Is Biodiesel available any place in the Finger Lakes?
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: >Please support Ithaca Biodiesel's efforts to bring this infrastructure to >our community: > > > > >from the April 30, 2007 edition - >http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0430/p02s02-ussc.html >Now in the Bay Area: the anti-gas station >The smell of french fries wafts from the local 'gas' station. But it's not >the snacks sold inside, it's the fuel. >By Ben Arnoldy | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor > > >With gas over $3.50 a gallon here in California, many station owners must be >relieved to have pumps with credit card readers. Better to cut out all >interaction with the sullen customers. >But Jennifer Radtke has just one ancient pump, prices a few pennies above her > competition, and lines that occasionally stretch over an hour long in this >quiet corner of Berkeley. Yet customers clearly love the place, doubling the >business each year and making possible a major expansion this summer. >How? She offers biodiesel, an alternative fuel that soothes so many >environmental and political bugaboos it may some day edge out lattes as the >Left >Coast's favorite liquid. >"Everything about [biodiesel] is really incredible. It's nontoxic, >nonflammable, it's made from vegetable oil," enthuses Ms. Radtke, who jointly >owns and >runs BioFuel Oasis with five other women. For her, biodiesel is about a >feeling of independence more than politics. Oh, and it "smells great." >The fumes around BioFuel Oasis evoke French fries or donuts – foods that may >be for sale at some gas stations, but somehow wouldn't fit here among the >organic tangerine juice and the local artwork that proclaims, "Trees are wiser > >than you think." >As much as BioFuel Oasis fosters an alternative, anti-gas station community, >their product is rapidly joining the mainstream. It's the fastest growing >alternative fuel in the nation, with production tripling last year, according >to > the National Biodiesel Board. Their website, biodiesel.org, lists roughly >1,000 retailers, most of them in middle America. >The fuel can be put safely into many diesel vehicles without modifications, >though cold weather or older parts may require the use of biodiesel that's >blended with petroleum diesel. >For Oasis customers, one of the biggest selling points is that the fuel comes > from a potato chip factory in southern California, not the Middle East. >"Pretty much every time I went to buy gas, I thought about what was going on >in Iraq, and I was feeling awful," says Aimee Wells, as she fuels up her VW >Gulf, a diesel car she bought last year so she could switch to veggie power. A > bumper sticker on it reads, "Biodiesel: no war required." >Ms. Wells also fills up an extra 15 gallons inside jugs in her trunk. She's >driving down to Los Angeles and wants to have enough for the round trip. If >she happened to run out, she could always fill up with conventional diesel: >There is no danger in mixing. >Other customers extol biodiesel's environmental virtues. Andy Brucker of El >Cerrito drives an F-250 truck for his construction work. He says he's paying >the $3.70 a gallon mainly to help reduce global warming gasses. >Biodiesel emits 78 percent less CO2 than petroleum diesel, among other >substantial drops in carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons, and particulates, >according to >a report from the US Department of Energy. However, other research suggests >that greenhouse-gas cuts could be dramatically reversed if demand for >vegetable oil changed land use. So far, corn and soy are grown for animal and >human >food, with an abundance of oil as a byproduct. >"It wouldn't be economical to grow either soy or corn if it was only going to > be used for fuel," says Michael Briggs, a professor with the University of >New Hampshire's Biodiesel Group. "There's this notion that fuel crops are >going to displace food crops, which isn't going to happen." >The visibility of "french fry fuel" is on the rise here. San Francisco last >week opened its first commercial biodiesel station, and the mayor says the >city's fleet of diesel vehicles will switch to biodiesel by year's end. >This summer, BioFuel Oasis will move to a new Berkeley location with two >pumps with two nozzles each. >"We're taking a historic gas station and bringing it into the 21st century," >says Radtke. The new station will have solar panels, grow plants on trellises > around the pumps, and sell urban farming equipment. "We're transforming a >fueling station and making it really cool and sustainable and environmental." >Part of the six businesswomen's mission will be – ironically – to get >customers to use less of their product. They post information about how to >maximize fuel efficiency and carry material about biking. >One enthusiastic customer has taken biofuels a step further. Philippe Monin >shelled out $1,500 to convert his car to take straight vegetable oil, or SVO. >He swings around once a week to local restaurants and gets their used frying >oil for free. If it's from a Japanese restaurant, he notes, the car exhaust >can smell like tempura. >He recalls making the switch after hearing about record profits by the oil >industry. >"I said, 'No more.' I can't give them more money," says Mr. Monin. Now he >doesn't pay a dime to fuel his vehicle and laughs as he drives past gas >stations. "I see the price going up almost every day, and I just buzz by. I >wave and >say, 'Bye!' " > >_Full HTML version of this story which may include photos, graphics, and >related links_ (http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0430/p02s02-ussc.html) > > > >---------------------------------------------------- >Gay Nicholson, Ph.D. > >607-533-7312 (home office) >607-279-6618 (cell) > >1 Maple Avenue >Lansing, NY 14882 >[EMAIL PROTECTED] > >Sustainable Tompkins >Program Coordinator >w_ww.sustainabletompkins.org_ (http://www.sustainabletompkins.org/) > >Southern Tier Energy$mart Communities >Regional Coordinator >Cornell Cooperative Extension of Tompkins County >615 Willow Ave., Ithaca, NY 14850 >[EMAIL PROTECTED] > > > > >************************************** See what's free at http://www.aol.com. >_______________________________________________ >RSS, archives, subscription & listserv information for: >[email protected] >http://lists.mutualaid.org/mailman/listinfo/sustainabletompkins >free hosting by http://www.mutualaid.org > > _______________________________________________ RSS, archives, subscription & listserv information for: [email protected] http://lists.mutualaid.org/mailman/listinfo/sustainabletompkins free hosting by http://www.mutualaid.org
