What is wrong with diesel? and why no Biodiesel?

Okay, I’ll start out with a confession. I am a huge dieslhead. I own a VW Jetta TDI. I get 49 MPG. I am happy. When the apocolypse comes, I’ll make fuel from any kind of oil available :D. Okay, that is just a joke, but its nice to know I have an engine that can run other alternative fuels with little modification and little work. But that’s besides the point.

The point is Biodiesel. Lets start out with a fact. Tons of cars sold in Europe today are diesels. Half of new cars sold in Germany are diesels. The modern diesel engine is efficient and is powerful.

Diesels are also known as dirty. That is true, but diesels are only high in NOx and particulate emissions while gasoline engines are particuarly high in CO2 emissions, which are worse for the greenhouse. This might be why Diesels are permitted in Europe more, because the climate is more forgiving towards smog.

But lets put all of that aside. What is wrong with Biodiesel? Biodiesel, where available costs around 2 dollars a gallon. Back when I was first interested in BioD that was expensive, but by today’s gas prices that isn’t that bad. Plus you also get the added benefit of helping the environment. In terms of carbon it all makes sense. Our atmosphere has a certain amount of carbon in the atmosphere in the form of CO2. But we keep on pumping carbon (in the form of oil and other fossil fuels) out of the earth into the atmosphere. In some way the amount of carbon on earth is still the same, but the amount of carbon in the atmosphere is rising. Peak oil is a debatable concept, so lets leave that aside, but the thing about biodiesel that is very amazing is the fact that it is a closed carbon system. For a plant to grow it needs CO2 (and sunlight and other things, but this is the important part). Cars emit CO2 gases. If a car runs only on plant matter, it is impossible for it to emit more carbon than the plants absorbed. And thus you get your closed system.

Combine that with the fact that we have farm subsidies out the ying yang here in America and Western Europe. I figure that as long as we are paying farmers to grow stuff for no reason, we might as well get them to grow things that can be converted into fuel. At the very least we can stop paying farmers to grow tons of food that will floos various markets and instead have them grow renewable fuel sources. Soybeans are a good source of oil for this purpose. Its not necessarily a solution to our energy problems, but hell, its a start.

What really baffles me, though is all of this hype about fuel cells and hybrids. Diesel engines are more efficient than gasoline engines by nature. Why are there no diesel hybrids? Secondly, why do people see fuel cells as the answer? To me they are no better than a sophistocated, albiet dangerous battery. There is no readily available souce of H2, so we would have to produce it through electrolysis which requires lots of energy… Where should that energy come from?

Okay maybe I am a little zealous when it comes to the prospects of BioD, but it seems to me that people attach such a stigma to diesel that it is immediately out of the running for a “futuristic” source of renewable fuel. People don’t want to have a solutiont that relies on old tech. Because of this, I believe that people are overlooking the potential benefit of a diesel electric hybrid and Biodiesel.

For those of you who don’t know, Biodiesel is made by combining NaOH with oil and alcohol (can be ethanol or methanol). The result is biodiesel and glycerine. Its a very simple process than anyone can do themselves. And yes, it works with almost any diesel. If anything a couple of modifications have to be made for the effects of biodiesel on the fuel lines.

I’m not saying that this is a solution to all of out fuel problems, but I think it is really something that isn’t given the proper attention, at least in the national media. How many Prius drivers would consider driving a diesel although I am getting the same gas mileage and emitting less CO2?

One of the problems with biodiesel is the scale at which it can be produced; I don’t have any figures, but I’m pretty sure there isn’t enough space on the planet to be able to grow enough oilseed crops to replace petroleum entirely. Fossil fuels managed to form energy reserves using the available space on the planet by doing so across vast timespans.

IIRC some French farmers were trying to use sunflower seed oil for their car engines. The French government made it harder for them because of taxation issues but the oil worked ok.

Gasoline engines can be fairly easially converted to run on alcohol which is also a bio-fuel, which can be made at home (again, just like bio-d. not easilly). Gas engines can also run very well, actually better on LP gas or natural gas, which reserves should last much longer then known oil reserves.

I think much of d’s unpopularity came from it’s dirty past. D cars were underpowered, hard to start in the cold - maybe impossible, dirty and it was hard to find fuel. The early d cars were also of poor quality (IIRC a GM d car would have the hear blown off as the bolts they used couldn’t take the higher compression.) Also the tell-tale clowd of black smoke we all see on trucks during acceleration reminds us today of D’s dirty past.

When people buy a new car, they have to take these factors into account and more likely to stick to what they know. No one really wants to wait to start their engine (for glow plugs to heat up), or get to a gas station 1/4 inch below E and find out that they can’t buy fuel. I’m not saying these are reall issues, but they are perceived as such.

Also it would be socially unacceptable to use the term ‘gas’ for diesel, and people like to use the word gas - it’s a fun word, step on the gas, I got gas, etc.

A side Q:
Could a d car use veg. oil from a supermarket directly as a emergency fuel?

Well, in theory, yes!
The only thing that a SVO (Straight Veg. Oil) conversion does to a diesel is switch between diesel and SVO. So you can heat the engine with Bio-d or d and then you switch to SVO in the middle then you flip a switch back before you arrive at your destination.

But you can carry diesel around anyway as a spare fuel in the car. SVO would probably work if you just ran out of fuel and your engine was hot.

Plus I don’t need to use the term fuel. I’ll simply say step on it, or fill up, etc.

The only thing though is that switching to biod can cause you to need a new fuel filter. If it weren’t for that I’d probably get some. Maybe I will one day soon. Its really funny though, because it smells really innocuous.

