How is biodiesel used today

However, with the advent of newer diesel engines equipped with exhaust gas recirculation EGR , particulate filters, and catalytic converters, clean diesel technology provides incredible fuel efficiency with ultra low emissions levels. When coupled with the use of biodiesel, both new and old diesel engines can significantly reduce emissions, including particulate matter black smoke.

Studies on biodiesel emissions have been conducted for almost 20 years. In that time biodiesel has undergone the most rigorous testing of any alternative fuel, having been the first and only fuel to be evaluated by the EPA under the Clean Air Act Section b. This study examined the impact of hundreds of regulated and non-regulated exhaust emissions, as well as the potential health effects of these emissions. Some of these results are summarized below.

Biodiesel helps reduce the risk of global warming by reducing net carbon emissions to the atmosphere. When biodiesel is burned, it releases carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, but crops which are used to produce biodiesel take up carbon dioxide from the atmosphere in their growth cycle. A joint study conducted by the U. Department of Agriculture, and the U. Department of Energy determined that biodiesel reduces net carbon dioxide emissions to the atmosphere by Energy Balance The energy balance of a fuel is a ratio of how much energy is required to produce, refine and distribute the fuel compared to the amount of energy the fuel releases when it is burned.

A higher ratio indicates a lower environmental impact, as less fossil energy is needed to produce, refine and distribute the fuel. Biodiesel has a very high energy balance compared to other alternative fuels. A joint study found that on average biodiesel releases 3. For comparison, diesel fuel delivers only 0. Grown, Produced and Distributed Locally Worldwide, energy security is becoming a hot topic in government and society.

Nearly every country in the world depends on imports of various forms of fossil fuel energy, including oil, coal and natural gas. Biodiesel can improve energy security wherever it is produced in several ways:.

Increased Refining Capacity Biodiesel is produced in dedicated refineries which add to overall domestic refining capacity, eliminating the need to import expensive finished product from other countries.

Difficult Targets When biodiesel is produced, distributed and used locally in a community based model it presents a much more difficult target for a potential terrorist attack than large centralized facilities like oil refineries or pipelines used in the petroleum industry.

The Congressional Budget Office and the U. Biodiesel has been proven to be much less toxic than diesel fuel, and is readily biodegradable. These attributes make it less likely to harm the environment if an accidental spill occurred, and far less costly to repair damage and clean up. Less Toxic than Table Salt Being derived from vegetable oils, biodiesel is naturally non-toxic. The acute oral LD50 lethal dose of biodiesel is more than By comparison table salt NaCl has an LD50 of 3.

This means that table salt is almost 6 times more toxic than biodiesel. Aquatic Impacts In an aquatic environment, biodiesel is 15 times less toxic to common species of fish than diesel fuel.

A Safe and Stable Fuel Biodiesel is safer to handle than petroleum fuel because of its low volatility. It's typically blended with diesel and designated by the amount of diesel it's mixed with. In fact, you can typically find some biodiesel in almost all "regular" diesel sold at gas stations in the U. The cost of producing biodiesel is approximately the same as the price of producing petroleum. Incentives provided by federal policies have helped keep market prices competitive.

Federal low-sulfur diesel fuel standards have also given biodiesel a boost. There are many benefits of using biodiesel, even in its blended form, although some environmental benefits depend on how the fuel is produced. One benefit is simply the fact that the fuel comes from a renewable resource that can be grown in the U. Biodiesel also reduces tailpipe emissions, including the amount of soot and "air toxics" released into the atmosphere. Unlike petroleum diesel, which contains sulfur and carcinogenic benzene, two components the state emissions boards and EPA regulate, biodiesel is nontoxic and biodegradable.

Because of its lower emissions and the national drive to reduce reliance on petroleum, biodiesel is the U. It is used by all four branches of the U. It is often used on farms, in manufacturing equipment, and in the construction industry. Because the demand for biodiesel is growing, producers will be able to increase production, making biodiesel more widely available for consumers. Today, beef, pork, poultry, eggs, and milk have had the most dramatic price increases, augmented by drought, a virus outbreak, and growing exports.

Energy markets now regularly compete with the food sector for vegetable oil, so soybean prices and energy prices have been statistically linked, creating a floor price for soy oil. Rising food and energy prices are already dangerously expanding the problem of "food insecurity.

Further, despite significant subsidies and protectionist policies, biodiesel is obviously more expensive than heating oil, still requiring government aid to survive. Energy Information Administration is not projecting a significant increase in biodiesel production. As the human health e. The Government Accountability Office last year found that the U. Contrary to what we keep hearing, total life-cycle greenhouse gas emissions from biofuels are virtually impossible to measure.

To illustrate, there is significant disagreement about the actual energy and greenhouse gas savings of biofuels displacing fossil fuels, and a "a large number of publications that analyze the life-cycle of biofuel systems present varying and sometimes contradictory conclusions, even for the same biofuel type.

This process involves a significant amount of fossil energy itself along the entire supply chain that often make biofuels less environmentally friendly than petroleum-based fuels. From crushing through transport, it can take 18 megajoules of fossil energy to make just one liter of soybean-based biodiesel — that equates to half a liter of gasoline. The unaccounted for environmental problems that indirectly arise from biofuel use are significant: 1 direct conflicts between land for fuels and land for food, 2 other land-use changes, 3 water scarcity, 4 loss of biodiversity, and 4 nitrogen pollution through the excessive use of fertilizers.

Soy-based biodiesel, our main feedstock for biodiesel, is especially land intensive — taking five times more land than ethanol to produce the equivalent amount of biofuel energy. There are various ways of making biofuels, but they generally use chemical reactions, fermentation, and heat to break down the starches, sugars, and other molecules in plants.

The resulting products are then refined to produce a fuel that cars or other vehicles can use. Much of the gasoline in the United States contains one of the most common biofuels: ethanol. Made by fermenting the sugars from plants such as corn or sugarcane, ethanol contains oxygen that helps a car's engine burn fuel more efficiently, reducing air pollution.

In the U. In Brazil—the second-largest ethanol producer behind the U. Alternatives to diesel fuel include biodiesel and renewable diesel.

Biodiesel, derived from fats such as vegetable oil, animal fat, and recycled cooking grease, can be blended with petroleum-based diesel. Some buses, trucks, and military vehicles in the U. Renewable diesel, a chemically different product that can be derived from fats or plant-based waste, is considered a "drop-in" fuel that does not need to be blended with conventional diesel.

Other types of plant-based fuel have been created for aviation and shipping. More than , flights have used biofuel, but the amount of aviation biofuel produced in accounted for less than 0.

In shipping, too, adoption of biofuel is at levels far below the targets set by the International Energy Agency. Renewable natural gas, or biomethane , is another fuel that potentially could be used not only for transportation but also heat and electricity generation. Gas can be captured from landfills, livestock operations, wastewater, or other sources.