On Sun, 12 Mar 2006 14:14:15 -0500, Jeff Wisnia
wrote:

FWIW, I read recently that to produce even a noticable scratch in fossil
oil consumption by using soy based fuel would require growing soy on
nearly all the farmable land area in the USA.

That's assuming we only use soy oil as a feed stock. It still sounds
overstated, but I won't argue too much since I can't back it up.

But BD can be made from any veggie oil or (as you pointed out) animal
fat. In arid climates, jatropha (a bush/small tree) seems to be a
promising source. The wave of the future may be algae, which could be
grown anywhere the sun shines, but so far the limiting factor seems to
be extracting the oil from the plant. There seem to be several people
working on it, so they aren't talking much about the details out of
concern for tipping off the competition.

I guess some of this depends on what you call a "noticeable scratch."
I've heard that all the waste fryer oil we currently produce could
account for 3% of diesel usage (maybe I've got that wrong, but there's
definitely a lot of it out there). That isn't much in terms of GDP or
import levels, but I'd call it a noticeable amount. And it doesn't
even require new oil to be produced. A drop in the bucket is better
than none. Now, if we put a concerted effort into R&D as we have for
petrol, ther's no telling how far it could go, but I think it's best
not to view BD as a total replacement for petrol. We're going to have
to look at multiple solutions for a very big problem. BD is, IMO, a
step inthe right direction.

td