biodiesel or related blends.

"This year it really caught fire," he said. "At this point, artists like Willie Nelson (who markets his "Bio Willie Diesel"), Bonnie Raitt and the Vans Warped Tour are experimenting with biodiesel. They're running B20, which is 20 percent biodiesel and 80 percent petroleum diesel.

"Although we're pioneers in terms of our industry in making this happen, it really needs to be brought up that you don't have to do 80 percent petroleum and 20 percent biodiesel. You could go with the eneat' product and really kick it into high gear in terms of being an agent of change."

Biodiesel gets the same mileage per gallon as regular diesel, O'Rourke said, and a government rebate of 99 cents per gallon to those who use alternative fuels keeps the cost in line with the price of regular diesel, which he says averages $2.99 per gallon nationwide. That comes in handy for the 30 to 40 tours the company works per year.

"Roadshow is buying biodiesel in such quantities for many tours happening at the same time, I'm able to identify one of my vendors and say, eWhat kind of price per gallon can you give me if I buy 10,000 gallons?'" O'Rourke said. "They're selling me a lot of biodiesel at a screamin' rate and I'm able to pass those savings on to the touring artists."

The company, which also teams with Florida Coach in Kissimmee, Fla., contracts with about a dozen farm co-ops and manufacturers throughout the U.S. for refueling stops during a tour, keeping in mind tight schedules that must be kept on the road.

"We've had our challenges, but all personnel and all gear has arrived at a venue when it was scheduled without fail for all 1 million miles' worth of B100 trucking that we've done," O'Rourke said.

Current and upcoming tours using vehicles running on B99 include Melissa Etheridge, String Cheese Incident, Pearl Jam, and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, which has the largest biodiesel fleet with 18 trucks and buses.

By Francisca Ortega, Associated Press
June 21, 2006

LAS VEGAS (AP) - Southern Nevada motorists can start filling their vehicles with biodiesel fuel thanks to a Utah-based company.

Sinclair Oil Corp. announced Wednesday that it's the first to offer biodiesel fuel to retail customers in the Las Vegas area. The Salt Lake City-based company started selling a 5 percent biodiesel fuel blend, made in part from soybeans, in 16 of its 30 gas stations here.

The fuel can be used interchangeably with regular diesel fuel and will sell for about $2.93 a gallon, about what regular diesel costs in the area.

Advocates for biodiesel say it is better for the environment, better for engines and lessens the country's dependence on foreign oil.

"I think biodiesel will evolve and grow," said Bud Blackmore, Sinclair's senior vice president of marketing. "It's certainly being pushed by all governments to expand alternative fuels."

Biofuels, such as ethanol and biodiesel, could provide up to 37 percent of the United States' transport fuel within the next 25 years, according to the Washington, D.C.-based Worldwatch Institute.

Gary Weinberg, sales manager for Haycock Petroleum, Sinclair Oil's supplier in southern Nevada, called Las Vegas a test market for selling biodiesel fuel to retail customers. Haycock has supplied Clark County school buses and the McCarran International Airport motor pool with a 20 percent blend for the past five years.

Sinclair estimates it will replace 250,000 gallons of diesel fuel annually in Las Vegas with biodiesel by selling the blend. The company, with it's familiar green dinosaur logo, supplies fuel to some 2,600 stations in 21 states in the West and Midwest, according to its Web site. It offers a 2 percent biodiesel mix in Minnesota and North Dakota.

Haycock Petroleum takes pure biodiesel fuel made from soybean oil, which is supplied by Biodiesel of Las Vegas, and mixes it with petroleum-based diesel to create a 5 percent blend. The regional petroleum company serves Nevada, California and Utah.

Weinberg said he thinks farmers could be prepared to supply the nation with a 20 percent biodiesel blend in the next five years.

"Farmers have been paid for years not to grow certain crops," he said. "Now instead of being paid not to grow something, they'll be paid to grow soybeans."

The Worldwatch Institute warns, however, that large-scale use of biofuels could bring different kinds of agriculture and ecological risks.

"It is essential that government incentives be used to minimize competition between food and fuel crops and to discourage expansion onto ecologically valuable lands," Suzanne Hunt, Worldwatch Biofuels Project manager, said in a statement.

By Tatiana Prophet, Victorville (CA) Daily Press
May 20, 2006

High Desert companies look ahead to $4 diesel

Daryll Evey checks a new hose for his tanker before heading out on a run for more biodiesel on Thursday afternoon. Evey's High Desert Alternative Fuels is beginning to provide bulk biodiesel to area trucking companies. Photo: Kevin Clark

VICTORVILLE o Diesel prices are finally soaring high enough for biodiesel to be a practical alternative for commercial use.

Like many companies in the High Desert, Service Rock depends on trucking for its operations. Now they are experimenting with biodiesel o 35,000 gallons a month.

At its Palmdale plant, the cement mixers and loaders are running on biodiesel purchased from Darryl Evey, former diesel mechanic shop owner, Apple Valley planning commissioner and founder of High Desert Alternative Fuels.

Evey has balanced his concern for the environment with business sense. With his tractor trailer, Evey makes the six-hour drive to Coachella every few days to pick up a load. This month, he began turning a profit for the first time o with two customers buying in bulk.

Looking ahead to new regulations, Service Rock didn't want to wait till June 1, when Califor nia is mandating a new, ultra-low sulfur fuel called S15, which is costly to refine.

Bob Kelley, vice president of operations, said the company has been testing the fuel to make sure it agrees with their trucks. So far, he's been pleased.

"Frankly, it makes the most sense," said Kelley, whose company uses about 200,000 gallons a month for 200 highway trucks and 80 non-highway trucks. "You don't have to do anything to the car."

No conversion is necessary for use of biodiesel, said Evey. All that's needed is a diesel engine. That's because German inventor Rudolph Diesel originally designed his engine to run on peanut oil at the 1900 Paris exposition, according to biodiesel Web sites.

Biodiesel advocates like it because it burns cleaner than diesel. According to biodiesel.org, biodiesel is the first alternative fuel to have fully completed the health effects testing requirements of the Clean Air Act. The fuel greatly reduces unburned hydrocarbons, carbon monoxide and particulates and eliminates sulfur altogether.

Kelley and Burmeister are taking it slow: there are issues with older equipment, which Evey warned them about. Older engines have rubber components, which biodiesel tends to soften. It also tends to clean the sludge from storage tanks.

"You gotta stock up on filters," Burmeister said.

And it turns to gel at 32 degrees, although that can be eliminated with additives.

But for Kelley, the fuel is promising.

"There's a lot of pluses about it," Kelley said. "I'd like to convince everybody not to use it so there's enough for us."

According to the National Biodiesel Board, 150 million gallons of biodiesel are expected to be produced in 2006, but that's only a drop in the bucket compared to the 44.8 billion gallons of diesel produced last year.

There are arguments for consumers to use biodiesel as well. While ethanol is used as an alternative to gasoline, Evey says that when it comes to engines, the diesel has no equal.

"The diesel engine is the most efficient engine in the world," he said. "Better gas mileage, fuel economy, and they last longer and need less maintenance."

By Tim Christie, The Eugene Oregon Register-Guard
April 23, 2006

Biodiesel's popularity and sustained gas prices mean 'diesels are back,' analysts say

Clark Tippin (left) and Jacob Frankfort joined to open Green Eye Automotive in Eugene to sell only diesel vehicles, and mostly Mercedes Benz cars. Photo: James Quigg

In the 1970s, when oil embargoes sent gas prices through the roof, Americans began buying diesel-powered cars.

Diesel was cheap compared with gas in those days, and consumers chose from such models as the utilitarian Volkswagen Rabbit - which was cheap, noisy, slow, and got nearly 50 mpg - and the more luxurious Mercedes Benz W123 cars - which were expensive, sturdy, and slow, and got 25 mpg or more.

Today diesels are enjoying a resurgence not seen since those gas-line days of the 1970s, driven by rising gas prices and interest in burning biodiesel.

Diesel engines get great mileage - 20 to 40 percent better than their gas-burning counterparts - and the new generation burns much cleaner than the old diesels, experts say. Most can run biodiesel - at least the blended versions - without risking damage to the engine or the warranty.

"Diesels are back, and that is thanks to high, sustained gas prices," said Jesse Toprack, executive director of industry analysis at Edmunds.com, an automotive Web site.

Gas prices are expected to average $2.62 per gallon this summer, according to the Energy Department, about a quarter more per gallon than last summer, and to stay high through the rest of the year.

In Europe, where gasoline sells for about $6 per gallon, diesels are widespread, and account for about 40 percent of new car sales.

In the United States, light-vehicle diesels accounted for just 3.2 percent of new car sales last year, but that figure is expected to triple over the next decade, according to J.D. Power and Associates.

The increase in demand can be seen both at new car dealers such as Sheppard Motors in Eugene, which sells new turbo-diesel Volkswagens as fast as they can get them onto the lot, and at used car dealers such as Green Eye Automotive, which sells mostly older Mercedes and American-made pickups fueled by diesel.

"When gas prices creep up, everyone is looking for something that will provide more mileage and more bang for the buck," said Phil Speers, Sheppard Motors' general manager.

Volkswagen's diesels, known as TDIs, are the best-selling diesels in the United States, and whether it's the Golf, Beetle Jetta, or Passat, it's in high demand, Speers said.

"If we had 50 in stock, we could sell all of them," he said.

One indication of the demand for the TDIs is that dealers can get premium prices for them, said Edmunds' Toprack. Nationally, dealers are getting close to sticker price and sometimes more for the TDIs, while the gas Jettas are selling for slightly over dealer invoice, he said.

Used, late model Volkswagens also are in high demand, Toprack said, especially in the five states that prohibit the sale of new diesels because of tougher emission rules: California, New York, Massachusetts, Maine and Vermont.

Buyers who can't or don't want to spend $20,000 or more on a diesel are turning to an unlikely alternative: Mercedes Benz.

Mercedes sells new E-class diesels for more than $50,000, but the diesels it built in the 1970s and 1980s can be had for less than $10,000.

Mercedes built about 2.5 million cars built on the W123 chassis between 1976 and 1986, and most of the ones sold in the United States ran on diesel. As their popularity as a cult car grows, their value has gone way up, said Vince Layton, president of Club 123D, a group dedicated to those older Mercedes built on the W123 chassis.

"Ten years ago, these were so unappreciated and valueless," he said.

Layton can - and does - extol the virtues of these older Mercedes at length. They're heavy, over-engineered, and simply built, without engine computers. Parts are relatively cheap and available, he said.

"They're simple, durable and they just go," he said. "People who like this car like it because of its engineering design."

