Would you use

Veggie
Oil Vehicle?
Vegetable oil can
power your vehicle, T
to Fuel Your
his may sound strange, but you
can run your diesel car or truck on
vegetable oil and nearly eliminate
your use of traditional gas or diesel. For cer-
By Tim Wacker
but growing, part of the population that’s
passionate about using grease to make their
cars go. These people are drawn to this al-
ternative fuel because it saves them money,
but the effects on tain people, veggie oil could lead to major
savings. Called veggie cars or grease cars,
gives them more control of their transpor-
tation fuel needs and makes a difference for
the environment these vehicles have fuel systems modified to
burn both diesel fuel and straight vegetable
the environment.
All this may sound too good to be
are still unclear. oil. The idea is actually a modern twist on
the original intention for the diesel engine.
true, and in some ways it is. Is it the most

But even proponents say veggie oil is

not for everyone because of the extra work
it requires. Nevertheless, there is a small,

jon hardesty; above: istockphoto/steven kratochwill

Marcos Markoulatos and Ty Martin,

of Lawrence, Kan., run their trucks
on filtered waste vegetable oil.
greentransportation
environmentally friendly alternative fuel? It’s a lifestyle, attracting the bohemian in
ens like butter when it is cold. That means
Should new vegetable oil or used grease be a growing number of Americans who, for the engine has to be warmed up before it
used? And here’s the real kicker: It’s techni- environmental, financial and/or political can run on vegetable oil, and the veggie oil
cally illegal (see “Veggie Oil Vehicles and reasons, bristle over using fossil fuels for
must be flushed out before the engine cools
the Law”). So, before you start hoarding transportation. Whatever your motivation down. Otherwise, you will have clogged
Wesson Oil, there are a few things you might be, if you have a diesel engine, it fuel lines when you next try to start the car.
should consider. could run on cooking oil. To convert a diesel engine to run on veggie
oil, you have several options.
Want Fries with That? The conversion hardware can
To get a sense of how this be bought in kit form from a va-
works, consider the example of riety of manufacturers. Greasecar
Ty Martin. On Thursdays and The main attraction for many Vegetable Fuel Systems of
Sundays the Lawrence, Kan., auto Easthampton, Mass., estimates
mechanic parks behind his favor- veggie oil fans is that it’s they’ve sold about 4,000 of their
ite restaurant and heads inside for conversion kits over the past few
a hamburger and fries. As he eats not a fossil fuel. years at prices ranging from $995
with friends at the bar, kitchen to $2,000. Lovecraft Bio-Fuels of
staff fill a tank in the back of his truck with In fact, in the 1890s German inventor Los Angeles, Calif., and Portland, Ore.,
grease that was used to cook food just the Rudolf Diesel originally designed his en- which sells kits and installs them, estimates
day before. An hour later, truck and driver gine to run on vegetable oil. it has sold about 1,800 units, starting at
head home, both smelling faintly of burnt $425 for the kit alone and $870 installed.
peanut oil. The used grease then propels A New Kind of Kit Car (Lovecraft also sells a one-tank system.)
Martin’s pickup all over town, all for free The big challenge with using vegeta- Some people custom build veggie cars.
(except the food). ble oil in Diesel’s engine was, and is, cold Martin saw his friend Marcos Markoulatos’
For Martin, burning vegetable oil means weather. Vegetable oil works best when it is Greasecar kit in operation and decided he
more than maintaining a dual fuel system. hot — ideally 160 degrees — and it thick- could do the conversion himself. He ended

Veggie Oil Vehicles and the Law

Excited about the idea of running your car on veggie oil? Maybe even
free waste oil? Before you get too excited, carefully consider this prob-
lem: It’s technically illegal, although that may be changing soon.
How could something so simple and well-intentioned cause legal
problems? Here’s the skinny:
• Fuel taxes on “traditional” fuels (gasoline, petroleum diesel)
help fund the building and maintenance of roads used by
veggie oil cars. Using vegetable oil as a fuel without paying
fuel tax on it is considered tax evasion.
• The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) frowns
on using vegetable oil in engines designed to
burn diesel fuel because the emissions are not
the same. If, for example, someone were to de-
velop an unusual chemical concoction to burn
in gas or diesel engines, it could cause toxic air
pollution if it weren’t tested and approved prior
to use.
All states have a fuel tax of some kind and the
federal government also taxes fuel, but enforce-
ment of tax laws regarding vegetable oil as a fuel
are inconsistent. When it comes to biodiesel,
which is basically chemically processed vegetable
oil that mimics petroleum diesel fuel, federal tax
shawn schreiner

laws are straightforward: You’ve got to pay taxes

Golden Fuel Systems (Springfield, MO)
on it no matter where it comes from.
founder Charlie Anderson displays an
While enforcement of these laws has tradition-
example of “good grease” suitable for
ally been lax, a few recent cases have received at-
use in a veggie-oil-powered vehicle.
tention and may signal a new level of concern:

112 Mother Earth News December 2007/January 2008

up with a used gas tank behind his
truck seat and rubber heating hoses
running from his truck radiator
through the tank — all for $250.

