Bio Fuels

[JD]

Maybe someone can explain the benefits of Bio-fuel. I’ve always been a bit skeptical about using it, mainly because of the wear and tear on the engine issues bandied around in the international press.

The other aspect of it that I’ve been worried about, is the growing food for fuel aspect. Not a clever idea when half the world are struggling to find enough to feed themselves.

On BBC world a few days ago, I heard a comment that put this in perspective. The commentator stated, ‘to fill an average 65 litre tank with bio-diesel requires enough food to feed one person for 365 days’.

Surely that makes the whole process of bio-fuels preposterous to even consider.

I fill up, on average, once a week. If that’s 365 meals worth, that works out at 52 meals a day. I can’t consciously consider using bio-fuels when it’s use is put in such terms.

Today I filled up with standard diesel. I think food should be grown to eat. When you use land, and the food that is grown on it for fuel for motor vehicles, it can only affect those peoples in the world at the lower end of the income chain. Food prices are bound to rise, available food will be in short supply, but the rich countries with the most abundance and choice of food, are using bio-fuels to help alleviate their own fuel deficiencies.

Maybe I’ve got it all wrong, perhaps someone who understands it better can explain, but to me it’s like taking the food out of the third world babies mouth. Not just in real terms of bio-fuels coming from food, but also in the cost of that food having to compete with how much the bio-fuels companies are prepared to pay for the harvested product.

It just seems utter madness.

[VincentD]

JD, totally agree.

Food should be grown to eat. This 'green' movement strikes me as being the 'politically correct' thing to be doing these days, unfortunately. I saw an article just the other day voicing similar concerns that too much land is being utilised to grow fuel, not food.

I have been annoyed over Toxin's efforts to bulldoze the nation into accepting ethanol-based fuels from day one. They don't have the infrastructure, the ethanol is imported, it's subsidised off higher prices for benzene - it's gone from just being annoying to way over the top. Phasing out 95 octane benzene was the last straw, as most of the european vehicles are optimised to run on this. It's still difficult to get, but available.

Rant to be continued later ...

[HHTel]

Phasing out 95 octane benzene was the last straw, as most of the european vehicles are optimised to run on this.

Surely, 95 octane is equivalent to what's known as 4 star in the UK. European cars have not used this for some time. The only need for this is for old classic cars. Or maybe I'm wrong.

[chelsea]

HHTel, in Australia we have 91 octane which is normal unleaded, 95 octane and 98 octane.
I run a leaded car and use 95 octane plus a fuel adative to make up for the lead in the petrol. If I do not use the adative the engine pings like hell.
I would say most people here use normal unleaded and then your mid/top range of vehicles use the 95 & 98 octane.

[deepee]

JD,
My local aircon service man uses recycled cooking oil and fat as a substitute for regular diesel fuel in his Toyota van.

He collects it from a well known fast food chain and processes it at home in some gear he made from metal scrap.

So many other people are now chasing this used oil for this use that there are dealers involved in it's collection.

The van seems to run as well as it would on regular diesel and it really does smell like hamburgers cooking when it passes by.

By the way he claims the diesel motor was originally developed to run on plant based oils and that the use of mineral oils came about due to their cheaper production costs at that time.
How the wheel may now be turning eh?

[Randy Cornhole]

My local aircon service man uses recycled cooking oil and fat as a substitute for regular diesel fuel in his Toyota van.

Thats fine until his van gets high colesterol and has a 'part attack'...

[Condoking]

Standard unleaded for the majority in the west is 95 octane whilst Premium unleaded, for the boy racers is usually 98 octane. 4 star used to be the 98 octane Leaded. Some countries also have 91 or 92 which is normally OK in warm weather for smaller engines.

For the Bio fuels argument it all seemed like a good idea to satisfy the greenies but there are arguments both for and against whether the bio-fuels use more or less energy to produce than they actually provide. There will be no conclusive answer all the time the Biofuels producers are subsiding the studies, but my guess is that the benefits are marginal, if any.

I remember a few years ago there was a problem in Wales whereby the supermarket stalls ran out of cooking oil as the locals had worked out that it was cheaper per litre than Diesel through the pumps, quite an achievement for the Welsh.

Maybe it was just unfortunate coincidence but Biofuels started about 10 years ago in a small way at the same time as the Chinese, Indian, Brazilian etc. economies started to take off. As the lower middle classes of these countries became a bit richer they wanted more meat on the table, on average a person consumes about 180 kilos of grain if eaten directly but this rises to about 730 kilos if it is consumed as meat. Simply put the demand for Grain and cereals has shot up far faster than world production.

To cap it all, not so long ago Europe had food mountains and paid farmers to set aside land, not to grow crops on it, now they are subsidising bio-fuels with tax reductions and Europe and the States have food subsidies but the world is short of Food.

Be thankful though, the United Nations and Governments around the world are uniting to solve the food shortages and high oil prices. God bless the politicians and God help the rest of us.

[The understudy]

Over here in southern California we have 87, 92, and 95 octane Fuel but as Oil Prices here rise like crazy people tend to think Bio fuells are an easy way out. After I saw the the Jawdropping equation that JD presented to us I thought "Them Americans think only in short and egoistic terms don't they. The average Joe Public would support Biofuels as they think only of their anger of the high Gas/Petrol prices which are now @ an average of $4.57 per Gallon here in Southern California.
We all must get away from Fosssil fuel but betting only on Biofuels cannot be in our interests.

Your's The understudy!!!!

[Guess]

Over here in southern California......Gas/Petrol prices which are now @ an average of $4.57 per Gallon....

Your's The understudy!!!!

And is just half of the cost in most European costs. One problem I can see that may now happen is that demand may outstrip supply with the existing ex-french and KFC oil.

There are other source of recycled bio fuels but not enough to supply world demand yet. I can see that the way forward will be to increase the growth of oil seed crops again and re-use the land lefte fallow due to EU regulations. Secondly I have seen much discussion regarding blends of fuels. This requires less of a modification to the engine and is suitable for deisels although performance takes a hit. Most owners of diesels do not worry about performance.

The smell that JD mentions can be cured with additives and clean exhaust systems are becoming affordable.

I only see all of this as an interim solution to solve an immediate problem. Other forms of power and transport should be taken much more seriously by governments.

PS
Good new for Beer Chang drinkers. Methane gas is considered a viable bio fuel.