The W123 Mercedes is sometimes called the Million Mile Car because of the bullet-proof durability of the engine, he said. They're used as taxis in the Middle East and South America. Layton, who has a model with 352,000 miles, said a well-maintained Mercedes diesel can easily go 500,000 miles.

Business partners Clark Tippin and Jacob Frankfort developed an appreciation for those older Mercedes diesels because of their interest in running biodiesel, a clean-burning nonpetroleum fuel refined from vegetable and waste oils.

They saw a market niche and, in January, opened Green Eye Automotive on River Road.

The River Road lot definitely has a counter-culture feel to it, from the peace-sign incorporated in the logo to the worn Tibetan prayer flags flapping under the awning, juxtaposed with a row of German-engineered luxury cars.

Tippin has been in the car business for about 10 years. He started out buying cars at auction for a dealer in Hawaii, then started buying cars for himself. Frankfort is a finish carpenter who was looking for a new gig when Tippin suggested they go into business selling cars that can run on biodiesel.

They've sold about 25 cars since opening, and interest is definitely growing as gas prices rise, Tippin said. "We're getting plenty of customers," Frankfort said. "The hardest part is getting the cars."

They travel to California or Arizona for weeklong car-hunting trips, buying enough vehicles to fill up a truck.

But lately, the market has gotten more competitive. Tippin said that during his last trip to California, he looked at 20 Mercedes diesels and bought three. When he got back, he raised his prices.

People such as Keith Stevens keep buying them. Stevens bought a bronze 1980 300 CD coupe from Green Eye for about $4,000 and is running 100 percent biodiesel.

"I wanted to do my part in society to help out the environment," he said.

Plus, it drives nice, he said.

"You feel safe, secure," he said. "It's a Mercedes - it's a nice ride."

from the Kansas City Business Journal
April 7, 2006

The Kansas City area will get its first retail biodiesel station on April 14.

Maher Oil Co. will start offering biodiesel on that date at its Valero station at 6th and Wyandotte streets in Downtown.

"It'll be the first opportunity for regular citizens in Kansas City to fill up at the pump with biodiesel," Sam Swearngin, Missouri co-chairman of the Kansas City Clean Cities Coalition and a superintendent of the city's Central Fleet division, said Friday. "We've been getting requests for retail biodiesel for years."

The city started using biodiesel about four years ago, Swearngin said. Now, several city departments use 1.3 million gallons of biodiesel a year combined in 900 diesel-powered vehicles and pieces of equipment, he said.

John Cook, owner of Maher Oil, said offering biodiesel will cost him almost the same as regular diesel.

"That's the beautiful part of biodiesel," he said. "I had to do nothing."

Biodiesel requires no changes to a station's storage tanks or dispensing system, he said. He did have to spend a negligible amount on signage, he said.

Biodiesel is a mixture of vegetable oil and regular diesel fuel. Cook will sell a mixture of 20 percent soybean oil and 80 percent regular diesel fuel at his Valero station.

Biodiesel's wholesale cost changes as a function of regular diesel's cost, Cook said. Soybean oil's cost is relatively stable, he said.

Biodiesel's cost is currently a few cents a gallon cheaper than regular diesel, he said, but that is subject to frequent and sudden change.

Maher Oil owns two other gas stations in the Kansas City area. Cook chose the Valero station Downtown because it's a visible location that helps make people aware that "there are alternative fuels and ways to help our environment."

Biodiesel has become America's fastest-growing alternative fuel, the Kansas City Water Services Department said in a written release, citing statistics from the U.S. Department of Energy. Biodiesel and biodiesel blends reduce emissions while offering similar performance to petroleum diesel, the city said.

Biodiesel has the highest energy balance of any liquid fuel, the city said. For every unit of energy used to make biodiesel, 3.2 units are gained.

By Rosemary Winters, The Salt Lake Tribune
February 23, 2006

'Lexus of diesel fuel': Another firm plans to build a commercial refinery in Springville and sell fuel by spring

OREM - Coconut shrimp, polenta triangles and pot stickers sizzled in deep fryers at Culinary Crafts headquarters, but the Wednesday luncheon's main attraction wasn't the maple-glazed salmon. It was the hot grease.

At a demonstration in Orem, John Crawford, a partner in Domestic Energy Partners, pours vegetable oil into a small model of a machine the company has developed to make bio-diesel fuel.

photo: Paul Fraughton/The Salt Lake Tribune

In a matter of minutes, John Crawford turned soybean oil into diesel fuel. Biodiesel, a renewable fuel made from virgin or used vegetable oils, has been manufactured in the United States for decades. But Crawford said he's invented a process to produce it more cleanly, cheaply and efficiently.

By way of demonstration, Crawford, a chemical engineer and principal in Domestic Energy Partners, poured soybean oil and methyl alcohol into a spout on a black box that hid the processor and out came biodiesel.

Conventional biodiesel production requires a catalyst, such as lye or sulfuric acid, which then has to be removed from the fuel with a stabilizer and water. DEP partner Ron Crafts said six-tenths of a gallon of water is contaminated for every gallon of biodiesel produced in a conventional system. DEP's technology uses a "solid heterogenous catalyst" inside the machine that is not dissolved during the process, Crawford said.

"There is nothing to remove if there is nothing put in in the first place," Crawford told the luncheon guests.

Biodiesel has been touted as a way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, cut dependence on foreign oil and boost revenue for farmers. Last year, the United States produced 75 million gallons of biodiesel, or about 0.1 percent of the amount of diesel gas it consumed, according to the National Biodiesel Board.

"Biodiesel is the Lexus of diesel fuel," said Andre Shoumatoff, director of Utah Biodiesel, a Park City nonprofit that advocates for the use of biodiesel. "As a home brewer, [I] am always saying there has got to be a better way . . . If [DEP's] claims are true, this technology is quite revolutionary."

This spring, Domestic Energy Partners plans to roll out large-capacity machines suitable for on-site production by companies with large fleets.

Priced at $2 million, each one can produce up to 2.25 million gallons of biodiesel per year, Crafts said. A user can produce biodiesel for the cost of the feed stock plus 40 cents per gallon, or about $1.60 per gallon, Crafts said. A blend of 20 percent biodiesel 80 percent petroleum diesel (B20) is selling for about $2.63 per gallon in Utah, a price comparable to regular diesel. Pure biodiesel costs upward of $3 per gallon.

DEP has already sold four of the machines, including one to BioUSA, a startup company that plans to build Utah's first commercial biodiesel refinery in Springville and begin selling the fuel in late spring.

BioUSA president McKay Morley said he'd like to buy additional machines and boost production capacity to 10 million gallons by the end of the year.

"The initial studies we have done show that demand far exceeds 10 million gallons," said Morley, who fuels his own pickup with biodiesel.

That would represent a huge jump in biodiesel sales in the state. Distributors Dal Soglio Inc., Cardwell Distributing and Jardine Oil sold about 240,000 gallons of biodiesel statewide last year. Their customers include Utah Power and Light, Hill Air Force Base, Park City Mountain Resort and Salt Lake City International Airport.

Culinary Crafts, owned by Crafts and his wife, has produced its own biodiesel on site for the past year, using the new biodiesel technology to capitalize on "yellow grease" left over from cooking.

Biodiesel powers the company's fleet and buildings, thanks to an auxiliary generator Crafts installed. That eliminates the cost of disposing of kitchen grease and protects the company from fluctuations in petroleum costs, Crafts said.

Domestic Energy Partners plans to release a smaller-capacity machine, suitable for production at home or a small business, in two years. That would sell for about the price of a high-end lawn mower, Crafts said.

By Nathan Crabbe, Gainesville (FL) Sun
January 17, 2006

Take some vegetable oil, add lye and methanol, shake it up and let it settle.

Make the mixture wrong and you'll produce soap. But the right mix produces a fuel fit for use in any diesel engine, which advocates say will help free the nation from its dependence on foreign oil and clean the air.

photo: Michael C. Weimar / The Gainesville Sun

Evan Ashworth mixes components Wednesday including used peanut oil, methanol and potassium hydroxide to demonstrate how biodiesel is manufactured on a small scale.

A series of workshops held last week in Gainesville about making biodiesel - which is considerably more complicated than the simplified instructions above - are part of local efforts to promote the fuel. Biodiesel can be made on the cheap by processing waste oil from restaurants, or costs slightly more than regular diesel if bought from commercial distributors.

Advocates are betting the fluctuation of gas prices due to war and hurricanes makes the timing right for the domestically produced fuel to gain wider appeal.

"It's just not sustainable the way things are going now," said Scott Davies, a partner in a Gainesville company planning to sell biodiesel here.

That company - Freedom Fuels Inc. - is now getting the needed permits and taxes in line to sell biodiesel on a commercial basis. Another locally based group, the North Florida Biofuels Network, is teaching folks to produce biodiesel on their own and bringing together people who want to pool resources in such work.

"You can probably make this stuff for $1 a gallon if you can get free grease," said Lyle Estill, member of a biofuels co-operative in North Carolina.

The co-op, Piedmont Biofuels, is a model for efforts here. The co-op makes and sells biodiesel for its members and systems for others to produce it. Members pay $50 per year and $3.50 per gallon for fuel. The price is fairly standard for commercial biodiesel producers, as compared with diesel that currently costs up to $2.80 in Gainesville, but biodiesel offers the benefit of more steady prices.

The co-op is based in a town of 3,000 outside Raleigh yet has been able to recruit hundreds of members, said Estill, who likes biodiesel for reasons ranging from its environmental to its political benefits. He expects the fuel will do even better in Gainesville.

"This place is ripe for some sort of biodiesel," he said.

Freedom Fuels is planning to sell biodiesel locally in the next few weeks, obtaining the fuel from producers in Lakeland and Georgia. A biodiesel workshop at the Dignity Project, which fixes and donates cars to needy residents, has project members interested in producing the fuel on a commercial scale there.

The project might provide free fuel for cars that it donates or publicly sell the fuel to subsidize costs, said Kim Lapan, the group's vehicle director.

For donated cars, that would require obtaining cars with diesel engines. Just 3 percent of the cars sold in the United States last year had diesel engines, but the cars are much more prevalent overseas. DaimlerChrysler's chief executive announced at an international auto show last week the company is considering selling more diesel cars in the United States, in part because they are more efficient than vehicles with gas engines.

But there are some problems with using biodiesel in those vehicles. Pure biodiesel can thicken and clog engines in sub-freezing temperatures. While that shouldn't be a problem except for the coldest days in Gainesville, some biodiesel producers address the problem by selling a mixture with diesel. The biodiesel company of musician Willie Nelson, BioWillie, sells a 20 percent mix at pumps in Texas and other states.

