Fill ‘Er Up Full of Beans

When the snowplows start running in Minneapolis-St. Paul this winter, there will be something new in their gas tanks: soybeans.

By Dan Orzech Wired.com

The snowplows — hulking, 58,000-pound Ford LT 9000 diesel trucks — will be burning a blend of regular, petroleum-based diesel and diesel fuel made from soybean oil.

Yes, soybean oil. Almost any vegetable oil or animal fat, it turns out, can be transformed into a type of diesel fuel that runs just as well in diesel engines as conventional diesel and is far more environmentally friendly.

The oil doesn’t even have to be new. Biodiesel, as the fuel is called, can be made from recycled vegetable oil, after it’s been used in deep-fat fryers in fast-food restaurants.

Hennepin County, home to much of the Twin Cities urban area, has been testing biodiesel in a small number of snowplows for the past two years, in weather as cold as minus 22 degrees Fahrenheit. Last month, the county announced that all its diesel equipment — not just snowplows, but road-paving equipment, street sweepers and ambulances as well — will begin using a blend of diesel fuel that includes 5 percent biodiesel.

The idea of fueling diesel engines with vegetable oil is not new. When inventor Rudolf Diesel first showed his engine at the 1900 World Exhibition in Paris, it was running on 100 percent peanut oil.

For the next 100 years, however, diesel fuel was made almost exclusively from stuff that was pumped out of the ground, not grown on top of it.

Now, thanks in part to the rising price of petroleum products and to soybean farmers looking for new markets for their crops, biodiesel is poised to hit the big time.

In Europe, where gas prices are much higher than in the United States and the roads are filled with diesel-powered sedans from Volkswagen, Peugeot and Mercedes, biodiesel is already a fact of life. In Germany, 1,500 gas stations sell biodiesel at the pump. In France, all diesel fuel sold contains 5 percent biodiesel.

The United States is not far behind. Minnesota has passed a law requiring that all diesel fuel in the state contain 2 percent biodiesel by 2005. Similar legislation was introduced in Ohio last September. And provisions in the energy bill, currently being hotly debated in the Senate, would give a tax break for biodiesel.

Biodiesel is already in use in more than 350 commercial and government fleets in the United States, according to the National Biodiesel Board. At the St. Louis airport, hundreds of vehicles have been using biodiesel for four years. Aircraft rescue trucks, street sweepers and other diesel equipment at the airport run on B20, a mix of 80 percent petroleum diesel fuel and 20 percent biodiesel.

Switching to the new fuel was easy, said Frank Williams, an airport fleet maintenance technician. "You don’t have to change your engines at all to use biodiesel. We went from petroleum diesel straight to B20, with no modifications."

Why the growing interest in the fuel? It’s cleaner, for one thing. Biodiesel reduces carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons and particulate-matter emissions between 10 percent and 20 percent compared with conventional diesel. It essentially eliminates exhaust emissions of sulfur oxides and sulfates, which are major components of acid rain. "There’s a noticeable reduction in pollutants from biodiesel," Williams said. "You can tell if a truck is using biodiesel or not, just from what’s coming out of the tailpipe."

Biodiesel is not only healthier, but it also, curiously, smells better. According to many who’ve worked with the fuel, biodiesel exhaust smells a bit like french fries or fresh popcorn — a vast improvement over the usual noxious fumes that spew from most diesel engines.

The environmental and health benefits of biodiesel are causing a lot of people to take a look at it. But biodiesel has something else going for it: It’s slipperier than petroleum diesel. With tighter environmental standards for diesel engines just over the horizon, that lubricating property is likely to give the new fuel a boost as well.

In three years, new Environmental Protection Agency regulations will slash the amount of sulfur permitted in diesel fuel. That’s good for the environment, said Doug Tiffany, a research fellow at the University of Minnesota who studies biodiesel. However, the low-sulfur fuel doesn’t lubricate as well, so additives will be needed to keep fuel-injection pumps and other parts working smoothly. "Adding even 1 or 2 percent biodiesel restores the fuel’s lubricating qualities, slowing engine wear and tear," he said.

Biodiesel backers also cite national self-interest as a reason to use the new fuel. The United States burns roughly 30 billion gallons of diesel fuel a year, equivalent to more than a quarter of the country’s annual crude-oil imports. "By using more biodiesel, we are reducing our dependence on foreign oil and contributing to our own economy, while decreasing pollution," said Jenna Higgins, a spokeswoman for the National Biodiesel Board. "It’s a win-win-win situation."

The factor holding back biodiesel so far seems to be price. Several years ago, a gallon of biodiesel cost two or three times as much as a gallon of petroleum diesel. With a growing number of companies now making the fuel, however, its price is rapidly approaching that of regular diesel.

In rural Minnesota, for example, where conventional diesel has been averaging about $1.45 a gallon, many retailers have begun selling a 1 percent or 2 percent blend of biodiesel at the same cost as regular diesel, said Sherry Lowe of the Minnesota Soybean Growers Association.

And at the Marine Corps’ Camp Lejeune, in North Carolina, where approximately 300 vehicles run on biodiesel, government purchasing contracts have brought the price of the fuel down to 90 cents a gallon. That’s only a penny more than what the Marines pay for petroleum diesel, said Harold Taylor, the base fuels officer.

As more companies begin producing the fuel, its price is likely to continue falling. A group of soybean farmers in Minnesota recently announced that they would begin construction soon on a 30 million-gallon biodiesel plant.

Meanwhile, many are happy to pay a premium for biodiesel. The St. Louis airport pays 8 cents a gallon more for biodiesel than for conventional diesel, according to Williams, a price it doesn’t mind paying because of the environmental benefits of using the cleaner fuel. "If the price of biodiesel were to fall to the point where it’s the same as or below petroleum diesel, the market for it will just go crazy," he said.

http://wired.com/news/autotech/0,2554,61077,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_1