Biodiesel Oil - is it really that green?

Biodiesel oil has been in the news a lot on the back of worldwide discussions about global warming.

If you don't know what biodiesel is its diesel fuel made from a variety of renewable sources such as oilseed crops - canola, soybean. It can also be produced from used cooking oil and other fats. Because it can be produced relatively easily for under $1 per gallon, some biodiesel enthusiasts make their own from everyday ingredients including lye, alcohol and vegetable oil and they see it as a way to stave off the costs of rising fuel prices.

Governments around the world have encouraged increased use of biodiesel oil largely because it is a cleaner burning, renewable fuel and affords greater energy independence. Because of this it has been seen as a contributory factor in helping decrease the effects of global warming. If this is true then biodiesel oil is truly green but other factors however have emerged which have caused environmentalists to see red.

Increased use of biodiesel oil means increased production of the sources from which it is made. Traditionally this is corn, soybeans, and palm oil plant all of which require large spaces in which to grow to produce decent yields. These ingredients may be good for producing biodiesel but they also happen to be a major food crop for people and animals. The increase in demand for these raw ingredients has surely contributed to rising food prices and adversely affected the poorest. So, should we grow food or fuel? It could be contested that we would never be able to grow enough crops to provide the vegetable oil (feedstock) for producing the amount of biodiesel that is being advocated around the world right now.

Another factor increasingly in the news is the destruction of our rain forests and animals natural habitat. Increased demand for palm oil in particular has lead to great swathes of rainforest being destroyed... This begs the question "Is-Biodiesel-Made-From-Palm-Oil-Threatening-the-Very-Existence-of-Orangutans"??

In order to determine whether biodiesel oil is green we need to know a lot more about the balance between benefits and costs in environmental terms.

If Governments are becoming more focussed in their search for 'cleaner' fuels without legislating to control how and where this fuel is produced, will biodiesel oil ever be green especially when it may be doing more harm to our environment than good?

Maybe the future rests with greater debate around the green economics and the need to find and develop true green raw ingredients used to make Biodiesel Oil. ....a case of the good, the bad, and the Algae?

Some species of algae are ideally suited to biodiesel production due to their high oil content (some well over 50% oil), and extremely fast growth rates.

Because Algae can be used to for oil production it is of great interest to environmentally concerned researchers who know that our current oil supply is finite. Because algae grows relatively quickly, it might be a terrific source of diesel in the future.

Early research surmised that enough biodiesel to replace all petroleum transportation fuels in the USA could be grown using human and animal waste as fertilizer in 15,000 square miles. To put that into perspective the Sonora desert in the southwest US makes up 120,000 square miles. If the Technology exists today to cultivate enough algae that can produce that amount of fuel, then surely there should be more encouragement from governments to develop this, and other alternative, truly green forms of alternative energy.

Governments around the world have known for a long time that fossil fuel will not last forever but they have done very little to encourage the use of alternatives. The USA has not signed up to Kyoto and if the USA does nothing then precious little will change quickly.

Some Governments in Europe have made some small tax concessions but are not doing a great deal to encourage biodiesel oil use. Maybe this is directly due to the massive amount of tax they charge on petroleum diesel; would they be able to charge the same on more environment friendly fuel?

A much fairer way of applying fuel tax would be to link it directly to CO2 emissions. In this way environmentally friendly fuels would attract a lot less tax and fossil fuels would attract a much higher tax. Also monies raised through road fund licenses together with tax and duty charged on fuel could be used to undertake major research and development on other more environmentally friendly forms of fuel. Sadly this will not happen whilst these huge sums of money are diverted to fund other political agenda's and policies?

Despite governments around the world agreeing in principle that something needs to be done about finding cleaner fuels, large-scale adoption of green fuels is unlikely to happen whilst world economies are so intrinsically linked to fossil fuel oil and governments continue to be at the beck and call of the big oil companies.