How Can We Go Green, When Blocks Are Around Every Corner?
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Looking around at the ZDNet website, it is amazing what is found. All of the articles are not strictly IT related. Varied article subjects can regularly be found, and many are fascinating reading. Some are simply infuriating - not because of the authors, but because of the news delivered.
As looked at the stories this morning, one from later yesterday caught my eye, concerning being ‘green’. I am greener than most, but not rabid about it. I believe that if we get more people doing simple things- ones that take little or no thought once a pattern is established- then some real benefits to ourselves and the planet can be had.
So it is very disheartening when I read about how people are being castigated, and sometimes punished for doing what has been lauded as ‘desirable and correct’ behavior. I am speaking of the few (let’s face it, not many people drive diesel automobiles, and few are willing to sell their current car to buy one) people who are using vegetable oil from various sources to make biodiesel.
from the Green Tech Pastures
Know somebody in America running a vehicle on vegetable oil? New or used, it doesn’t matter, that fuel is not government approved. Apparently the EPA could crack down on canola-burners and slap on some pretty hefty fines.
It’s not just the Feds who are against using veggie oil in a vehicle. One man in Illinois fell afoul of the revenuers in his own state. And then the state legislature tried to come to his rescue. The case of the 79 year-old veggie oil scofflaw from Decatur remains unresolved at this time.
If you decide to go veggie diesel despite the regulators, here’s a site, Greasecar, that will sell you a conversion, kit.. In their FAQ, no mention of the legal issues involved in going fryer-waste for your fuel. So I gave ‘em a call. The guy I spoke with at Greasecar–they actually answered their phone–said they are in open communication with the EPA. Greasecar advises its customers to check with the proper state agency that taxes fuel.
Some Greasecar drivers actually voluntarily pay fuel taxes to state and fed agencies even though there is no formal mechanism to tax such vegetable oils, much of which are recycled directly from restaurants and food processors. The Greasecar Guy says that the vegetable oil system is technically illegal because the fuel is untaxed but he surmises the EPA is not too fussed because there are so few veggie oil vehicles in America. Wikipedia states point blank: it’s illegal. Like marijuana laws, there are some states more liberal on used cafe fry-up than others: Pennsylvania and Arkansas don’t care if you light up, they’re tax-exempting you, as long as it’s vegetable oil you’re burning.
Here’s Greasecar’s claim about emissions from burning used, filtered veggie oils: “There is no sulfur content in vegetable oil which eliminates the first major carcinogen associated with diesel fuel. Vegetable oil plants absorb more carbon dioxide from the air during their growing cycle than is released when the oil is burned, this means that vegetable oil does not produce excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere (this is referred to as carbon neutral). Due to a slightly cooler burn some studies have shown NOX reductions when burning vegetable oil. More studies are underway and results will vary depending on engine and tuning. As a sulfur free, bio-mass fuel vegetable oil emissions are less harmful to the environment and less toxic to people and animals.”
Wouldn’t it be an improvement if our suburban aired smelled more like French fries, less like gasoline fumes?
This is the sort of egregiously dim-witted behavior that causes at least half of the problems that normal, sane people face in this country. If tax incentives are there for producers of ethanol, which is currently questionable in efficacy to alleviate any long term problem, why should anyone inventive and energetic enough to process their own fuel be stopped, prosecuted, or simply persecuted, for this behavior that will, in a small way, help save the planet?
The state and national legislatures are busy enacting laws at a breakneck pace, to show the constituent base that work is being done. Frequently the ‘work’ being done should be left undone, and serious thought to removal of many laws should be given [especially since the founding tenet of the Republican party was as little law as possible to encroach upon personal freedom - let’s start seeing some of these ‘drugstore Republicans’ start walking the walk or else STFU and go away ].
Perhaps some enterprising Congressperson will see this, and can start to put right the wrong that is being done here, so that less pollution will enter the atmosphere, and we can all breathe a little easier.
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Tags: biodiesel, green movement, federal taxes, fuel production, carbon emissions, waste products, energy efficiency
7 Comments
Jim in Virginia
May 21st, 2008
at 2:17am
Frankly, I don’t care a bit about Greasecars. But for you to just take the claims of the promoters of Greasecars as fact is somewhat disconcerting. Do we just take Philip Morris’ view as gospel on the safety of cigarettes?
