Moving from petroleum Diesel to biodiesel.
Although converting your Diesel car or truck to biodiesel requires no special equipment, there are a few things to watch out for. In particular, biodiesel is an excellent solvent and it cleans out the sludge in your engine and fuel tank very effectively.
This can clog your fuel filter. As part of their all-encompassing customer service, BioFuel Oasis offers classes in how to change your own fuel filter, and recommends that you do so a few months after switching over to maintain good performance. BioFuel Oasis’s owners believe it is empowering to take responsibility for maintaining your biodiesel-burning vehicle.
BioFuel Oasis doesn’t produce the fuel it sells, although some owners enjoy homebrewing their own. They sell high quality commercial biodiesel that meets the standards of the ASTM, the international standards organization. Every effort is made to get vegetable oil from local restaurants, which is then refined by trusted companies and delivered to BioFuel Oasis’s storage tanks.
Biodiesel can run in any diesel vehicle, although, because of new combustion methods, late model 2007 – 2010 models may not be compatible with it. If you want to use biodiesel in your late model vehicle, check with your dealer and the manufacturer, or ask someone at the BioFuel Oasis.
Advantages of biodiesel.
Biodiesel offers numerous advantages:
- It’s nontoxic and biodegradable
- It’s nonflammable. You can store a five-gallon container in your garage or car safely.
- It produces lower emissions. Greenhouse gases, particulates and carcinogens are greatly reduced.
- It’s sustainable. A 2001 study found that biodiesel yields 3.2 units of fuel product energy for every 1 unit of fossil energy consumed in its lifecycle. It takes 1.2 units of fossil energy to produce just 1 unit of diesel fuel.
“My purpose in starting the Oasis was not to sell the most biodiesel possible and get rich,” says Radtke in Not a Gas Station. “It was to give people a real possibility of using a cleaner, renewable fuel. It was about the bigger picture—what’s going to make our whole community the most successful and sustainable for many generations to come.”
Editor’s Note: Here is some supplementary information about Biofuel Oasis for those in the area or anyone who wants to visit:
BioFuel Oasis
1441 Ashby Avenue (corner of Sacramento)
Berkeley, California 94702
Phone: 510-665-5509
Contact: biodevas@biofueloasis.com
Regular Station Hours:
Monday thru Saturday: 11 a.m. – 7 p.m. (staffed)
Closed Sunday
Additional Hours with Fueling Freedom Card (unstaffed):
Monday thru Saturday: 7 a.m. – 11 a.m.
Sundays: 7 a.m. – 8 p.m.
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Sounds like a good place to bypass – the hippy stop.
The advantages listed you really believe?
Sounds like a good place to bypass – the hippy stop.
The advantages listed you really believe?
Hey, I think it’s great. They recognized a service that wasn’t being fulfilled and built a business around it. Win/win.
Whether or not recycling used cooking oil is the best approach to solving our dependency on petrol doesn’t refute the fact that someone out there is at least typing something, and it’s solution which seems to have no negative and only positive results.
Anything can happen I suppose – maybe one day the fast food industry will go belly-up and take a big chuck out of this biofueler’s resource pool, or maybe science will find the holy grail of renewable energy. In the meantime, this isn’t a bad work-around, I think.
Hey, I think it’s great. They recognized a service that wasn’t being fulfilled and built a business around it. Win/win.
Whether or not recycling used cooking oil is the best approach to solving our dependency on petrol doesn’t refute the fact that someone out there is at least typing something, and it’s solution which seems to have no negative and only positive results.
Anything can happen I suppose – maybe one day the fast food industry will go belly-up and take a big chuck out of this biofueler’s resource pool, or maybe science will find the holy grail of renewable energy. In the meantime, this isn’t a bad work-around, I think.
Whether or not recycling used cooking oil is the best approach to solving our dependency on petrol doesn’t refute the fact that someone out there is at least typing something…
Oops! I mean, trying something. I’m the one typing something (poorly). (-:
Whether or not recycling used cooking oil is the best approach to solving our dependency on petrol doesn’t refute the fact that someone out there is at least typing something…
Oops! I mean, trying something. I’m the one typing something (poorly). (-:
This sounds fantastic. I hope these entrepreneurs continue on this trend, and would like to congratulate them on their success.
This sounds fantastic. I hope these entrepreneurs continue on this trend, and would like to congratulate them on their success.
@russ- Yeah, I hate it when people try to break the mold and test-run a new way of doing business.
All the advantages listed there are backed by scientific research. It’s all been posted about before: http://gas2.org/2008/04/10/biodiesel-mythbuster-20-twenty-two-biodiesel-myths-dispelled/
@russ- Yeah, I hate it when people try to break the mold and test-run a new way of doing business.
All the advantages listed there are backed by scientific research. It’s all been posted about before: http://gas2.org/2008/04/10/biodiesel-mythbuster-20-twenty-two-biodiesel-myths-dispelled/