Biodiesel – Myths and Facts

Biodiesel releases only the CO2 that was absorbed by the plants as they were growing and making oil

What is Biodiesel?

Few facts you most probably know already, but never the less to mention:

1. A clean burning alternative fuel, produced from domestic, renewable resources such as plant oils, animal fats, used cooking oil and even new sources such as algae.
2. Contains no petroleum, but it can be blended at any level with petroleum diesel to create a biodiesel blend.
3. Biodiesel blends can be used in compression-ignition (diesel) engines with little or no modifications.
4. Simple to use, biodegradable, nontoxic, and essentially free of sulfur and aromatics.
5. Biodiesel is not raw vegetable oil.
6. Fuel-grade biodiesel must be produced to strict industry specifications (ASTM D6751) in order to ensure proper performance.
7. Biodiesel is also not the same as ethanol. Ethanol is a renewable biofuel made primarily from corn and intended for use in gasoline-powered engines, while biodiesel is a renewable biofuel made from a variety of materials and designed for use in diesel engines, with different properties and benefits.

MYTHS

Biodiesel is an experimental fuel and has not been thoroughly tested.

FACT: Biodiesel is one of the most thoroughly tested alternative fuels on the market. A number of independent studies – performed by the U.S. Department of Energy, National Renewable Energy Lab, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Stanadyne Corp. (the largest diesel fuel injection equipment manufacturer in the U.S.), Lovelace Respiratory Research Institute, and Southwest Research Institute – have shown that biodiesel performs comparably to petroleum diesel but with greater benefits to the environment and human health.

Biodiesel does not perform as well as diesel.

FACT: One of the major advantages of biodiesel is the fact that it can be used in most existing diesel engines and fuel injection equipment in blends up to 20 percent with little impact to operating performance. Biodiesel has a higher cetane number than U.S. diesel fuel. In more than 50 million miles of in-field demonstrations, B20 showed similar fuel consumption, horsepower, torque, and haulage rates as conventional diesel fuel.

Biodiesel also has superior lubricity, and it has the highest BTU content of any alternative fuel (falling in the range between #1 and #2 diesel fuel).

Biodiesel in any blend is incompatible with the new 2010+ diesel engine technologies

FACT: The new engine emission control systems in the 2010+ vehicles are all still easily compatible with blends up to at least B5. Rumours about incompatibility stem from concerns about the possibility of increased engine oil dilution that can come into play with the use of higher biodiesel blends (B10 and higher) in the few new light-duty diesel vehicles that utilize an emissions control system with in-cylinder post-injection technology.

Biodiesel contributes to rising food prices.

FACT: Produced from a variety of renewable resources, such as plant oils, fats, recycled grease, and even algae, biodiesel is the most diverse fuel on the planet. And soybean-based biodiesel actually has a positive impact on the world’s food supply. Processing biodiesel from soybeans uses only the oil portion of the soybean, leaving all of the protein available to nourish livestock and humans.

By creating a new market for soybean oil, we increase the availability of protein-rich meal for human and livestock consumption. The increased meal supply results in a more cost-effective food and feed source.

Biodiesel increases greenhouse gases because it causes land to be cleared.

FACT: U.S. biodiesel reduces life-cycle carbon emissions by 60 to 80 percent, depending on the source, making it the best carbon reduction tool of any liquid fuel commercially available. Biodiesel is the first advanced bio-fuel to make it to market. It has the highest energy balance of any fuel, returning 4.5 units of energy for every unit of fossil energy needed to produce it.

Biodiesel doesn’t work in cold weather.

FACT: Properly managed, high quality biodiesel blends are used successfully in the coldest of climates. Biodiesel will gel in very cold temperatures, just as common #2 diesel does. Although pure biodiesel has a higher cloud point than #2 diesel fuel, typical blends of 20 percent biodiesel are managed with similar management techniques as #2 diesel. Blends of 5 percent biodiesel and less have virtually no impact on cold weather operability.

Download: Specification for Biodiesel (B100) – ASTM D6751-09

What happens when the wind doesn’t blow?

One of the questions most often asked about wind power is ‘what happens when the wind doesn’t blow’. In the big picture wind is a vast untapped resource capable of supplying the world’s electricity needs many times over.

In practical terms, in an optimum, clean energy future, wind will be an important part of a mix of renewable energy technologies, playing a more dominant role in some regions than in others. However, it is worthwhile to step back for a minute and consider the enormity of the resource.

Researchers at Stanford University’s Global Climate and Energy Project recently did an evaluation of the global potential of wind power, using five years of data from the US National Climatic Data Center and the Forecasts Systems Laboratory 1). They estimated that the world’s wind resources can generate more than enough power to satisfy total global energy demand.

Using only 20% of this potential resource for power generation, the report concluded that wind energy could satisfy the world’s electricity demand in the year 2000 seven times over.

After collecting measurements from 7,500 surface and 500 balloon-launch monitoring stations to determine global wind speeds at 80 meters above ground level, they found that nearly 13% had an average wind speed above 6.9 meters per second (Class 3), sufficient for economical wind power generation.

Offshore Resources

North America was found to have the greatest wind power potential, although some of the strongest winds were observed in Northern Europe, while the southern tip of South America and the Australian island of Tasmania also recorded significant and sustained strong winds. To be clear, however, there are extraordinarily large untapped wind resources on all continents, and in most countries; and while this study included some island observation points, it did not include offshore resources, which are enormous.

Scale of large wind turbines

For example, looking at the resource potential in the shallow waters on the continental shelf off the densely populated east coast of the US , from Massachusetts to North Carolina, the average potential resource was found to be approximately four times the total energy demand in what is one of the most urbanized, densely populated and highest-electricity consuming regions of the world 2).

The WBGU calculations of the technical potential were based on average values of wind speeds from meteorological data collected over a 14 year period (1979–1992). They also assumed that advanced multi-megawatt wind energy converters would be used. Limitations to the potential came through excluding all urban areas and natural features such as forests, wetlands, nature reserves, glaciers and sand dunes. Agriculture, on the other hand, was not regarded as competition for wind energy in terms of land use.

Looking in more detail at the solar and wind resource in 13 developing countries, the SWERA (Solar and Wind Energy Resource Assessment) project, supported by the United Nations Environment Programme, has found the potential, for instance, for 7,000 MW of wind capacity in Guatemala and 26,000 MW in Sri Lanka. Neither country has yet started to seriously exploit this large resource.

After this initial pilot programme, SWERA has expanded since 2006 into a larger programme with the aim of providing high quality information on renewable energy resources for countries and regions around the world, along with the tools needed to apply this data in ways that facilitate renewable energy policies and investments. The private sector is also getting into the resource-mapping business, with Seattle based 3Tier launching its ‘mapping the world’ programme in 2008, with the goal of making accessible resource assessments available for the entire world by 2010.

In summary, wind power is a practically unlimited, clean and emissions free power source, of which only a tiny fraction is currently being exploited.