And by the way, I don’t know how old you are or if you know one lick about history, but misguided policies governing energy policy in this country were enacted in the early to mid 70’s, by a heavily Democratic Congress looking for ways to fund the 10 year old war on poverty which has failed miserably (though tripling the size of government in a scant twenty years (thank you LBJ).
Now that the government heartily enjoys the crack cocaine of gasoline taxes, do you think Congress is going to eliminate them, or allow others to somehow avoid them? Grow up - look at alcohol and cigarettes - it ain’t happening - I don’t care what party you belong to.
Jim in Virginia
May 21st, 2008
at 2:27am
One more thing - please don’t tell me that you or anyone else is going to determine whether my behavior is “desireable and correct”. The last thing we need is an army of ‘Green Police’.
the oracle
May 21st, 2008
at 4:19am
Frank, you seem disgruntled. I am not sure why. Who among us is not for freedom?
As for the words from the man at Greasecars, he is absolutely correct.
I was, at one time, going to be a chemist, so I have taken more than Introductory Chemistry. Sulfur is not present in vegetable oil, so no sulfur oxides come out the tail pipe - that means no sulfurous and sulfuric acids when water combines with the vapors, so no attacking of our lungs, our buildings, and other living beings. The oxides of nitrogen are lower due to lower temperatures of combustion. This is why the compression ratio of gasoline cars in the seventies was reduced. Lower temperatures means less pollution.
These are good things. They have no effect on you, so why would you want to have these enterprising people castigated?
Oh, and yes, what we do need is an army of Green Warriors - though not truculent, as you might think. If you don’t care about the environment for yourself, what about your progeny?
Jack in California
May 21st, 2008
at 9:06am
Oracle good point, please stay with it.
And by the way” Jim’s off topic comments are typical of misleading Republican/conservative propaganda. Using a “concern” for energy to expound his unsupported anti Democratic claims is the same old diversionary smoke and mirrors. Don’t think of the Republican caused absolute disaster of the last 7 years instead go back 30 years. But don’t remember that the Presidents that signed legislation into law in “the early to mid 70’s” were the Republicans, Nixon and Ford. Don’t think that ” tax incentives are there for producers of ethanol, which is currently questionable in efficacy to alleviate any long term problem” was just another Republican reward to big business/big moneyed interests at cost to the pockets of the rest of us and the detriment of the environment.
crude lover
May 21st, 2008
at 10:57am
The U.S. is awash with oil under the ground, offshore, and in Alaska. We could build more refineries and nuclear plants because this country has the best people in the world, if they are allowed to perform at their full potential. Problem is we are not allowed to build or access it by the environmentalist-wackos or the liberal vote-panderers trying to ruin the progress of this country by their socialist dogma.
Drill for the oil wherever it is found with no restriction, build refineries and power-plants and you will see this country rise to prominance in the world. Global-Warming is a farce, Don’t accept it as truth - Don’t drink the Kool-aid.
the oracle
May 21st, 2008
at 1:58pm
crude lover, aside from your blindly repeating the attitudes and views of the lunatic fringe, what do you really think? Are you capable of independent thought?
No matter how much oil you think there is, it IS running out. It is a fact - a conclusion of the logical mind.
Nuclear power - I am with you on this one completely. While we need good controls so there are no more ‘accidents’ such as in Pennsylvania, we should be building breeder reactors to reprocess the tons of spent fuel stored underground. We could do well with a few more nuclear plants, but solar is green and completely safe, so great expansion is needed there.
It is not socialist, wacko, or dogma to care about where one lives. If you have not personally experienced the effects of global warming, you must certainly not be paying attention.
You seem to be the one accepting blindly what the Conservative/ Republican/ Old thinking is on this, and you should investigate for yourself - your eyes would not believe what is happening.
the oracle
May 21st, 2008
at 2:01pm
Jack, thaniks for the comment.
I find it strange that the people who are complaining the loudest are not getting the point, which to me is as much about personal freedom as greening the planet.
Sillier also because the responders seem to be exactly the type that would have had relatives in the past who made their own moonshine, and were always complaining about ‘those darn revenuers’.