Could somebody explain bio-diesel to me.

If we can get a source of fuel from soybeans or corn, why aren't we doing it? It is a renewable product unlike oil that is gone once it's mined. It seems that it can power large buses and trucks too, so wouldn't this enable people to keep their SUV's without ruining our economy and our planet?

Now I am really stupid when it comes to how a car operates, but is bio-diesel mixed with gasoline or can it stand on it's own? Could it be used on non-diesal engines like most people drive? Would it work in a hybrid using the bio-fuel instead of gasoline? Are any of these things possible and if so, how do we convince car manufacturers to get on board?

does it cost to make a gallon of bio-deisel..

The problem is we need major government investments in infrastructure. There are no biodeisl stations in L.A. I would have to go to Santa Barbara to get gas!! Otherwise I would have bought a biodeisl ready car last year.

do with our tax money not endless investment in war. I also wish they would give each property owner who wants to invest in solar energy, $10,000 to help them get started. We could really reduce our dependence on oil with these two things. However, as long as the oil industry is running our government, it will never happen.

kitchen. If you're going to change your life by using more renewable energy sources, start by changing everything you've been taught by the corporations who have a vested interest in keeping you thinking the way you've always thought.

http://journeytoforever.org/biodiesel_make.html

http://www.jrwhipple.com/sr/fuel_making.html

http://running_on_alcohol.tripod.com/

http://www.happinessonline.org/BeTemperate/p27.htm

or start a co-op.

So it is MORE cost effective.

But Brazil's been doing it for years:

Plus, WVO (basically, the stuff in the fryers at Burger King) can be quickly cleaned and used in your tank. MUCH better than petro.

cant be mixed with gasoline.

can be run straight in normal temps. needs to be mixed in freezing temps.

I think the biggest thing holding it back was the price. untill this week it was almost a buck per gallon more.


I think gm is working on a hybrid diesel.

Biodiesel runs in diesel engines.
Biodiesel can be made from any type of vegetable oil or animal fat

biodiesel will not run in a conventional gasoline engine
ethanol (grain alcohol) can be used instead of gasoline with minor modifications

agricultural based fuels could easily supplement 25% of our fuel needs if we were to switch over to more diesel/electric hybrid vehicles.

forums.biodieselnow.com/

check it out, lots of info on here
make your own biodiesel

this is easy, high school chemistry stuff

I think it's time to study up on this.

Some newer deisel engines have problems with it. Older engines can burn it with few/no modifications.

Not mixed with gasoline. Won't work in gasoline engines.

Two types of cost in it's production to be considered.

First is monetary cost. I think right now it costs more than petroleum deisel. Economies of scale could easily change that.

Second cost is energy. I've heard some say biodeisel costs more energy to produce that it delivers. Not sure about that, and I'm ready to stand corrected if someone has firmer info.

Current Biodeisel users sometimes enjoy the ability to get waste cooking oil from restaurants who are happy to get rid of it for free. I've heard that is rapidly changing as restaurants are recognizing the potential value in their used cooking oil.

That's the extent of my knowledge on it. I'll be reading to see what others know.

All chemically derived fuels cost more energy than they produce. Nothing is 100% energy efficient.

All organics, be they soy beans, hemp, grasses, corn, etc... basically collect solar energy and store it in their material. (In simple carbon chains, I think?)

The question is, does the process to convert those organics into a usable fuel require more energy than the solar energy the organics collected in the first place?

Ie: Assume the plant stores 10 units of extractable solar energy by the time it is harvested. How many units of energy does it take to convert that plant into usable fuel, including energy losses due to waste heat, friction, transport costs, etc...?

to transform oil into bio. It takes energy to make the methanol, caustic, and vegatable oil.

Compare the energy it costs to prepare a fuel with the energy obtained by burning it.

My understanding is that petroleum based fuels are about 1:10 right now. For the expenditure of 1 unit of energy you get enough fuel to provide 10 units of energy. Very profitable. You can power an oil refinery by burning its own product, and have quite a bit leftover to run cars, etc...

So, with Bio fuels. They collect solar energy as they grow, binding it into their chemical structures. This is the energy they provide when burned. The question is, in order to get them into a liquid fuel form, how much of that energy must be expended? (ie: wasted?) In otherwords, if you fueled a bio-fuels refinery by burning its own product, would it be self sustaining? Would any be left to run cars?

Many older cars would have problems with it as they have rubber based hoses and parts. Newer cars are designed to run on European diesel which contains bio-diesel so most newer cars are biodiesel ready.

I thought newer engines were more highly stressed, and designed for more specific fuel types, whereas older deisels had larger fuel quality tolerances?

And I thought rubber hoses were only an issue with alcohol fuels, and not a problem for diesels burning, effectively, corn oil?

Thanks for the info.

For a science fair project, a kid from the midwest was running his Diesel VW Jetta only on fuel that he was making in his garage- out of used fryer oil! So not only was he being clever and eco-conscious- his car exhaust smelled of french fries!!!

Or would that be freedom fries?

Smack me upside the head, if you must!:spank:

Has this been worked on?