And while biodiesel has environmental benefits, there are also downsides. Sierra Club officials have criticized the fuel for requiring farming that uses natural resources and dirtier fuels. Burning biodiesel produces no acid rain-forming sulfur dioxide, far less human health hazards such as soot and less greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide than conventional diesel. But it actually produces more smog-causing nitrous oxide.

Biodiesel is just one of a broader group of biofuels experiencing increased interest. The Florida Department of Agriculture last week held a meeting to encourage more of the state's farmers to grow crops for biofuels. Those include ethanol, which can be produced from corn and other crops and already is a widely used additive in gasoline.

University of Florida microbiologist Lonnie Ingram attended the meeting to discuss his work developing bacteria that converts waste wood and other plant parts into ethanol.

"There's no reason we can't be the top state in biofuel production," he said. "One of the things we do well is grow plants."

But he admits making such fuels a significant portion of U.S. energy use is probably decades away. In the meantime, he said, biodiesel and other alternatives can incrementally help wean the country off foreign oil.

Local advocates are banking on Gainesville being on the leading edge of such efforts. But they concede much more must be done to cut down on energy use before the country can gain energy independence.

"This is not the solution," said Mark Robinson, a partner in Freedom Fuels. "Conservation is really the main thing - but this is something we've got to do first."

Cold snap raises issues when biodiesel gels up

By Sharon Silke Carty, USA TODAY
January 3, 2006

An unusually cold December in parts of the country exposed a flaw in biodiesel - a partly organic fuel that many hope will lessen the country's dependence on foreign oil.

Biodiesel has been gaining in popularity in recent years. Its allure is simple: The fuel can be made from material such as soybeans or recycled french fry oil mixed with regular diesel to make a cleaner-burning fuel.

Tax breaks for biodiesel users - rebates of 50 cents to $1 per gallon - have encouraged use.

But cold weather can cause biodiesel to solidify, clogging fuel lines and filters and leaving vehicles with no power. Just before Christmas, Minnesota temporarily lifted a recently enacted mandate that all diesel fuel sold in the state be biodiesel, because of complaints from truckers during a cold snap. In Colorado, dozens of students had no ride to school when biodiesel-powered buses wouldn't start.

Straight diesel fuel will also solidify, but at a lower temperature. Biodiesel supporters say it's just been unusually cold, and the newer fuel gets the blame for problems that would happen anyway.

But John Hausladen, president of the Minnesota Trucking Association, says: "Our organization has always opposed the mandated use of the fuel. We supported the concept of developing the fuel; we wanted to be partners rather than guinea pigs. The state mandates for the brand-new fuel are creating a statewide experiment with an outcome that is yet to be determined."

He says 62% of fleet managers his group surveyed in December reported trucks were having problems from failure to start, to losing power going up hills, to stopping in the middle of the road.

Mike Bute, a diesel technician at Riverland Community College in Albert Lea, Minn., says there would be problems even with straight diesel. "Every year, when it gets subzero, there are diesel-powered vehicles that gel up and stall," Bute says. "This year, because of the mandate, the biodiesels have been taking the blame for that. It really hasn't been more than usual."

Through its Clean School Bus USA program, the Environmental Protection Agency encourages school districts to make changes that will cut emissions from buses, including switching to biodiesel. Through 2005, the EPA program doled out $7.5 million in grants.

The Jefferson County, Colo., school district used an EPA grant to convert 175 of its 350 school buses to biodiesel. But in early December, when Colorado had more than a week of subzero temperatures, eight buses failed to start. "It's the coldest December we've had in 10 years," says Marc Horner, fleet manager for the Jefferson County schools. "It's out of the norm. With the cold weather, it just brings out mechanical problems of all sort."

Willie Nelson Markets 'BioWillie' Fuel

By Danny Hakim, The New York Times
December 31, 2005

photo: Paul Natkin, Farm Aid / AP

Willie Nelson drives a Mercedes.

But do not lose faith, true believers. The exhaust from Mr. Nelson's diesel-powered Mercedes smells like peanuts, or French fries, or whatever alternative fuel happens to be in his tank.

While Bono tries to change the world by hobnobbing with politicians and Sir Bob Geldof plays host to his mega-benefit concerts, Willie Nelson has birthed his own brand of alternative fuel. It is called, fittingly enough, BioWillie. And in BioWillie, Mr. Nelson, 72, has blended two of his biggest concerns: his love of family farmers and disdain for the Iraq war.

BioWillie is a type of biodiesel, a fuel that can be made from any number of crops and run in a normal diesel engine. If it sounds like a joke, a number of businesses, as well as city and state and county governments, have been switching their transportation fleets to biodiesel blends over the last year. The rationale is that it is a domestic fuel that can provide profit to farmers and that it will help the environment, though environmentalists are not universally enthusiastic about it.

"I knew we needed to have something that would keep us from being so dependent on foreign oil, and when I heard about biodiesel, a light come on, and I said, 'Hey, here's the future for the farmers, the future for the environment, the future for the truckers," Mr. Nelson said in an interview this month. "It seems like that's good for the whole world if we can start growing our own fuel instead of starting wars over it."

In some ways, it is a return to the origins of the diesel engine; some of Rudolf Diesel's first engines ran on peanut oil more than a century ago.

Last week, a cargo-loading company that operates in the Port of Seattle said that to fuel its equipment next year it would purchase 800,000 gallons of biodiesel, most of it a blend known as B20 that is 80 percent conventional diesel. As of late September, Minnesota requires almost all diesel fuel sold in the state to be 2 percent biodiesel, and Cincinnati started using a 30 percent biodiesel blend, B30, in its city buses because of concerns about fuel shortages after Hurricane Katrina.

Biodiesel can cost as much as a $1 a gallon more than regular diesel when pure, though it is typically sold as B20. Prices vary depending on volume and region, and new tax incentives are aimed at closing the cost gap. BioWillie was selling for $2.37 a gallon yesterday in Carl's Corner, Mr. Nelson's own truck stop in Texas that serves as headquarters of his year-old company, Willie Nelson BioDiesel. That was just 4 cents more than the conventional diesel selling at another station nearby.

Mr. Nelson's BioWillie is aimed mostly at truckers and is usually sold as B20 (pure biodiesel can congeal in colder climates). BioWillie is currently sold at 13 gas stations and truck stops in four states (with Texas having the most), and it fuels the buses and trucks for Mr. Nelson's tours.

If BioWillie demonstrates anything, it is that the combination of Middle East wars, global warming and rising prices at the pump has led many people to offer solutions to the world's energy's squeeze. Depending on whom you ask, cars will someday run on hydrogen, electricity, natural gas or ethanol.

Mr. Nelson is making his bet on biodiesel.

"I don't like the war," he said in the interview. "In fact, I don't know if you ever remember a couple years ago, it was Christmas day, and my son Lukas was born on Christmas Day, he's like 16 years old, and we were watching TV and there was just all kind of hell breaking loose and people getting killed and I was talking to my wife, Annie, and I said, You know, all the mothers crying and the babies dying and she said, 'Well, you ought to go write that.' "So I wrote a song called 'Whatever Happened to Peace on Earth?' "

He began to recite the first verse:

So many things going on in the world,

Babies dying, mothers crying.

Just how much oil is human life worth?

And whatever happened to peace on earth?

"That upset a lot of people, as you can imagine," he continued. "I've been upset about this war from the beginning and I've known it's all about oil."

Every alternative to oil, however, has its drawbacks. Biodiesel would reduce most emissions of smog-forming pollutants and global warming gases, and it could be used instead of foreign oil. But some studies show that it increases emissions of one harmful pollutant, nitrogen oxide, and it could not be produced in vast enough quantities to supplant oil-based fuel, or come close to it, unless the nation starts turning the suburbs over to farmland. And as with ethanol, producing great quantities of biodiesel from corn or soybeans could drive up food prices.

Bill Reinert, Toyota's national manager for advanced technologies, said in an interview this year: "I frankly don't see biodiesel being an early alt-fuel player across a wide swath of geography. It's a boutique fuel. There's not enough payoff and not enough people into it."

Peter J. Bell, the chief executive of Distribution Drive, a distributor of biodiesel that is working with Mr. Nelson, said of the nation's nearly 200,000 gas stations, "650 carry biodiesel, so we have a job in front of us." Mr. Nelson sits on the board of Distribution Drive's parent, Earth Biofuels, a publicly traded company.

Daniel Becker, the Sierra Club's top global warming expert, said he would prefer to see wider use of a cleaner alternative fuel, like natural gas.

Referring to biodiesel, he said, "In order to grow soybeans, you need multiple passes over the field with diesel tractors, you need a lot of fertilizer that's energy intensive to produce and, at the end of the day, you have a product that is no boon for the environment."

He went on: "If you're going to go to the trouble of using an alternative fuel, use a good alternative fuel. If you really want to listen to Willie Nelson, go buy one of his records and play it in a hybrid."

Mr. Nelson first heard about biodiesel two years ago from his wife while they were staying in Hawaii. He recounted the story.

"My wife came to me and said 'I want to buy this car that runs on biodiesel, and I said, 'What's that?' And so she told me, and I thought it was a scam or joke or something. So I said, 'Go ahead, it's your money.' "

She bought a Volkswagen Jetta with a diesel engine and started filling it with fuel made from restaurant grease. This is not uncommon. Home hobbyists make their own biodiesel by collecting used grease from restaurants and chemically treating it to turn it into usable fuel, or by outfitting their car or truck with equipment to re-form the grease.

"I drove the car, loved the way it drove," Mr. Nelson said. "The tailpipe smells like French fries. I bought me a Mercedes, and the Mercedes people were a little nervous when I took a brand new Mercedes over and filled it up with 100 percent vegetable oil coming from the grease traps of Maui. I figured I'd be getting notices about the warranty and that stuff. However, nobody said anything."

"I get better gas mileage, it runs better, the motor runs cleaner, so I swear by it," he added.

How far does he think biodiesel can go?

"It could get as big as we can grow fuel or find different things to make fuel from, such as chicken fat, beef fat, add that along to soybeans, vegetable oils, peanuts, safflower, sunflower," Mr. Nelson said.

O.K.. What about hemp?

"Hemp is a very good one," he replied, not missing a beat. "In fact, several years ago, a friend of mine named Gatewood Galbraith was running for governor of Kentucky and we campaigned all over the state of Kentucky in a Cadillac operating on hemp oil. He was trying to get it legalized in the state of Kentucky and, of course, he lost, but the cannabis thing in fuel is a very real thing."

Mr. Nelson said he did not expect to make much money on his venture. As he put it when asked about his Mercedes, "I didn't get it selling BioWillie, I'll tell you."

