The answer is simple. I just went Biodiesel.
The car you see in the photo is 22 years old. A 1985 Mercedes Benz 300SD. It has 160,000 miles on it and I expect to get easily another 150,000. At the rate I drive, less than 10K a year, I expect the car to be good for another fifteen years at least.
The best thing is this: nobody died for the fuel in the tank.
Crossposted at Dailykos.com
There’s a lot of confusion about Biodiesel. That’s because the terms are thrown around pretty carelessly by those selling the cars and doing conversions.
This car is NOT converted. It’s the standard Diesel engine that came with the car originally. You do NOT have to convert your car to run on biodiesel. Not one bit.
That’s the beauty of it. Any diesel engine can run on 100% biodiesel without modifying it in any way.
That is because biodiesel actually IS diesel fuel. The fuel has been converted instead of the engine.
Where the confusion comes in is when people want to actually run their diesels on pure vegetable oil. In that case, due to the high viscocity of the vegetable oil, the engine needs to be modified so that the oil is heated, and therefore thinned, to the point where the engine can safely use it. That’s a wonderful idea, because then the enterprising soul can retrieve used vegetable oil from restaurants and after some careful filtering can burn it as fuel in their car. Or you can just buy some big jugs of Mazola at Costco and burn that.
But for now I’m using biodiesel, which is 100% vegetable oil (and sometimes fish oil) which has been treated with wood grain alcohol (the kind that will blind you if you drink it — methanol) which chemically converts it into a diesel fuel that any diesel engine can use.
Like mine.
Furthermore, I’m helping the climate:
A 1998 biodiesel lifecycle study, jointly sponsored by the US Department of Energy and the US Department of Agriculture, concluded biodiesel reduces net CO2 emissions by 78 percent compared to petroleum diesel. This is due to biodiesel’s closed carbon cycle. The CO2 released into the atmosphere when biodiesel is burned is recycled by growing plants, which are later processed into fuel.
This excellent page from a Seattle-based Biodiesel supplier goes into even further detail about the environmental benefits to biodiesel over Petro-diesel:
Using Biodiesel in place of gasoline or petro-diesel significantly reduces your vehicle emissions. In comparing B100 Biodiesel to petro-diesel, the following figures have been provided by the EPA*:
Unburned hydrocarbons are reduced by 67%
Carbon monoxide is reduced by 48%
Particulate matter is reduced by 47%
Sulfates are reduced by 100%
Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) are reduced by 80%
Nitrated PAHs are reduced by 90%
I have every intention of doing an engine conversion to my new car because I like the idea of being able to run the car on not only biodiesel but also vegetable oil. But that’s a few months and several hundred dollars away.
In the meantime I’m running it on pure biodiesel, and the main reason I’m writing this diary is this:
I cannot tell you how good it felt to drive away from filling it up the first time with the biodiesel knowing that nobody died for my fuel. Knowing that no Big Oil Company profited from this tank of fuel, and knowing that I never had to use their blood-soaked fuel ever again.
And since I’ve crossed that rubicon (which I have to admit I was a little nervous to do — I mean, I’ve never poured anything but gasoline or petro-diesel into a car’s tank before — WHAT WOULD IT DO? WOULD IT REALLY WORK?) I am just shocked at every car I see, all the millions of them that crowd Los Angeles, that are NOT running on this stuff.
You have a choice now. You don’t have to drive a car that runs on gasoline. You can do what I did. And if you don’t want to drive a 22 year old car, there are plenty of new Diesels that you can buy and run on pure biodiesel.
You can tell Exxon to go fuck themselves.
It feels great.
Just for fun I want to show you these little babies which will be available in the United States in 2008 (finally).
They actually make a .7 liter Diesel which is currently available in Canada (not here) which gets something like 81 mpg.
They’re about to make hybrids and EV’s as well.
You can click here to find a biodiesel retail pump near you. (and more are on their way, believe me)
And yes they’re trying to ban biodiesel in Bush’s state of Texas. This is total bullshit and is being fought. But you can bet the Oil Companies are gonna fight this tooth and nail. Because they know that this is one way out of their power over us — you can make your own damn biodiesel and cut them out of the picture completely!
American car companies are also deliberately keeping many models off the American market. Imagine that …
I’m not a car guy. At all.
But I love this car.
And I’m infatuated with Biodiesel.
It’s really solar power — letting plants use their magic to store the sun’s energy to power a car — it’s exactly what our bodies do.
Thus the “bio” part becomes even more meaningful.
I’ve never loved a car before. I hope it doesn’t break my heart. 🙂
My partner and I looked into making our own biodiesel. I have a great deal of technical skills, but the caustic chemicals, heating, etc. needed for home production put me off.
If we ever have a retail pump, we’ll look into it again.
p.s. Good on ya.
You can click here:
http://www.biodiesel.org/buyingbiodiesel/retailfuelingsites/default.shtm
And see if there’s one near you.
This page is down while we perform maintenance on our system.🙂
Does that page cover Australia, which is where Keres is based out of?
How hard is it to find biodiesel to fill up with? I haven’t seen anywhere near me that offers it (but then again, I haven’t been looking because I have a gas-powered car.)
http://www.biodiesel.org/buyingbiodiesel/retailfuelingsites/default.shtm
And see if there’s one near you. It is dismaying to me that many people who want to go biodiesel are limited by availability! Makes me want to open a few businesses ….. hmmm……
Very interesting post. Good luck with your car.
Unfortunately, when choosing an older vehicle for this purpose, one is largely limited to those built by Mercedes. While the cars have many admirable attribrutes including extended longevity, the cost of parts/repairs can be high. It’s just something to consider.
