Biodiesel Paves The Way To Environmentally Sound Trucking

Enjoying that fresh Washington State apple down in Jackson, Mississippi? Well, you have diesel fuel to thank for that. Diesel is the fuel that powers nearly all freight transport in the United States and is the choice of fuel for many passenger vehicles worldwide. Rail, shipping and trucking are the heaviest users of diesel fuel to help transport goods around the country and the world and thus contribute significantly to the carbon footprint. However, a new technology promises to reduce the greenhouse emissions from these emissions, and that's called biodiesel.

What Is Biodiesel?

Biodiesel is created when a renewable fuel is mixed with regular diesel. Renewable fuels typically include corn oil, filtered grease, soybean oil, algae or processed biomass. It's called biodiesel because some biological material is blended with the diesel to reduce the proportion of diesel in the fuel.

What Are The Benefits?

Biodiesel's benefits are numerous, including lower emissions and potentially lower costs. Biodiesel is typically blended at the scene, in other words, a car or truck will have equipment that will filter the bio material and mix it with the fuel before sending it to the engine. This means the bio material, such as grease, is stored separately and can be used at any time to improve fuel efficiency. The on board processing of the fuel is also very useful because many restaurants give away used grease for free meaning free fuel.

The other benefit of biodiesel is that it lowers the carbon footprint and greenhouse emissions of transportation because the material burns cleaner. Vegetable based oils burn cleaner than diesel. There's also the consideration of the refining process for diesel which causes a lot of pollution. Finally, biodiesel has less impact on the environment than regular diesel because in case of the spill, a good portion of the fuel is organic matter appearing naturally in the environment.

What Are The Downsides?

Pre-blended biodiesel typically has problems with performance at low temperatures. Whereas regular diesel will stay in a liquid at freezing temperatures, biodiesel's organic matter will tend to turn into gel clogging fuel lines. It's important to also carefully monitor the blend of diesel in extreme operating environments.

Conclusion:

The use of biodiesel for mainstream applications will increase in future years. Problems with cold temperature performance can easily be addressed with special additives to lower the freezing point of the fuel. Being environmentally friendly never was so easy.