"I hope somebody makes money out of it; I'm sure they will. And probably what'll happen is that the oil industry will wait until everybody else builds all the infrastructure and then they'll come in and take over," he said. "But that's O.K. I don't worry about that. As along as the idea progresses because all I'm caring about is getting it out there and maybe helping the country, the farmer, the environment."

Asked if he intended to become a fat cat C.E.O. with a big cigar in his mouth, he replied: "I'll give you my part of it. I'll just sign over all my earnings and belongings to you right now and I'll sing 'Whiskey River.' "

One thing is certain: if Mr. Nelson's venture makes any money, none of it will go to pay a $16 million tax bill to the Internal Revenue Service. That debt, which arose from Mr. Nelson's participation in illegal tax shelters, was erased in 1993 with surrender of some property and the profit from his album "The IRS Tapes: Who'll Buy My Memories?"

Click here for an earlier article on BioWillie.

from The Associated Press
December 1, 2005

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. - Fuel is the thing with feathers. Hoping to find an efficient way to help power automobiles and trucks, researchers at the University of Arkansas say they have developed a way to convert chicken fat to a biodiesel fuel.

"We're trying to expand the petroleum base," said Brian Mattingly, a graduate student in chemical engineering. "Five to 20 percent blending of biodiesel into petroleum-based diesel significantly reduces our dependence on foreign oil."

Mattingly's research allows biodiesel producers to assess different materials to see what works best. Producers will be able to choose the best way to convert different grades of chicken fat into fuels.

R.E. Babcock, a professor of chemical engineering, said chicken-fat fuels are better for the environment and the machines.

"They burn better, create less particulate matter and actually lubricate and clean things like cylinders, pistons and fuel lines," Babcock said.

Traditionally, biodiesel producers have used refined products like soybean oil because they are easier to convert to fuels. However, the refining process makes soybean oil more expensive - and fuel producers must compete with grocers for the oil supply.

Chicken fat can be a less-expensive substitute because it is available at a low cost. However, fatty acids in raw chicken fat can lead to the creation of soap during the various chemical processes.

In his studies, Mattingly used high-quality fat (less than 2 percent fatty acid content) and low-quality, feed-grade fat (6 percent fatty acid content) obtained from Tyson Foods Inc. plants in Clarksville and Scranton. The high-quality fat is more expensive than the feed-grade fat, but both are less expensive than soybean oil.

It took different steps to refine the different fats, but it could be done, Mattingly said.

"The project demonstrated that there is a very fine line between facilitating an adequate reaction and generating so much soap that the biodiesel yield is diminished," Mattingly said. "Basically, deciding which method to use comes down to economics."

Michael Popp, an associate professor of agricultural economics, said it is too early to tell if making biodiesel fuel from chicken fat is economically feasible.

City's refiners work to corner 'green' fuel market

by Peggy Anderson, The Associated Press
from www.seattlepi.com
November 29, 2005

The Pacific Northwest loves being green.

Recycling got an early start here. Seattle-based coffee giant Starbucks has scrambled to provide bird-friendly shade-grown coffee. State forestlands were the first in the West to earn "green certification" for environmentally sound management.

Now, with gasoline prices to wallet-busting ranges and petroleum tainted in many minds by violence in the Mideast, demand for biodiesel is booming.

The vegetable oil-based fuel can be burned in place of regular diesel or mixed in varying blends, with 20 percent biodiesel the most common ratio.

The blends are a little pricier than petroleum diesel but loaded with "green" cachet -- after all, it's made from soy or canola or recycled restaurant oils.

"Almost all of our customers run the highest blend that they can. Seattle is kind of unique in the nation," with private users pressing for the highest blends possible, said Dan Freeman of Dr. Dan's Fuelwerks in Ballard. "We have the highest concentration of individual users in the nation in the Puget Sound area."

Why buy it?

"Environmental reasons, political reasons, every reason," said Seattle landscaper Ann Magnano, one of Freeman's customers. "It's about giving farmers the opportunity to keep farming ... helping the planet."

"I'd rather pay American farmers than Saudi kings," said Shoreline resident Jeff Van Horn, who also likes using the cleaner fuel around his kids.

Biodiesel is available at specialty stations such as Freeman's and at a few regular stations and some heating oil suppliers.

But it's going to be a while before biodiesel goes mainstream in the United States.

At this point, somewhere between 3 percent and 4 percent of the nation's registered vehicles are diesel -- well below the 49 percent in Europe, where higher gasoline prices long ago made diesel's 30 percent to 40 percent greater fuel efficiency appealing.

Meanwhile, the country isn't capable of replacing even the petroleum diesel it already uses with homegrown biodiesel.

"We don't have the acreage, the production capacity," said Peter Murchie at the Environmental Protection Agency.

Washington and Oregon hope to get in on the ground floor of domestic biodiesel production.

"We're trying to build a whole industry in this state, from growing to crushing to refining to using," said Matt Steuerwalt, energy aide to Gov. Christine Gregoire.

Seattle, Tacoma and Olympia are all using biodiesel for at least some of their public transit and service vehicles.

But there've been some supply problems, said Jim Boone, maintenance manager for Seattle's Metro Transit, which runs 340 of its 1,400 buses on B5 biodiesel, a mix of 5 percent biodiesel and 95 percent ultralow-sulfur petroleum diesel.

"They're not making enough of it yet," Boone said. "Sometimes we can't get it."

With two new 35-million- gallon-a-year plants coming on line in Minnesota, and more in other states, shortages should be less of a problem, said spokeswoman Jenna Higgins at the National Biodiesel Board in Washington, D.C.

Washington officials are interested in canola oil as a source of biodiesel because it isn't as vulnerable to jelling at low temperatures as soy oil, the source of about 90 percent of U.S. biodiesel.

A Washington State Ferries test of B20 was scrapped when operators ran into what they called "a butterscotch mousse" of "brownish slime" in ferries where one wall of fuel tanks was the outer skin of the boat -- exposed to the chilly water of Puget Sound.

Fuel filters that were usually changed every couple of months were being replaced three or four times a day, said Paul Brodeur, the system's operating program port engineer.

"It's a learning process," Brodeur said. "People are trying different things. Europe is about five years ahead of us and we're about five years ahead of Canada."

Biodiesel can also be made from recycled vegetable oil used, for example, to make french fries.

The relative simplicity of making biodiesel fuel has raised concerns that amateur refiners may undermine the industry's reputation by producing fuel that's unreliable.

The Environmental Protection Agency has awarded a $70,000 grant to a project called Bio-49 Degrees that is teaching technical college students in Washington and British Columbia how to refine used oil from restaurants with mini-refinery equipment made by Bruce Barbour of Bellingham. Barbour works for the state Ecology Department.

"The independents are not an issue for EPA," said Peter Murchie, who heads up the agency's "diesel team" and is co-coordinator of the West Coast Collaborative, a program that encourages production of alternative fuels.

By Tim Hoskins, Iowa Farmer Today (www.iowafarmer.com)
November 22, 2005

RALSTON -- When people finish a briefing and tour of this Western Iowa biodiesel plant, a common reaction is, "That is simple."

Surprisingly, the process of making biodiesel is simple and easy to understand, says Larry Breeding, general manager for biodiesel operations for West Central Co-op.

Breeding has learned the basics of the biodiesel process in four months since arriving in Carroll County after working in the petroleum industry in Louisiana.

Breeding gives an overview of the operation here that takes soybeans and turns them into 12 million gallons of biodiesel annually. The plant was built to process the 8 million to 9 million bushels of soybeans stored on site.

Here's how it works:

• The soybeans arrive from farms just as they do at many other elevators in Iowa.
• From the elevator, the beans are transported to the crushing plant.
• In the crushing plant, the beans are roasted and hammer-milled to extract the soy oil. The roasting produces the only odor during the tour.
• The soy oil is refined to remove some of the gumming agent.
• The oil is stored until it is needed in the biodiesel plant.

"The crushing plant runs five days a week. They can produce enough soybean oil in five days to feed the biodiesel plant for seven days," says Breeding.

A conveyor brings soybeans from storage to a crushing plant at West Central Co-op in Ralston. In the upper right is the biodiesel plant with storage tanks behind it.
Inset: Biodiesel is loaded into a tanker to be shipped out of the storage tank to a fuel terminal.

The biodiesel plant runs 24/7 with a continuous-flow process that keeps soy oil pumping into it and the finished product o biodiesel o pouring into storage tanks.

The soy oil is pumped into the biodiesel plant. It then is mixed with methanol and a catalyst to start the reaction called transferication, which turns soy oil and methanol into biodiesel and glycerin.

An acid is used to stop the chemical reaction.

After that, the biodiesel is separated from the glycerin. The biodiesel then is washed. The water and remaining methanol are removed and recycled.

The biodiesel is tested and pumped into a storage tank. From the storage tank, biodiesel is sold and transported by truck or rail from the loadout facility.

Glycerin made from the process is used in many industrial chemical applications.

Generally, the process starts with 100 pounds of soybean oil and 10 lbs. of methanol. The result is 100 lbs. of biodiesel and 10 lbs. of glycerin.

Depending on the quality of soy oil, the process sometimes produces about a pound of fatty acids, which can be used in livestock feed rations.

The temperature, which is key, is constantly monitored throughout the process. Two operators run the operation room in 12-hour shifts.

They monitor the plant on computer screens in the control room.

The four-story biodiesel plant sits on a 75x75-foot concrete pad. Pipes and tanks make up most of the plant.

The pipes transport the materials. In the tanks, either reactions take place or chemicals are separated.

Breeding says the only emission from the plant is "a little bit" of steam that is used to help maintain the temperature for the reactions.

The methanol and water are separated and will be recycled to make more biodiesel.

by Elton Robinson, Delta Farm Press
October 20, 2005

The way Crittenden County, Tenn., farmer Boyce Johnson sees it, every time he fills up at the soy biodiesel pump, he increases demand for U.S. soybeans. But for demand to have a positive impact on prices, he's going to need some help.

Boyce Johnson

For example, if all the nation's truckers burned just 2 percent soy biodiesel, it would increase the market for soybeans by about 450 million bushels annually. That's about 16 percent of U.S. soybean production every year and more than double current U.S. soybean ending stocks, reported by USDA.

By the same token, the United States would be hard-pressed to take soy biodiesel use much higher in the short term. "Biodiesel (which is made from almost any product containing oil, including soybeans) will never be a 100 percent replacement for petroleum diesel," said Gordon Petty with Ritter Oil Co. in Crawfordsville, Ark. "We just don't have enough production capacity. But in years to come, the sky's the limit. If crude oil stays at $70 a barrel plus, then biodiesel has an advantage."