I actually learned to drive in a 1974 240D with a manual transmission, way way back in the late 70’s. 🙂
It was my father’s, so I saw how the cars were phenomenally well designed and engineered. But yes, the tradeoff is that when something DOES go wrong, because they’re so well engineered, those well-engineered parts can be pricey.
However, the cars are built for endurance and with pride, so they don’t break down very often.
I find the tradeoff to be well worth it.
The thing, if you’re buying an old one like this, is to find one that’s in good shape. THAT can take a while. I looked at a lot of them, and this car was in by far the best shape of any of those at which I looked. Some of them had been downright abused, which I don’t understand.
of course. just like big Pharma fights the legalization of marijuana. the beauty of cannabis of course is that it grows just about everywhere, good soil or bad, long or short growing season, unlike tobacco which can only be grown in warm regions.
big Pharma can’t control how/where this plant is grown– so it’s much more convenient to simply ban it.
BTW, I see some darn good oil can be made from hemp. I assume it can be refined using methanol the same as vegetable oil and used to fuel your benz?
the parallels are similar and I had thought of them.
Just like you can grow your own, uh, medicine, you can grow your own biodiesel. Corporate America frowns on both, because they can’t control it.
Yup.
Hemp oil I’m sure would make fantastic biodiesel. They probably do it up in Canada but I don’t think you can grow hemp in the U.S. (correct me if I’m wrong).
Seems to me I read recently that there’s a bill afoot in Congress that will allow farmers to grow industrial hemp for things like paper, rope and fuel. “Industrial” in this sense some variety that’s low on THC but otherwise usable for anything you’d want to use hemp for. I can’t look it up right now — gotta get back to work.
It’s the Industrial Hemp Farming Act of 2007 (HR 1009). One interesting thing I notice about it is, it was introduced by a Republican (Ron Paul, R-TX) but all of the co-sponsors are Democrats, including my own representative, Jim McDermott.
I don’t see a downside to this bill. I hope it passes, but have no idea what its prospects are.
is about as “maverick” a Repub as you can find. He’s constantly bashing Bushco and the neo-cons. I think he claims to be a libertarian but for some reason is registered Repub.
I hope that bill goes somewhere and passes. The hemp ban is just plain silly, but I’m sure it’s because some big corporations way back when got it passed because hemp was too much competition for them.
“Plastics!”
Something like 24 years ago, I got rid of my last car. Since then it’s been public transportation and the kindness of friends all the way.
Yes, I realize that there are perceived problems with this approach, especially in modern American cities that are not only pedestrian-hostile, but you could make a pretty good case that they are built specifically to require you to have a car. And like I tell anyone who presses me on the matter, it’s like any other lifestyle choice — like being, say, a smoker, or an orthodox Jew, or other similar decisions. You make the choice, and you structure your life in such a way as to make the choice work. In my case this means I’ve had to live in the city, close to bus lines. I can’t just pack the car, pick up and take the family on a weekend excursion like my parents used to do. I get frustrated at job postings I think I’m otherwise qualified for because they specifically list a driver’s license. And yeah, once in a while the bus doesn’t come or I’m stuck waiting for it to show up in a snowstorm.
But the benefits far outweigh the disadvantages so far. No car payments. No gas payments. No insurance payments. No repairs. No worry about my personal safety or those around me because I’m a rotten driver. A cleaner environmental conscience. Better health because I do more walking. No contribution to the bottom line of Exxon, Chevron, BP, Arco, Ford, GM, Chrysler or Toyota. And your diary gives me one more — nobody has to die so I can get around.
But I have to say, if you’re going to have a car, your approach is a good one.
I’m with you all the way. I walked away (literally) from my car in 1998 and haven’t looked back since. I’ve lived in three different (American) cities since then, none of them the uber-pedestrian friendly ones like NYC or Seattle, and done just fine.
As a side note, I tend to meet a lot of interesting people when either walking down the street or on the bus. It’s an unexpected bonus!
Pax
The first “big” city we went carless in was Austin, Texas. I’m just happy if we had to live in Texas, it was in Austin. Anywhere else, we might never have been able to leave our apartment.
At the time there were two fairly decent bus systems in Austin (still are, from what I understand) — one serving the public at large, and one for UT students. Don’t tell anyone, but I would occasionally hitch a ride on the UT bus that came within a couple blocks of where we lived, when I had someplace I wanted to go and could use the student bus for free and looked enough like a student to be able to get away with it. 🙂
Excellent diary Nordic. I might add that Willie Nelson and his wife are really big biodiesel supporters especially because it allows farmers (who already own a lot of diesel equipment including tractors) to provide their own fuel.
One of the canards of the gasoline tax/price issue is that rural residents are dependent on gasoline to get around more than urban dwellers. The saving grace of biodiesel is precisely that it can be created in those same rural environments locally rather than being shipped in on the backs of (petro)diesel trucks.
Pax
Great diary – congratulations.
One minor warning – I’ve been at a scientific meeting this week, and an engineer from the University of GA who works promoting biodiesel and researching new feedstocks for use making biodiesel said during a talk that if you’re driving a pre-1994 car on biodiesel, you need to check whether your hoses are made of rubber or not. For most cars that are pre-1994, he said that “biodiesel will cause the hoses to dissolve.” (fuel line hoses, I guess?) I haven’t had a chance to look into this yet (not my area of expertise), and I don’t know if it applies only to American cars, but I wanted to pass it along FYI.
Has anyone heard about this?
yep:
Draft Al Gore: 2008
and thanks for mentioning it.
My mechanic says not to worry. He says the rubber degrades so slowly it doesn’t really matter, and the parts that are rubber are quite small and short and are replaced anyway during regular maintenance. He says it’s something to keep an eye on, but not to worry about. I hope he’s right! But he says he’s worked on a lot of biodiesel-running cars and a lot that are converted as well.
If it’s a problem they can easily be replaced.