Veggie
fuel
The
biodiesel alternative: used cooking oil instead of petroleum
D.R. Thompson
February 19 , 2003
Biodiesel’s day has dawned. The cleaner-burning alternative to diesel is the fastest-growing “green” fuel in the country. Production of biodiesel, which is made entirely from vegetable oil, jumped from 5 million gallons in 2001 to over 10 million gallons in 2002.
Biodiesel’s popularity stems largely from its ability to power existing diesel engines without modification — just pump it into a diesel tank and go. It can be used straight or blended with conventional diesel. It’s biodegradable, nontoxic and emits fewer greenhouse gases than diesel.
Yet for all its modern enviro appeal, biodiesel is actually as old as the diesel engine itself. Rudolf Diesel, the 19th-century originator of diesel technology, used refined peanut oil to run his invention. Diesel’s workhorse engine took off, but the rise of cheap crude oil killed his vision of farmers growing their own fuel.
Now, after a century burning fossil fuels, the diesel engine is finding its way back to its agricultural roots.
More than 200 organizations now use biodiesel, such as the U.S. Postal Service, NASA and a variety of mass-transit systems, school districts and local governments, including Maui County and the City & County of Honolulu.
Most of the federal and state agencies that embrace biodiesel were encouraged by federal legislation mandating their use of alternative fuels. No such laws apply to Honolulu, though.
“We’re doing it simply because it’s the right thing to do, environmentally speaking,” said Robert Primiano, head of the city’s automotive equipment service division.
When the city started using biodiesel in November, it instantly became the largest biodiesel consumer in the state, buying some 12,000 gallons a month. About 1,000 vehicles in the city’s diesel fleet run on a blend of 20 percent biodiesel to 80 percent diesel.
Although biodiesel doesn’t offer quite the mileage of diesel, it does burn cleaner. When used in its pure form, biodiesel emits 67 percent fewer hydrocarbons, 48 percent less carbon monoxide and 47 percent fewer particulates than diesel, according to a recent Environmental Protection Agency study.
On the downside, biodiesel releases 10 percent more nitrogen oxide.
Another sticking point may be the price. On O‘ahu, biodiesel retails for $2.59 a gallon, currently about 60 cents more than diesel.
Even so, Hawai‘i’s biodiesel prices are among the lowest in the nation, according to Bob King, president of Pacific Biodiesel, the sole commercial producer of the fuel in the Islands.
“We’re selling it retail for better than some wholesale prices on the Mainland,” King said.
By recycling used cooking oil — which restaurants actually pay King’s company to take off their hands — Pacific Biodiesel keeps its raw-material costs way down. Most Mainland producers rely on virgin soy oil.
Breaks on fuel taxes would lower biodiesel’s price at the pump. The National Biodiesel Board — the industry’s lobbying group, which carries all the clout of U.S. soybean farmers — has been pushing Congress for a reduction of the 24.4-cent-per-gallon federal tax on diesel.
But King isn’t holding his breath for that. He believes state and county incentives are better bets.
Indeed, in 2002 the state of Hawai‘i halved the 15-cent-per-gallon fuel tax for biodiesel. Current legislative bills (SB1239, HB1539) would reduce that again by half.
On Maui, where Pacific Biodiesel is based, county incentives have helped bring the price of biodiesel down by 35 cents from O‘ahu prices to $2.24 per gallon. When diesel prices spike, biodiesel actually costs less in Kahului.
King anticipates producing a record 250,000 gallons of fuel this year. That may be a drop in the tank next to the nearly 300 million gallons of diesel Hawai‘i pumps annually, but it means the industry’s got plenty of room for growth. King’s already studying the feasibility of planting vegetable oil crops once he maxes out the supply of recyclable fryer oil.
King’s current clientele includes small farmers, tour-boat operators and a variety of other businesses, including one Maui customer offering a biodiesel-powered rental car, the “Bio-Beetle.”
A few dozen motorists on Maui and O‘ahu have caught on to biodiesel, too. Vicky Dworkin is a librarian at Kailua Public Library. She and husband John Wendell set out to buy a new car preferably with a diesel engine for fuel economy. Once they discovered that Pacific Biodiesel had a plant on Sand Island where they could buy diesel fuel made from recycled restaurant grease, they were sold. Their 2002 Volkswagen Golf sports vanity plates that read “BIODZL.”
The higher cost doesn’t faze them.
“Biodiesel’s really not that much more expensive, and it’s worth it to us to be doing something good environmentally,” Dworkin said.
One small subset of biodiesel users has found a way to beat the premium price at the pump — they brew it at home. It’s a practice the biodiesel industry scowls at, warning that poor quality fuel can damage engines.
That hasn’t discouraged Ano Tarletz, a “sustainable lifestyle pioneer” on the Big Island who’s been using homemade biodiesel for two years. It costs Tarletz less than 75 cents per gallon to produce, not counting labor or capital.
However Tarletz racks up most of his miles not on biodiesel, but on another little-known alternative fuel — straight vegetable oil. He’s rigged his old telephone company truck to switch back and forth between the two. He starts the engine on biodiesel and runs it just long enough to heat and thin the vegetable oil for use; before shutting off the engine, he switches back to biodiesel to clear the lines and cylinders of the thicker, coagulating fuel.
His beef with biodiesel is that it requires chemical processing when diesel engines can run happily on the pure, unrefined stuff.
Still, he sees the growing popularity of biodiesel as a good thing.
“Biodiesel is available now to an average person — that’s what’s powerful about it,” he said. “You don’t need an $80,000 hydrogen car. You get an old $800 diesel Rabbit, and you’re in.”