Petty and Johnson were among several speakers at a Sept. 20 field trip for a group of students from Crittenden County's Wonder Junior High School. The trip included a farm tour and an introduction to the environmental and engine-health benefits of biofuels. Crittenden County, as well as Shelby County in west Tennessee, were recently cited by EPA for being out of compliance for air quality.

According to Eddie Brawley, head of metropolitan planning organization in Crittenden County, "This means we have to cut down on the amount of gasoline and diesel fuel we use."

Biodiesel can help the effort in several ways, according to the experts.

"It is a boutique fuel," Petty says. "It can be used to lower pollution and adds lubricity to your engine. We have some users who are using B99 (99 percent biodiesel), who tell me they get extra miles per gallon without any loss of power."

Biodiesel is normally mixed with petroleum diesel to create a biodiesel blend and is used in compression-ignition diesel engines with few or no modifications. Biodiesel is biodegradable, non-toxic and essentially free of sulfur and aromatics, though users around the farm do notice a deep-fry odor coming from exhausts.

Just about any blend of biodiesel and petroleum diesel will reduce air pollution, according to Andy Couch with the West Tennessee Clean Cities Coalition, who drove to the field day in a 100 percent biodiesel automobile. "But it's not the answer to global warming and our overdependence on foreign oil."

Recently, biodiesel has enjoyed a temporary price advantage over petroleum diesel thanks to petroleum fuel hikes and a blender's rebate of $1 per gallon for biodiesel. The blender's credit is immediately passed on to the customer purchasing the fuel, but it takes as long as three months for the blender to receive the rebate, which has somewhat hampered biodiesel distribution, according to Petty.

"When the blender sends his road use tax to the government every month, the rebate goes down as a credit for the taxes we owe. That's another reason why a lot of people don't want to deal with it. The blender's money is tied up. Smaller companies can be stressed for cash."

Currently, Petty "splash blends" biodiesel and diesel from two tanks at his facility, meaning on-road customers can choose any blend of biodiesel they want. "To get the blender's credit of a dollar per gallon of biodiesel, "you have to blend a minimum of 1 gallon of petroleum diesel," said Petty who, stores B100 in a 12,000-gallon tank.

But those who have the most to gain from a larger biodiesel market - farmers - are sometimes hamstrung in their effort to run more biodiesel, according to Johnson and Petty.

Johnson, who is on the board of the local Farm Bureau, noted that there is no legal limit to the blending percentage for on-road diesel. He runs B15 in his pickup. But federal law requires that off-road biodiesel blends higher than B2 be injected with a red dye. Petty says an injector to do this is on order, but until it gets there, he can't sell the higher blends to off-road users.

"When the injector comes in, biodiesel is going to take off in this county," Johnson said. "We're going to jump to 20 percent to 40 percent blends on our off-road biodiesel overnight."

If you're counting your red dyes, yes, that's two. Federal law already requires that all off-road diesel be mixed with a red dye to help thwart illegal sales. So when off-road diesel, already colored red, is blended at a percentage greater than B2, it will get a second shot of red dye. The government requirement includes a disclaimer that red dye itself can harm engines, a conundrum that has Johnson and Petty shaking their heads.

If industry can find a way to work through the government red tape, the subsidy will help encourage industry to build more biodiesel plants, which can cost a minimum of $25 million to construct, according to Petty, who sells gasoline, farm diesel, road diesel and jet fuel at his facility.

"The oil companies and distributors need to work together for the right reasons," Petty said. "We have some politicians who think we can conserve our way out of today's problems. We won't. The only way you can do that is to turn into a Third World country. So let's blend in 5 percent biodiesel and cut our imports."

Owners of older diesel-engine vehicles with steel fuel tanks should be cautious about starting out at too high a blend, Petty stresses. The cleaning action of the fuel tends to loosen particles attached to the tank which can then clog the fuel filter.

For those older vehicles, Petty recommends starting out with a clean fuel filter and burning no higher than a B10 blend until the engine starts to clean up. In addition, vehicles manufactured prior to 1992 may have to have their hoses replaced. Hoses on vehicles manufactured after 1992 "will tolerate a high percentage of biodiesel."

Couch says the fledgling biodiesel industry has its work cut out, but it's making progress because of the environmental benefits of biofuel. "There were 55 billion gallons of diesel used last year, compared to 30 million gallons of biodiesel. If we just get 1 percent of the market, we would be doing good. The current energy bill did establish a biofuel standard to have a 7.5 billion-gallon biofuel market by 2012, although that's going to be ethanol mostly."

"The biodiesel is going to fill a niche and it will help our farm markets," Petty added. "We desperately need some help on commodity prices. Hopefully, as the industry grows, it will become more efficient. I can remember when ethanol was so much more expensive than gasoline. Today ethanol is as cheap or cheaper than gasoline."

by Brian Farkas, Associated Press
October 2, 2005

CHARLESTON, W.Va. - Sherry Dean has a secret she's been keeping from her drivers since March - their Upshur County school buses are running on an alternative fuel made of vegetable oil and diesel. "I wanted to run it without my drivers or mechanics knowing," she said. "That way I can have a true feeling for how it's doing."

So far, the results have been "great."

Dean is among a slowly growing number of county transportation directors in West Virginia and across the nation who are switching from straight diesel to a mixture of diesel and biodiesel, a fuel based primarily on vegetable oils.

Biodiesel use has been growing since 1992 when Congress passed the Energy Policy Act in a move to reduce the nation's dependency on foreign oil. It has since been approved by the federal Environmental Protection Agency as an alternative fuel.

Since 1999, biodiesel use nationwide has grown from 500,000 gallons to 25 million gallons in 2004. It is estimated that usage will surpass 50 million gallons this year, said Amber Pearson with the Missouri-based National Biodiesel Board.

The board was established in 1992 by soybean commodity groups to promote the use and research of biodiesel. School systems have contributed to the growth. About 100 systems nationwide have made the switch, "and that number is growing all the time," Pearson said.

Nevada's Clark County started using the fuel after lawmakers in that state required the phased-in purchase of alternative-powered vehicles. The school system, which includes Las Vegas, uses about 3 million gallons a year, said Frank Giordano, who oversees the county's fleet of 1,300 school buses and 1,600 other vehicles.

"The good part of that is we've displaced 600,000 gallons of petroleum fuel," said Giordano. "That's something we're pretty proud of."

While county and school officials say they haven't noticed any appreciable increase in miles-per-gallon, they all say biodiesel doesn't require expensive modifications to their diesel engine buses. Also, the fuel produces less emissions and is healthier for the 24 million schoolchildren who ride buses daily.

And, perhaps, more importantly, recent petroleum price increases - coupled with state and federal incentives - now makes biodiesel an economical choice.

The EPA announced a $7.5 million grant program over the summer to help school systems reduce emissions from their older buses through replacing engines or switching to alternative fuels.

Kentucky officials expect to announce a $48,000 grant program in October. The state's 176 county and municipal school systems can use the money to pay the difference between regular diesel and biodiesel.

New Jersey also offers biodiesel on a statewide contract for local and state agencies to use. The state also has a biodiesel rebate program to offset the additional cost.

Four of West Virginia's 55 counties are using the fuel, and several more are planning to make the switch. Those that do use biodiesel are eligible for increased state transportation funding.

"I was banking on fuel continuing to rise," said Buster Nicholson, Jefferson County's operations director. "It's kind of a hedge against inflation."

The county, which is about 90 miles from Washington, D.C., began using the fuel in May and Nicholson said the change may generate about $60,000 in additional funding from the state Department of Education.

Under the state school aid formula, counties receive about 85 cents for every dollar in transportation costs. By switching to biodiesel, the reimbursement increases to 95 cents. While it takes up to two years for the state to begin paying at the higher rate, "once that cycle kicks in, it just keeps coming," Nicholson said.

Increased consumer interest and state and federal tax incentives for producers means there are now about 1,500 biodiesel distributors nationwide.

"It's a matter of economics," said Rich Cregar with the National Alternative Fuels Training Consortium at West Virginia University. "I don't think anybody is arguing we're going to see cheap oil again.

"Alternative fuels will be economically viable."

As the operations manager for the nation's longest running user of biodiesel in school buses, Joe Biluck Jr. has seen the industry evolve.

"Today, I'm happy to say there has been a tremendous amount of interest," said Biluck, director of operations for the Medford Township, N.J., school system. "The supply chain is improving."

When Biluck started using biodiesel, the closest distributor was in Massachusetts. He is now able to purchase fuel from a supplier in nearby Philadelphia.

Biodiesel supporters refer to the fuel as a renewable energy source since it is partly based on soybeans or other oil-producing vegetables. The common mixture is 20 percent biodiesel, 80 percent diesel fuel.

The fuel requires less technology to produce than ethanol, and Cregar said studies have shown that fuels based on soybeans and other crops could produce up to 3.5 million barrels of fuel daily.

An improperly mixed batch, however, can cause problems with a bus, or even make it stop running, said Marion County Transportation Director Tim James. Marion was the first county in West Virginia to begin using the fuel in its 79 buses.

"Just make sure when it's delivered, it's mixed," James said.

The EPA is requiring refiners to produce lower sulfur diesel fuel beginning next year, and diesel engine manufacturers to build cleaner burning engines by 2010. The agency estimates the new rule will cut emissions of smog-forming nitrogen oxides, soot, carbon monoxide, acid rain-causing sulfur dioxide and other air pollutants, preventing 8,300 premature deaths, more than 9,500 hospitalizations and 1.5 million lost work days.

"I consider it a very effective transition technology," Biluck said. "Five to eight years from now we'll be talking about something different."

In the interim, using biodiesel "shows people we are trying to do everything we can to offset energy costs and at the same time, be more sustainable," he said.

Driver converts engine to run on vegetable oil

by Mark Davis, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
September 23, 2005

In every human's life comes that moment, that instant when you stand on the brink of the irrevocable: With a single step, everything will change.

For Andy Raye of Duluth that moment came on a clear April afternoon this year. The precipice: a smooth stretch of Gwinnett roadway.

His 2002 VW Jetta, a handsome little machine with tan leather interior and painted a lustrous blue, toodled smoothly along the two-lane road. Houses slid by as his car reached 40 mph.

Everything was ready. Raye reached to the car's dash, where gleamed a silver toggle switch that the manufacturer definitely had not installed.

Click! The toggle activated a little switching box he'd installed under the hood, against the car's grill. It whirred into quiet, efficient life, cutting off the flow of diesel fuel and letting an alternate fuel flow into the engine's injectors.

The changeover "was seamless," Raye said. "For a moment, I didn't think it had worked."

Oh, but it had. Raye had stepped off his precipice and landed painlessly. He was running on vegetable oil.

