Selfsufficientish.com

saw this on BBC News Online and thought you should see it. If one factory can do it... then they all can!!

** Using cooking oil to power a factory ** A company in Worcester uses cooking oil to power its factory.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/mediaselector/chec ... id=5025724

Hope the link works - if not, then copy and paste :D

excellent.

still not sure why veg oil isn't used more as a fuel.

have many people on here converted deisel engines to run on veg oil?

a good renuable energy source, for sure.. not sure how it is on emissions tho. -

The only thing I've heard about emissions so far is the smell of chip shop!

some interesting stuff here about Biodiesel
http://journeytoforever.org/biodiesel_svo.html

Actually, we have touched on biodiesel in one or two threads here lately.

Personally, I'm in two minds about it. I can see it makes sense at the moment as an interim alternative, and I can see a lot of point in the efforts people are making in this way. But if we try to replace our use of crude oil with it then we will get ourselves into an awful lot of trouble, internationally.

Some estimates that I've read conclude that just to provide for the UK's current requirements will need 5 times the agricultural land area of the country. But of course, most of it won't actually be grown here at all - we will export that problem, inevitably to the third world, where whole countries will be laid down to a monoculture of biomass, with their economies totally dependent upon the dictates of first world paymasters; wars and tyranny could prevale as we manoeuvre for control over their output; imposed use of GMO will be an almost certain consequense...

As with gas, and electricity, we've just got to try and figure out a way to reduce our consumption.

Muddypause,

good post.

i guess what really needs to happen is for people to reduce the amount of energy they need to use on a day to day basis.

i work in IT, and even these days i find it quite tricky to persuade a company that it would be best for me to work from home (thus not needing to use energy getting to a work place etc) - but a lot of people still like to "see you there working".

it would be interesting on a small scale how much land would be needed to produce enough biomass for, say a small holding, to power a generator...

I'm in two minds about growing OSR or wheat for diesel, too - but can't see much wrong with using waste oil from catering for generating power. (As long as the British, and particularly the Scots, can't give up their love of everything deep fried!)

maybe stop putting pointless oils into everything, proper crop rotation, farming of land and eating less meat (meaning much more room for growing things) would also help make a fairly important difference? just musing ....

Many abattoirs and meat processing plants have long used tallow for fuel. However, in their wisdom, the Government has now banned them from using it so they are now switching to diesel. Make sense of that!

Stonehead

Re the use of tallow - I have heard that it may be due to residues from burning but cant believe its not easy to solve.
While on the subject can anyone poing me in the direction of a small processor that I can dump my bones and leftover fat into it and get bonemeal and tallow?

As an interim move I'm all for it - there are now a lot of enthusiasts putting together systems using either old Lister diesel engines, or the increasing supply of Indian built clones. If properly designed, you can use it to give all the electricity you need, and being watercooled, you can retrieve the heat from the cooling water for house heating
BUT, and it's a big but, the craze started because of the thought of "free" oil from chip shops etc. - nowadays it's getting to be in very short supply, so you're left with the option of paying 25p or more a litre in 1,000 litre loads of used filtered oil.
The other alternative is "grow your own" oil - we've recently been looking into it for a client who's interested, and have come to the approx. figures of 2.5 acres of rapeseed, or 4 acres of sunflowers per annum being needed for their needs.
The really worrying bit is that companies like Toyota are investing massively in GM technology - there is enormous pressure to grow biofuels - to the obvious detriment of life on earth.........(wave bye bye to the last of the Amazon, for a kick-off)

A local land rover nut sent me a link to an excellent veg oil site. I can't find it now but have asked for him to resend....

I have a mate who's wife runs a chip van on a very scenic harbour pier on the west coast of Scotland. He has been, for 10 years, reusing the old oil and running his pick-up on it. He swears by it! He showed me the process a few years back. It's pretty easy, but needs an additive because it's used oil. Using new oil is much easier!

I am very tempted, but need a £450 kit as my landy is ooooold (32 this year ) and the fuel pump it fairly primitive and would not cope with the thick oil

I will post the link once I have it.....

No sure of the exact technology but a chap I work with powers his car from old chip shop oil -- not only green, but an intriguing aroma of fish and chips as he drives down the road :)

Thurston Garden wrote:A local land rover nut sent me a link to an excellent veg oil site. I will post the link once I have it.....

Voila...

http://www.dieselveg.com/

here's a link to Ken Boak's site - full explanation of a domestic system based on a Lister - http://www.powercubes.com/listers.html