Its salad dressing really. I mean, you could eat it if you wanted. This suff is nontoxic, burns clean and is totally renewable. It comes from the SUN!!! (well from plants, but they use the sun)

why aren't we doing it?... well we are doing it. I live in san diego and the is a gas station that sells it. Most bio diesel is a mixed with normal diesel, so the stuff you can buy here is 20% vegi-diesel and 80% dino diesel. In Europe, almost all diesel has/is bo-diesel, but its like 10% vegi based. You can run 100% vegibased bio-diesel but it destroyers rubber hoses and gaskets. Once those are replaces though, you can run 100% bio diesel in most cases. You can even run straight cooking vegetable oil in diesels. If you want to run straight vegetable oil, in a diesel engine you have to have 2 gas tanks because vegetable oil will turn solid in cold weather. You have diesel in one tank to get the engine started and warm the vegetable oil up, then switch to the vegi-oil.

Could it be used on non-diesel engines like most people drive? ...No =(

would it work in a hybrid using the bio-fuel instead of gasoline?...yes bio-diesel hybrids are on the way...but not out yet.

enable people to keep their SUV's without ruining our economy and our planet? .... YES! it burns cleaner, is no-toxic and totally renewable.

As for cost, you can get used cooking oil for free from restaurants (they just throw it away so it ends up in dumps) and make biodiesel for as little as $.50 a gallon. Thats a hell of a lot better then the $3-$5 we are starting to see

As a final point, the first diesel engine was designed to run on PEANUT OIL!!!!! bio-diesel is not a new idea. The first diesels were bio-diesels.

As for cost, you can get used cooking oil for free from restaurants (they just throw it away so it ends up in dumps)

This would only work until more people start using it..

But this stuff grows right out of the ground so long term, it should be cheap too. Using waste oil is a good transitional tool to get enough people using that it becomes an industry. I mean, there are a LOT of McD's, burger kings, KFC's, Diners etc in the world. There are hundreds of thousands of tons of this stuff getting thrown away, and it could be used to run our cars, truck and busses until chevron starts selling it in all of their stations. I mean, you could, in theory, grow it in you own back yard when the waste oil supply dries up. My guess is you wont have much luck finding any dino-oil in you back yard.

the veggie bus, that is!

http://www.veggiebus.com/

First off, it can be run in almost any diesel engine. The only modification that would need to be made is if your engine has neopryne or other such like synthetic fuel lines. If so, then simply install metal fuel lines. Other than that, gas up and go.

Biodiesel is cheaper to make than regular diesel, aprox seventy cents to a dollar per gallon, and that is if you are mixing it yourself. A biodiesel refinery, due to their bulk purchasing power, can make biodiesel for as little as forty cents a gallon.

Biodiesel is ninety percent less polluting than dino-diesel. The major thing for some people is that if you make your biodiesel from waste veggy oil, the exhaust tends to smell like french fries. This can be eliminated if you run your biodiesel through activated charcoal before the final wash and filtering. In addition, the process of making biodiesel leaves no toxic waste, unlike dino-diesel. The only real waste product is glycerin, which is biodegradable, and better you, you can sell your left over glycerin to soap makers.

Biodiesel is much better for your engine. Due to the greater viscosity and less chemical additives, using biodiesel will prolong your engine life significantly. In fact, the original diesel engines were built to run on biodiesel, specifically made out of hempseed oil.

Due to the huge amount of fuel this country burns, we probably can't grow enough crops in order to fulfill all of our fuel needs. However we can significantly reduce our dependency on petroleum through the use of biodiesel, especially if is paired up with a diesel hybrid engine.

Biodiesel would be a boon for our cash strapped family farmers. It would provide another profitable crop to put into rotation. The best sources for vegatable oil, in order, are black oil sunflower seeds, soybeans, and hemp, though you can extract usable oil from virtually any crop

You can run straight biodiesel in your engine with no problems, and cold weather effects it just about the same as cold effects dino diesel. You would have to use an engine block warmer in cold weather. If you are going to store biodiesel, or are only running your diesel engine once every three months or so, it would probably be a good idea to cut it with ten-twenty percent dino-diesel in order that the biodiesel doesn't go bad. I imagine that if biodiesel ever goes big time, chemists will come up with fuel stabilizers that would forego the need for dino-diesel.

This is an excellent book to get you started on making your own biodiesel<http://www.amazon.ca/exec/obidos/ASIN/0970722702/701-8739658-2745164>
This is an excellent site in the real world use of biodiesel and other alternative fuels<http://www.dancingrabbit.org/energy/biodiesel.php>
If you don't want to go through the hassle of finding your own equipment and scrounging for the appropriate containers, you can find a fair number of people like this who are selling complete biodiesel producton kits<http://www.biodieselsolutions.com/home/home.asp>

Biodiesel is not the magic bullet solution to solving our fuel crisis, but combine is with other emerging technologies like hybrids, ethanol, etc, and this country can come up with a comprehensive plan that will kick the US's oil addiction for good.

By the by, if the idea of making your own biodiesel doesn't appeal to you, look around your state and city. More and more companies are offering the biodiesel alternative. Next year a new biodiesel refinery is going to be opening up fifteen miles away from me, and more are opening around the country as time goes on.

into this as a business opportunity. Thanks for the references.

I need a new Pick-UP and I think I want to go Diesel. I saw these guys on some tv show and the set-up is really easy to use but the initial cost is high (for those without the chemistry set) but you can make your own fuel at home.http://www.freedomfuelamerica.com/index.asp

And it's already been proven by the US government to be effective and cheep!

http://www.globalhemp.com/Archives/Government_Research/USDA/hemp_for_victory.html

You want low price fuel back? You want the economy to boom again?

This is it.

You now know without doubt what the neoCon's have in store for you.