You read that right. Vegetable oil, the squeezings from peanuts, sunflowers, soybeans, among other sources, can power your diesel engine with a few modifications.

photo: Eric S. Lesser

It's hard to say just how many motorists are switching from diesel to vegetable oil. Consider the use of biodiesel, which basically is diesel fuel made from vegetable oil. Though it's not exactly the same as Raye's garage project - using and creating biodiesel can be labor-intensive, and potentially risky - statistics indicate that people are embracing biodiesel and similar alternate fuels.

According to biodieselnow.com, a Web site devoted to alternate diesel consumption, use of biodiesel jumped from 500,000 gallons in 2000 to 15 million gallons in 2001. The U.S. Department of Energy estimates that biodiesel could account for 10 percent of the U.S. diesel market in the next decade or so.

Ask Raye, 41, why he made this jump to vegetable oil and he'll most likely grin. He'd like to say he did it for the environment, or to send a message to Big Oil, whoever they are. But he's pragmatic: The guy sells tankless water heaters for a living and does a lot of driving.

"There's nothing wrong with saving money," said Raye.

How much? Raye figures he's managed to pocket about $500 in savings in the last six months or so that he's been burning vegetable oil, which he gets free from a local restaurateur, who stores the stuff behind his eatery.

Yes, free. Compare that to diesel fuel, which costs about $2.59 per gallon.

And now, a little history.

Raye bought his car, a pert machine with 32,000 miles, in January. It was nearly flawless, with only a dimple in the passenger's front door, and it had a diesel engine. Raye started looking at the engine and thinking about converting it to vegetable oil.

It wasn't such an outlandish proposition. Raye had installed a set of high-performance Weber carburetors on an old 911 Porsche and had put the excitement back into an exhausted X-1/9 Fiat, among other projects. Why not change a car's diet?

"I know just enough about cars to be dangerous," he said.

He also knew enough to check with his wife first. Donna Raye told him to go ahead, "as long as it saved money and didn't attract roaches."

Raye got busy, searching the Internet for advice and parts. (see www.plantdrive.com) He also went to a cookout with a bunch of alternate-fuel enthusiasts. It was, said Raye, a meeting of like minds. Raye sort of looks like a cross between Christopher Walken and Kirk Douglas - clean-cut, as no-nonsense as a new pair of khakis. There he stood, surrounded by beards and ponytails, a scruffy bunch clad in denim.

He had to find fuel, too, but figured he wouldn't have to look far. Any restaurant that sells fried food has a holding facility where used oil is stored. The restaurant has to pay for the stuff to be hauled off, so Raye imagined it wouldn't be long before he hit greasy gold.

A Thai restaurant owner, who knew a good deal when he heard one, said OK. "It was a win-win for both of us," Raye said.

Raye set up a 55-gallon barrel outside the restaurant which workers soon filled with vegetable oil.

Raye got a second drum and took it to his local muffler shop, where a man with a torch burned three holes, each roughly the size of a canteloupe, into the barrel's removable top. Raye took the drum home and placed it in his garage, where it shared space with a towering Chevy Tahoe.

He grabbed two pairs of old jeans and sacrificed them to the project, slicing off three legs above the pants' knees. A local dry cleaner sewed shut one end of each leg. They looked like monstrous tube socks. He inserted one in each hole atop the drum, where they served as filters.

Also atop the drum was another, more refined filter attached to a tube that led to a pump. On the other end of the pump was another tube, leading to a simple little device that any driver would recognize: a pistol-shaped nozzle that fits easily into the opening of a car's gas tank.

Raye turned his attention to the Jetta. He stuck a round, 2 1/2-gallon aluminum tank in the rear of the car, fitting it in the spare tire. It would hold diesel fuel. Then he headed to a local mechanic, who inserted new fuel lines from the new tank in the rear to the engine in the front.

Raye popped open the hood and fitted the side of the engine with another filter, which featured a heating element to raise the oil to about 130 degrees Fahrenheit - hot enough to keep vegetable oil flowing easily. He cut the old gas lines and attached them, plus the new ones, to the switching assembly.

Then, in front of the engine, another heater - an 8-inch length of pipe through which the vegetable oil would pass before it reached the engine's fuel injectors. It would raise the oil's heat to 170 degrees, making it hot enough to duplicate the viscosity of regular diesel fuel.

The final touch: that toggle, which would switch one source of fuel to the other.

Raye, who figures he spent about $800 on his project, has used the stuff without fail since that first drive. He starts the VW with regular diesel fuel, letting the engine run for a few moments until it's warm. Then he switches over to the vegetable oil, usually when he's a couple of miles from his house. In the evening, he reverses the process, switching back to diesel as he nears home.

The car, he said, runs just fine. And it smells better than before.

"People say it smells like French fries," he said. "I think it smells sort of sweet."

Perhaps more like Pad Thai?

by Patrick Hoge, San Francisco Chronicle
September 15, 2005

Berkeley reduced greenhouse gas emissions in the city by 14 percent during the past two years with conservation measures that included running cars on vegetable oil, city officials said Monday.

The dramatic drop in carbon emissions apparently puts Berkeley at the forefront of a handful of cities that are legally committing themselves to reducing the pollution that many scientists have blamed for global warming.

"Berkeley's groundbreaking efforts to be a model environmental city are beginning to show dramatic results," said Berkeley Mayor Tom Bates.

The city calculated that its carbon emissions in 2004 were 2,066 metric tons less than its baseline number. To get equivalent air-quality benefits, the city would have had to plant 52,000 trees or remove 450 cars from the road, Bates said.

The greatest cut in greenhouse gases, 47 percent, came from city vehicles - particularly as a result of the use of biodiesel fuel but also through use of electric, natural gas and hybrid electric-gasoline powered vehicles.

Berkeley's City Council is expected to vote tonight to join four other cities, including Oakland, as members of the Chicago Climate Exchange, a stock-market-like association of private and public entities that has been trading "emissions allowances" since December 2003. The exchange requires members to reduce emissions by 1 percent per year through 2006.

None of the other cities has documented a reduction in emissions as big as Berkeley claims. This year, Oakland became the second city to join, but it has not calculated its emissions.

Chicago, a founding member of the exchange, claims about a 5 percent reduction over 2003 and 2004. Portland has not released numbers, while Boulder, Colo., showed a drop of 9 percent in 2003 and estimates its emissions stayed constant in 2004.

The exchange's 110 members include major corporations such as IBM, Ford Motor Co. and DuPont Co. In the first year, members of the exchange collectively reduced their carbon emissions by 9 percent, said Richard Sandor, the chairman and chief executive officer of the exchange. Numbers for 2004 are not yet available.

Berkeley is "doing a fantastic job" said Sandor, who was chief economist of the Chicago Board of Trade in the 1970s and an assistant professor at UC Berkeley's business school from 1966 to 1972.

The city has had problems this year with engines being damaged by contaminated biodiesel fuel - which is essentially vegetable oil - and has been using much less biodiesel as a result, which could result in higher emissions this year, officials said.

The city cut its use of natural gas by 16 percent but saw electricity use climb 5 percent, mostly from the opening of its expanded central library and the purchase of a downtown office building that has a tenant operating an Internet server farm.

Bates took a swipe Monday at the Bush administration for it refusal to abide by the Kyoto Protocol, which calls upon nearly 40 industrialized countries to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases by an average of 5.2 percent below 1990 levels by 2012.

"With the outrageous failure of our federal government to take action, it is essential for cities to step up to the plate and show real leadership in the fight against global warming," Bates said.

Michele St. Martin, a spokeswoman for the White House Council on Environmental Quality, took exception with Bates' criticism, saying that President Bush in 2002 set forth a plan to reduce national greenhouse gas emissions by 18 percent by 2012.

She claimed reductions were 2.3 percent in 2003 and 2.6 percent in 2004, but those numbers have been hotly disputed by environmentalists.

"We welcome efforts from all levels of government to meet that goal," St. Martin said.

By Dan Tilkin and KATU Web Staff, from www.katu.com
September 7, 2005

PORTLAND, Ore. - Skyrocketing gas and diesel prices may end up pushing more people toward biodiesel fuel which until now, has been far more expensive than regular diesel.

In a warehouse under the Fremont Bridge, a pioneer in Portland's biodiesel movement brews his product. For Loren Fennell, switching to biodiesel was a moral decision.

"It takes a willingness and commitment to walk that talk and become environmental," he says.

For others, price may soon be a factor in deciding to use biodiesel fuel. Now that prices at the pump are at or near $3.00 a gallon, biodiesel, at around $3.20 a gallon, may not seem that expensive to consumers.

In a few places, biodiesel is actually cheaper than traditional diesel. In Bellingham, Washington, near the Canadian border, biodiesel is 25 cents less per gallon.

"It's really hard getting off of old habits that we are so used to," says Fennell.

Fennell teaches clinics on making your own biodiesel. For more information, you can head to the Oregon Biodiesel Workshop Web site.

by Joseph Baneth Allen, from AmericanProfile.com
August 30, 2005

photo: Isaac Brekken

Whenever Harold Benich wants to get away from his hometown of Albion, Pa., (pop. 1,607) for a road trip on his custom-built Harley Davidson Fat Boy motorcycle, he bypasses the neighborhood gas station.

No, he isn't searching for the best bargain on gasoline. The fuel Benich buys can't be found at any typical gas station because Benich's motorcycle runs on soybean oil.

In fact, Benich has built the world's first motorcycle running entirely on a biodiesel fuel based on soybean oil, and it gets 100 miles to the gallon. Though fuel costs $2.50 a gallon and he has to get it from Columbus Foods in Chicago, Benich figures he's still ahead of the mileage game. Besides, the world should never run out of soybeans.

"The idea of building a motorcycle that could run on biodiesel fuel started out as a joke," recalls Harold's wife, Jody. "Nobody thought it could be done. That was the wrong thing to tell Harold. He worked as a diesel mechanic for Detroit Diesel, and now runs the Vehicle Restoration Plant at the state prison in Albion. He also repairs diesel-powered boat engines. Harold is simply a workaholic who knows diesel engines inside and out, and he can make them run."

"It really wasn't that hard to do," Benich says. "I spent two years building it in my garage during my spare time after work and on weekends." He also spent $15,000 on parts for his one-of-a-kind motorcycle. The engine was rescued from a construction site.

Building it turned out to be a little cheaper than buying a brand new Fat Boy motorcycle, Benich says. "I bought a new frame (from Harley Davidson), but it required some modifications. The biodiesel, three cylinder, inline engine had to be mounted crossways, so I had to (fabricate) a mounting bracket for it."

Benich finished his motorcycle ahead of several others who are still building their own versions of alternate fuel bikes. "Harold is the first one to have a motorcycle powered by biodiesel fuel on the road," says Jenna Higgins, director of communications for the National Biodiesel Board, based in Jefferson, Mo.

