National Biodiesel Day

[science_spot]

Biodiesel is a (newer) fuel made from vegetable sources.  It was invented by Rudolph Diesel in 1894 for use in his new invention - the diesel engine.  He designed the diesel engine to run on peanut oil, but petroleum based fuel became the standard.  Even so, he made millions off the rights to his diesel engine because the efficiency was about 75%; this was an enormous increase over the standard steam engine in use at that time.  The image below by stickerguy.com

 

 

Biodiesel is made from various plant and animal products (usually soybeans), and can be used alone or in a blend with petrochemical derived diesel fuel.  Waste animal fat, algae and waste cooking oils are also popular sources of lipids used to make the biodiesel.  The chemical structure is a mix of fatty acid esters.  Pure biodiesel is labeled as B100, and mixes are labeled according to their % biodiesel (B30 means 30% biodiesel and 70% petrodiesel).  

Hopefully in the future, vegetable based fuels will be the new standard, thus reducing our dependence on foreign oil, potentially increasing jobs in the USA.  The Energy Policy Act of 2005 increased the use of biodiesel in the USA, and its use continues to increase.  Biodiesel is cleaner-burning and uses renewable resources.  Since it does not contain any petrochemicals, it is not contaminated with aromatic or sulfur compounds that contribute to air pollution.  Also, plant-derived biodiesel recycles carbon dioxide (plants use CO2 -> biodeisel derived from plants -> CO2 generated by automobile emmissions -> grow more plants to make more biodiesel, etc).

Biodiesel (also known as methyl esters) are made by reacting fatty acids with alcohol.  The only byproduct is vergetable glycerin, which is a valuable material used in detergents and many other consumer products.  Want to make your own biodiesel?  You can join many others who already do and get instructions on how to do it!  I haven't look into this, so doing so is at your own risk.

Read more about biodiesel on the FAQ page of the National Biodiesel Board.  It is interesting that the most common electrical refrigeration system was also invented by Rudolph Diesel.  This Thursday, March 18th is a great day to learn about biodiesel as one of our greener fuel options.  I hope you enjoyed this post!

 

Tonya

The Science Spot

 

[emily7707]

Mar. 18, 2010 at 11:42 AM

Gah, my comment got away from me! Try again:

My husband runs his car off waste veg biodiesel, and my brother makes his own. Good stuff.

Hopefully in the future, vegetable based fuels will be the new standard,

Better yet, algae biodiesel!

[science_spot]

Mar. 18, 2010 at 1:15 PM

Emily - that is awesome!!!

Yes, algae would be the best... I think in this context 'vegetable' meant 'all plants'.

 

(Original Poster)

[arthistmom]

Mar. 20, 2010 at 11:24 PM

My colleague at the art school fuels his car with biodiesel (previously used cooking oil). There are now a couple of shops where we live who specialize transforming a conventional gasoline-consuming car into one that uses biodiesel.