Diesel stinks up the highway for a half mile behind. Mercedes diesel is far worse than following any truck, because the exhaust is at ground level and stays there to be picked up by each following car.

From what I’ve read, ethanol requires more energy to produce than it yields, so it’s more of an energy storage medium than a true fuel. The same is definitely true for hydrogen.

I’m also a huge fan of biodiesel, although given what I’ve been reading about thermal depolymerization lately, I’m inclined to think that might end up being the fuel of the post-peak-oil future.

Biodiesel exaust doesn’t stink.

It smells like popcorn popping from what I hear. Better than car exaust, I would think.

The point is that the engine and fuel are inherently more efficient. They get a bad rap for reasons like this, when it is really nothing to think of. I mean, we are in America, there are no cars without AC being sold anymore. Just put it on circulate and be done with it.

Also when you say Mercedes diesel, are you talking about the old ones or the new ones? You should know that soot is a problem of incomplete combustion, and current diesels have a computer that calculates the exact amount of fuel that can be injected without any of it not being completely burned based on conditions of the air.

This sounds like the typical reaction of those who seem to think diesel isn’t a viable alternative because it has such a bad name.

I’ll give a good sab at this…

Diesel has never been a real popular fuel choice in teh US historically for several reasons (poor low temperature performance, smell, low torque in the engines that were available, and gas so cheap that there was no reason to go to a higher milage fuel). Many of these may no longer be true, but it is why diesel never caught on.

So now on to biodiesel…
I want to buy a diesel car… Hmmm. I have about 3 selections in all the car dealers around town instead of the 50 choices for gas. But I buy one anyway.

I plant to use biodiesel, but… surprise! No place sells it. So I go to the local oil-seed co-op plant that makes biodiesel and fill up once a week. Middle of the week I got no fuel so I go look for regular diesel. Crud. Gotta head out to gas stations near the interstate since no local convienience store sells diesel. And all this to save $3 a fill up? The cry goes up “Bah, why bother?”

Other than semis, no one drives diesels so no one makes diesels so no one buys diesels so few sell diesel fuel so few make or sell biodiesel. Vicious cycle. In the US it won’t end until gas is 3 or 4 times more expensive than it is today.

Yeah, but that’s not what I’m getting at. You’re framing it as a gas vs. Biodiesel or diesel debate, but I am framing it as a hybrid and fuel-cell vs. biodiesel and diesel debate.

I’m not saying that it is easier to fill up your TDI with biodiesel than it is to fill up your prius with gas, but what I’m talking about is they hype, or the percieved direction more efficient cars in the US. Diesels are more effieicent than gas engines. Name any gas car that gets 49 MPG let alone one that gets the performance of a diesel (although nothing spectacular, but pretty much on par with your average 4 cylinder). So then why no hype for diesel hybrids? And WHY is there so much hype for fuel cells. Its just a dangerous, more efficient battery. Its not a source of energy. Now, I wouldn’t predict when we will reach peak oil, but its obviously going to happen. Or, oil will reach a point when it becomes more and more expensive to the point where people are driven to find other alternatives. At this point I think that we’ll naturally gravitate towards other ideas.

But what I mean is tha I think that if we had the amount of diesel technology as the rest of the world, and we are an anomaly for having such a small percentage of diesel engines, then we would have more options, at least, when gas becomes too expensive. I mean if you have a large portion of cars already using diesel, bio-d is an easy switch. Right now the only alternative is ethanol, which, as stated before, actually doesn’t net energy, meaning it is nothing more than a storage method.

I just feel that all things diesel are less popular in terms of solving our problems due to its reputation here in the USA. Sure, Biodiesel isn’t the cure-all, but its a damn sight better than dino diesel.

I don’t think it’s entirely accurate to say that bio-diesel is a closed system with respect to carbon. The majority of vegetable matter raised in the West has a lot of petroleum products tied up in its creation, in terms of fertilizer, pesticides, fuel and oil for farm equipment, distribution of finished goods etc. Then also, as has already been mentioned, converting the plant matter to biodiesel is also not an energy-neutral proposition.

Having said all of that, I’ve been quite tempted recently by the stated fuel economy of the Jetta TDI wagon. Being in Canada, however, cold weather performance is definitely a concern.

Using ADM’s method this is true, but they are funded by the Gov’t so efficency is not really an issue. What I was referring to was the apocolypse senerao in the OP. It is possiable to make a usable fuel at home for both gas and diesel cars.

Actually energy wise it may be ‘free’ to make ethanol if you have a heat source for something else. The heat removed by distiliation would be recaptured by the condensation. So you may be able to use a building furnace to make fuel totally free.

I am confused as to how you are drawing this distinction. Hybrid cars are simply more efficient gas cars. All the energy comes from the gas.

Sure a hybrid diesel would be even more efficient, but you are still playing the chicken and egg game with lack of diesel sales points and you still have poorer performance in winter whether it is straight diesel or hybrid.

I thought I saw this on the ferry this morning–and it appears that it is true.

http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/ferries/commuter_updates/index.cfm?fuseaction=press_releases_content&press_release_id=219

the ferry I was on I recall stated that it is running on Biodiesel–I will check it again tonite!

http://www.aaaworld.com/pages/articles.asp?id=368

I especially like the part about 3.24 units of energy produced per unit of energy invested in production.

What’s the ratio of “dinodiesel” energy?

I think you’re right, but it is a matter of engineering and economics, rather than thermodynamics - kanicbird has already toouched on this.