"Use of biodiesel fuel-powered vehicles isn't new," Higgins says. "Biodiesel fuel is already being used by Florida Power's vehicle fleet and in more than 60 major vehicle fleets around the country." Biodiesel fuel also saw some previous, limited use by the Allied and Axis Powers during World War II, and the inventor of the diesel engine, Rudolph Diesel, used a peanut oil-based fuel in the 1890s to run the first engines that bear his name.

Harold's biodiesel Harley isn't as powerful as a traditional Fat Boy motorcycle. "It runs a little bit weaker," he says. "There's a power difference of about 20 percent."

His motorcycle also doesn't make that traditional Harley vibrato when he takes Jody on road trips. "It sounds like a farm tractor," she says. Even the smell of his motorcycle is different.

"It smells like french fries," Jody says.

Benich's motorcycle has attracted attention up and down the East Coast. He's gone on 11 radio shows to talk about how he built it and how it runs. He also welcomes and answers inquiries about his motorcycle at his email address: smoker@erie.net.

"Harold's motorcycle always draws a crowd because people automatically seem to sense there's something different about it, and they want to know why. They just can't figure out what the difference is until we tell them," Jody says.

When not making road trips with Jody, Benich travels to biker events all across the country. "My ultimate dream road trip would be to drive out to California to be on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno, who also rides Harleys," he says.

Benich's next project is already taking shape in his garage. "Electric vehicles have long been viewed as impractical, so I'm now working on the first practical electric pickup truck."

"And to those who say it can't be done," he says, "the Wright Brothers also were told flying couldn't be done . . . before they took to the skies."

Tractorcade to Farmfest will deliver message about biodiesel.

from Agri News,
July 27, 2005

GILFILLAN, Minn. -- The Biodiesel Tractorcade, a parade of classic tractors, will end their two-day trek at Farmfest being held on the historic Gilfillan Estate in Redwood County Aug. 2-4.

"We are pleased to host the culmination of the Biodiesel Tractorcade," said Todd Benz, show director. "Tractorcade is preserving the American heritage of antique tractors and agriculture. We are fortunate to be able to bring today's farmers a piece of farming history via this fun-filled event."

The Biodiesel Tractorcade was formed last year after event co-organizer, T.J. Johnson, observed a similar event in northern Iowa.

This year's Tractorcade will start in Blue Earth on Aug. 1. The route will roll north and west, stopping overnight in St. James, and continue on toward Redwood County.

Riders will cover over 100 miles during the two-day event, which will end Aug. 2 at Farmfest.

More than 75 tractors, most of them vintage models, are expected to take part and the public is encouraged to come out and view them along their route.

Tractorcade is sponsored by biodiesel, Linder Farm Network, KTOE, Watonwan Farm Service, Country 101.5 and the Minnesota, Faribault County, Martin County and Watonwan County Soybean Growers.

"You can't imagine how happy we are to be able to fulfill one of our dreams," said Mike Parry, Tractorcade co-organizer. "For us to be able to travel through many different communities with the Biodiesel Tractorcade promoting agriculture by using tractors, then ending at the area's premiere agricultural showcase, Farmfest, is a dream come true."

For more information on Tractorcade, visit www.tractorcade.com or call Mike Parry at 507-382-8447.

Farm Aid Returns to Roots, Promotes Food from Family Farms; Willie Nelson, Neil Young, John Mellencamp, Dave Matthews Headline Concert

from usnewswire.com,
July 27, 2005

CHICAGO - Farm Aid founder Willie Nelson and co-founder John Mellencamp announced July 11 that the nation's leading family farm advocacy organization will mark its 20th anniversary by returning to Illinois - the state where it all began.

Farm Aid 2005 Presented by Silk Soymilk will urge Americans to choose food from family farms. The 20th anniversary celebration will kick off with a week of food and music events in Chicago. Pre-concert events will showcase the city's efforts to promote family farm food by linking rural and urban communities. The events will culminate with Farm Aid's 20th anniversary all-star fundraising concert to take place on Sept. 18 at the Tweeter Center in Tinley Park, IL.

The 20th anniversary concert will feature Willie Nelson, Neil Young, John Mellencamp and Dave Matthews, plus other top artists to be announced later. Farm Aid week in Chicago will include the County Fair at the Garfield Conservatory on September 17, a film festival, possible small-venue performances, educational and restaurant events, as well as the release of Farm Aid's book, FARM AID: A Song for America. During the week, Farm Aid will spotlight activities at Chicago-area farmers markets.

Farm Aid began in 1985 when Willie Nelson, inspired by comments from Bob Dylan at Live Aid, along with Neil Young and John Mellencamp, hosted a day-long music benefit for family farmers in Champaign, IL. From that moment forward, Farm Aid's activist board has shown relentless commitment and dedication, motivating support from millions of Americans and providing hope for struggling family farmers.

"From small towns to folks in the city, everybody knows family farm food is the best," said Farm Aid President Willie Nelson. "It's good to be back in Illinois where it all started. This state is showing how good food can connect places like Champaign and Chicago. It inspires us to think about family farmers every day. I'm looking forward to playing on the Farm Aid stage, playing music with my friends."

"Farmers have a tremendous impact on the quality of food that we eat," said Farm Aid Board Member John Mellencamp. "Farm Aid is always a great show, but even more important is that Farm Aid helps the consumer and the family farmer work together for the benefit of all of us."

Since its beginning, Farm Aid has traveled the country, supporting local organizations working to strengthen and promote family farms. From Washington state to Washington, DC, Farm Aid has established a platform for family farmers to help create a movement that increases the supply and demand for family farm- identified food. Farm Aid's vision is to offer as many opportunities as possible for farmers to provide us with good products-food and alternative fuels that protect our land, our health and our environment.

"Right now, America is on the cusp of a "good food" movement, promoted and supported by Farm Aid," said Farm Aid Executive Director Carolyn Mugar. "The American public recognizes family farmers as their resource for food that is local, humanely-raised, organic, and sustainable, and consumers are reaching for these foods in grocery stores, at farmers markets, in schools and even in hospitals. This demand offers growing economic opportunity for family farmers to thrive. Farm Aid will continue to work to increase the options for all family farmers in order to secure a safe, healthy food supply for our future."

"I am pleased to welcome Farm Aid to Chicago to celebrate its 20th anniversary," said Mayor Daley. "Chicago is committed to supporting small businesses and improving the quality of life for its residents, and Farm Aid helps family farmers do their job of producing the highest quality food for our City and for people all over the country."

For the third year, Silk Soymilk is the presenting sponsor of the Farm Aid concert. "Silk Soymilk is proud to present Farm Aid's 20th anniversary concert," states Mike Keown, Senior Vice President of Marketing for WhiteWave Foods. "We salute the important role that family farmers serve in promoting sustainable agriculture and providing healthy food to American families. We look forward to this celebratory event in the Chicago area- centrally located in the heart of our nation's Farm Belt."

Tickets for Farm Aid 2005 Presented by Silk Soymilk are on sale July 30 at 10 a.m. CDT and are available at all Ticketmaster outlets, the Tweeter Center box office, charge by phone in Chicago at 312-559-1212, or online at http://www.tweetercenter.com/chicago . For more information about Farm Aid's 20th anniversary, visit www.farmaid.org.

Farm Aid will offer special advance sale tickets to its FarmYard members. To become a member of Farm Aid's FarmYard, visit www.farmaid.org.

For directions, venue rules and regulations, parking and general information, please visit www.tweetercenter.com/chicago or call 708-614-1616.

Biodiesel fuels soybean farmers' hopes for future

from the Louisville, KY Courier-Journal,
July 14, 2005

To find biodiesel retailers in Kentucky, visit the Web site of the Kentucky Clean Fuels Coalition: www.kentuckycleanfuels.org/b20/distributors.html

To find biodiesel retailers in the U.S., go to the National Biodiesel Board's Web site: www.biodiesel.org/buyingbiodiesel/retailfuelingsites/

SIMPSONVILLE, Ky. - Sixty-year-old Jack Trumbo has been farming, he says, since he could follow his daddy to the barn.

Now, more than half a century later, Trumbo stands in a soybean field and marvels that it might soon power American motorists into a cleaner, more secure future.

Though traditionally used for food, many of the soybeans harvested in Kentucky and Indiana this year will likely end up as biodiesel, an increasingly popular alternative fuel that can be made from nearly any kind of fat, animal or vegetable.

After undergoing a simple chemical reaction, processed soybean oil, hog fat or cooking grease can go into almost any diesel engine, though most commercially available blends still mix biodiesel with the standard petroleum variety.

Biodiesel has long enjoyed support from grass-roots environmentalists, some of whom mix up batches in their garages.

But regionally it has been the more than 30,000 soybean farmers in Kentucky and Indiana who have pressed hardest for wider acceptance - and wider production. They say their renewable fuel source can curtail America's dependency on foreign oil and reduce air pollution from diesel engines.

"It's just a real sense of satisfaction in knowing you're using something you've grown," said Trumbo, who fills his tractors and pickup with a 10 percent soy-based biodiesel blend.

Whether biodiesel can truly meet the lofty goals set for it remains an open question.

But one thing seems certain. Growing demand for biodiesel would likely mean a windfall for the agricultural economies of both states, where soybeans are already a multibillion-dollar industry.

And with crude oil prices topping a record $60 a barrel last week, consumers - and government leaders - are starting to see biodiesel as a more attractive option.

A growing industry

Biodiesel has surged in popularity in Kentucky and Indiana this year on the heels of a Bush administration tax incentive. More pumps in both states offer biodiesel than ever before, usually in blends that cut standard petroleum diesel with 2 percent to 20 percent soy-based fuel.

Local farmers still make up a major percentage of local biodiesel customers. But they aren't the only ones.

Some government agencies, businesses and school districts in both states have put their diesel fleets on a vegetable diet in recent years.

Even regular consumers are paying attention.

Ted Wirth, a Louisville commercial photographer, owns two diesel Volkswagens, a 2002 Beetle and a 2002 Golf.

Volkswagen told Wirth that it has yet to approve soy-based biodiesel for use in its cars, he said. So he risked voiding his warranty if he used it.

But he says he hopes the company comes around.

Biodiesel is not new. But the real flood of interest in the United States did not come until this year, after President Bush signed the American Jobs Creation Act last October.

Part of the law gives biodiesel distributors tax credits equal to about a penny for every 1 percent of biodiesel they blend with regular fuel.

As a result, the price has come down to within a penny per gallon of regular diesel. Since then, suppliers say they have seen unprecedented sales.

Melissa Howell of the Kentucky Clean Fuels Coalition estimates that 2005 sales of pure unblended biodiesel have already met last year's total of 300,000 gallons. She said she expects that figure to double by the end of the year.

Indiana consumers bought 1 million gallons of pure soy biodiesel in the first six months of 2005, compared with 400,000 gallons for all of 2004, said Belinda Puetz of the Indiana Soybean Growers Association.

In March, seven Energy Plus 24 stations in Southern Indiana began carrying B-5, a fuel blended from 5 percent domestic soy-based biodiesel and 95 percent regular diesel.

And 27 retailers across Kentucky now offer biodiesel blends. Supply, Puetz said, can barely meet demand.

All of which seems like good news for farmers.

The price of soybeans could jump anywhere from 10 cents to 25 cents a bushel as demand for biodiesel increases, according to industry estimates.

Last year Kentucky produced 57.2 million bushels of soybeans. In 2003, the last year for which information is available, Indiana produced more than 200 million bushels.

"We're a growing industry," Puetz says. "It's going to take time to ramp up production."

Environmental issues

Though lower prices have stirred the most recent spike in sales, biodiesel has long been touted for its perceived environmental benefits.

According to the National Biodiesel Board's Web site, "biodiesel reduces the health risks associated with petroleum diesel" emissions.

Those risks include asthma attacks, respiratory disease, heart attacks and premature death, according to a report by the Clean Air Task Force, a Boston-based group that has lobbied for stricter federal diesel emissions standards.

Diesel soot caused 82 premature deaths in Louisville in 1999, according to the Clean Air Task Force study.

But requiring better engine technology for new diesel vehicles and fitting existing diesel vehicles with new emission-reducing filters will do more to curb emissions than biodiesel, said Frank O'Donnell, president of Clean Air Watch, a Washington, D.C., nonprofit.

"I don't think it would be a substitute for pollution-control devices," he said. "But it could be part of the mix."

In a 2002 emissions study by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, biodiesel received a mostly positive review.

Twenty percent, or B-20, biodiesel blends can greatly reduce some emissions that contribute to ground-level ozone, the study found. The B-20 blend also releases less fine-particle soot, which has been connected to several respiratory ailments.

But the study concluded that any amount of biodiesel can lead to a slight increase in the emission of nitrogen oxide, a key ground-level ozone ingredient. And it does little to cut the release of carbon dioxide, the gas climatologists consider the major cause of global warming.

Jim Scroggin, transportation director for the Madison Consolidated Schools in Madison, Ind., started filling his fleet's 50 buses with B-5 six months ago.

He said he no longer sees school bus tailpipes belching dark clouds of diesel smoke.

He also said he likes the fact that the district is buying something made in the United States.

Governments forge ahead

Whatever doubts remain, Kentucky and Indiana leaders have gotten behind biodiesel.

In February, Kentucky Gov. Ernie Fletcher called for the use of a 2 percent biodiesel blend, or B-2, in all state-owned diesel vehicles and B-20 in all Kentucky school buses.

Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels signed a measure earlier this year that requires state government vehicles to run on biodiesel whenever possible. Another Indiana law provides up to $20 million in state tax credits to Indiana biodiesel producers.

And U.S. Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., added language to the Senate energy bill passed last week that calls for doubling the production and use of biodiesel and other renewable fuels from 4 billion gallons to 8 billion gallons a year.

Lugar has cited biodiesel as a way to increase national security by reducing America's dependence on foreign oil, a concern that has grown along with higher oil prices.

The United States imports some 55 percent of the petroleum it consumes, a number expected to rise to 68 percent by 2025, according to the U.S. Department of Energy.

Members of the biodiesel industry concede that dependency on petroleum will never disappear in the United States.

Biodiesel in its pure form will always cost too much to replace petroleum outright, said Rick Geise, a spokesman for the Bio G-3000 biodiesel factory in Cold Spring, Ky. Besides, he said, no one could ever grow enough soybeans.

Still, biodiesel gives the United States a way to cope as it tries to stretch its increasingly expensive - and in the end limited - oil supply, he said.

"The ultimate objective is the extension of a finite resource," Geise said. "Dig your well before you're thirsty."

from the Connecticut Post,
July 14, 2005

NORWALK - No homeowner would want to put mashed soybeans into their oil tanks, but one company is betting that Fairfield County residents are willing to use the cleaner-burning fuel that can be created from fat and vegetable oil.

Biodiesel fuel has been around for more than 100 years, said Michael Devine, president of Devine Brothers, a seller of home heating oil, ready-mix concrete and building and landscaping supplies in Norwalk.

But "the practical use of it really wasn't materializing" until recently.

According to the National Biodiesel Board, the fuel, known as biodiesel, is left over when glycerin - a liquid used in medicines and soaps, among other products - is separated out of animal fat or vegetable oil. More than half of biodiesel comes from soybeans, Devine said.

It was during a Christmas party at the Devine offices in 2003 that Devine said he came across a brochure for a national biodiesel conference.

"I saw this being a possible addition - in the fuel oil business," Devine said.

What he learned is that oil tank burner motors run more smoothly with a home heating oil and biodiesel mixture - called bioheat - and that biodiesel is a natural solvent that cleans the system using it. The fuel doesn't require any alterations to most oil heat systems, he said, and can also replace diesel fuel in cars.

The company had extra room at its location on Commerce Street to bring in and blend the biodiesel, which comes into New Haven by rail and then is trucked to Norwalk, with home heating oil.

Devine Brothers moved to the Commerce Street site in 1936 after 18 years in business. Its approximately 5-acre facility employs about 50 people and includes a warehouse, a small office building and a holding tank area bordered on one side by the tracks of Metro-North's Danbury line.

Five blue tanks rise up along the Commerce Street side; the largest holds the heating oil, while the four smaller tanks are where Devine "splash" mixes the biodiesel and home heating oil.

Those tanks hold 1,000 gallons of biodiesel and 19,000 gallons of home heating oil, so the biodiesel makes up 5 percent of the total mixture. Based on 1 billion gallons in annual consumption of home heating oil, Devine said, this 5 percent mix saves 50 million gallons a year. It also cuts down the amount of sulfur - mixed in at the refineries so the home heating oil runs more smoothly in burners - that gets released into the air, he said.

The company blended its first batch in October 2004, and sold the mix to about 2 percent of its customers. To his knowledge, Devine said, no other home heating oil company in Connecticut is selling bioheat.

Thanks to new tax incentives, Devine charges the same price for the bioheat as he does for the regular home heating oil. Without the incentives, using biodiesel would add about 7 cents per gallon to his costs.

"Many of our customers have contacted us about it," he said, adding that selling to 5 percent of his customers is a realistic goal for next winter. For now, he is trying to create awareness, but will still sell the nonmixed home heating oil.

Rising oil prices are also causing customers to look for a cheaper solution. Not only does biodiesel replace some of the home heating oil - the 5 percent mix is industry standard now, but could go higher, Devine said - that would otherwise be consumed, but buying it puts money in the pockets of American farmers.

"I think there are a lot of people who are sensitive to these issues," said Devine, who said he likes being part of the solution to rising oil consumption.

He's so sure that bioheat will take off that Devine is getting cost information on converting from a "splash" operation to one that mixes the biodiesel, which would be stored in two of the 25,000-gallon tanks, with the home heating oil as it flows through the pipes into his trucks. Not only would this increase his capacity, but Devine would have more flexibility in increasing the percentage of biodiesel in the heating oil.

This type of innovation is necessary as the retail oil business changes, Devine said. Margins are shrinking, and businesses need to specialize to stay competitive, especially since, according to Devine, the industry is seeing more consolidation among what were once independent retailers.

"We don't intend to fall behind the curve," Devine said. And "if nothing else, we sell an oil that smells better."

by NDSU Extension (www.ext.nodak.edu),
July 4, 2005

North Dakota State University's North Central Research Extension Center in Minot is starting a demonstration project to demonstrate that biodiesel made from canola oil works.

"Biodiesel is an excellent renewable fuel for diesel engines," said Vern Hofman, an NDSU Extension Service agricultural engineer. "It can be derived from almost all oil-producing crops, which chemically are converted into biodiesel."

The demonstration project involves using canola oil-based biodiesel in one or two tractors during the growing season. The biodiesel will be mixed with diesel fuel at a ratio of 20 percent biodiesel to 80 percent diesel.

Center officials decided to use canola oil-based biodiesel in its project instead of commercially available biodiesel since the commercial biodiesel is made from soybeans, said Jay Fisher, the center's director. The Minot area has many more acres of canola than soybeans.

Archer Daniels Midland Co. provided more than 300 gallons of canola oil for the project and the NDSU Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering Department converted it into biodiesel.

The conversion process is called transesterification, according to Hofman. It reduces the size of the canola vegetable oil molecule, which is a fatty acid that is very similar to diesel fuel. The fuel is called fatty acid methyl ester, which also has the more popular name of biodiesel. A gallon of vegetable oil will produce about 1 gallon of biodiesel. Transesterification also produces a secondary product called glycerin.

Canola oil is used extensively in Europe as a diesel fuel extender, but none is used in the United States. Fisher said the Research Extension Center's project is demonstrating canola oil-based biodiesel since it is an excellent fuel extender. Center officials also chose it because canola oil-based biodiesel soon will be available in the United States through the $50 million biodiesel manufacturing plant being built in Minot.

"The state of North Dakota has tremendous potential to produce an alternative fuel for diesel engines," Hofman said. "As the name implies, biodiesel is similar to diesel fuel, except it is produced from crops commonly grown in North Dakota."

Canola, soybeans, sunflowers and safflowers are some of the main crops. All of them are capable of producing about 50 to 100 gallons of fuel per acre that can be used in an unmodified diesel engine, he said.

An estimate of the fuel production from the state's three main oil-producing crops in 2003 - soybeans, canola and sunflowers - is more than 300 million gallons. Fuel production from any other oil-producing crops would be in addition to this amount. In comparison, North Dakota agriculture uses about 85 million gallons of diesel fuel per year.

Canola oil-based biodiesel also is very cost effective to produce, based on its input and output ratio. It provides 3.3 British thermal units (Btus) of energy for every Btu put into growing canola and processing it into biodiesel, Hofman said.

However, biodiesel has some drawbacks, such as its gelling ability and higher cost than diesel, he said. Pure biodiesel from soybeans will gel at about 30 degrees Fahrenheit. Canola oil-based biodiesel gels at about 15 to 20 F, which means it will flow at lower temperatures. He recommends mixing biodiesel with No.1 diesel fuel, along with adding anti-gel products and fuel heaters to engines to reduce the gelling problem. The North Central Research Extension Center's demonstration project will help show producers how to work around these pr