Veggie-capable Vehicles
Finding just the right car to burn
vegetable oil can be more challenging.
First and foremost, it has to have a
diesel engine. The best cars to convert
tend to be older models, according to

jon hardesty (3)

Lovecraft. The exception appears to
be the Volkswagen Jetta TDI — even
more recent editions can be converted
easily. Among the better older models
for veggie conversions is the Mercedes
300 SD, particularly model years 1981 to
1985. Greasecar, on the other hand, says
the majority of its kits go in newer domes-
tic trucks or Volkswagen cars.
Diesel trucks get plenty of power out of
vegetable oil. Martin said his 1990 Dodge
Ram pickup made the switch without slow-
ing down. Lovecraft and Greasecar both
said the Ford F250 diesel models from
1995 to 2000 are well-suited for conver-
Filtering waste vegetable oil and fueling the
sions. These trucks easily accommo- truck is a family event for Marcos Markoulatos
date the necessary plumbing changes and daughter Eva Marie.
for burning vegetable oil.
New or Used Cooking Oil? For converts less concerned about sav-
Vegetable oil enthusiasts love the idea of ing money, or perhaps skeptical about us-
free fuel, so they take used cooking oil res- ing waste oil, brand-new vegetable oil is
taurants would otherwise throw away. To another option. But you’ll pay a premium.
find a veggie-car-friendly eatery near you, At your local supermarket it can cost $6 a
visit www.fillup4free.com. gallon or more. The cheapest oil right now

• In May 2007 in Charlotte, N.C., Robert Teixeira was fined There is also a concern that vegetable oil cars might violate the
$1,000 for failing to pay taxes on the vegetable oil he burns in federal Clean Air Act. The Act bans tinkering with auto emissions by
his 1981 Mercedes. anyone who doesn’t have EPA certification to do so, according to
• Two months before that David and Eileen Wetzel, of Decatur, spokesperson John Millett. Using vegetable oil instead of diesel fuel
Ill., were told they needed to be licensed as a special fuel sup- could quite likely affect the emissions from your car, Millett says.
plier if they wanted to keep “Also, a vehicle has to be modi-
driving their veggie car or face fied to run on vegetable oil.” Jones
possible felony fines for not says. “Such a modification is not
paying fuel taxes. legal unless it has been through
If you buy veggie oil that is in- an emissions certification proce-
tended to be used as fuel, the taxes dure — this is different than just
have already been paid by your registering the fuel — to ensure that
supplier. Dave Dunham, owner of German inventor Rudolf Diesel the modified vehicle itself meets
Smarter Fuel in Bethlehem, Pa., is emission standards.”
paying a lot of taxes on the used originally designed his engine With some state laws still very
vegetable oil he gathers for free. much up in the air, there are ways
bumper stickers: needasticker.com (2)

He collects hundreds of thousands to run on ... vegetable oil!
of gallons of oil from about 1,000
restaurants stretched across five
states. Then he cleans it up and resells it for about $1.95 per gallon,
depending on state taxes. Since the taxes are already accounted for,
consumers don’t need to report and pay the fuel tax individually.
The federal government does require you to fill out the neces-
sary registration forms to make biodiesel for your car but it does not
charge a fee for doing so, according to Enesta Jones, a spokesperson
for the EPA.
to play it safe if you’re not sure if
you should be paying taxes or not.
On his Web site www.biodieselnow.
com, Graydon Blair, owner of Utah Biodiesel Supply, a parts distributor
for home biodiesel brewers, suggests you keep a log of the gallons of
biodiesel or veggie oil you burn. Then if you do get into trouble with the
state tax authorities you can produce the log and tell them you plan on
paying at tax time. State and federal income tax forms have provisions
for paying fuel taxes, Blair says. (Consult your tax advisor for details on
how to best handle taxes in your state. — Mother)

www.MotherEarthNews.com December 2007/January 2008 113

Straight Talk on Biodiesel, Veggie Oil
William Kemp is the author of Biodiesel Basics and Beyond (see Page 135 to order), a is soybean oil, which can be bought in 250
how-to on making fuel from all manner of oil-producing plants. While he is an advocate gallon containers for about $3.40 a gallon.
of the technology, he offers a sobering assessment of its limitations in his answers here: A company called Smarter Fuel, based in
Mechanically, what is the difference between grease cars and biodiesel cars? Bethlehem, Pa., refines used vegetable oil
What it boils down to is biodiesel can be used with the existing fuel infrastructure of from restaurants across the mid-Atlantic
any diesel vehicle, while straight vegetable oil can’t be combusted in a modern diesel states and resells it for $1.95 per gallon.
engine without modifications. Also, in grease cars you need a system to preheat the oil The cost of the new and refined oils
and filter it before the fuel can be combusted. does translate into fewer headaches than
And what about the costs?
burning free used vegetable oil, which can
Straight vegetable oil has the advantage in that the cost and complexity of the fuel have bread crumbs, water, even the occa-
drops dramatically, compared to biodiesel. If you look at the costs of making biodiesel, sional chunk of catfish in it. But there are
70 percent of the cost of the fuel is the feedstock — that’s the canola, soy or peanuts different schools of thought on how clean
that are used to eventually produce the fuel. The rest of the cost is processing that used vegetable oil needs to be before you
feedstock. You don’t have those costs with straight-oil fuel, although capital costs burn it in an engine.
must be amortized. One restaurant prefilters the oil for
Which is easier to use?
Martin and Markoulatos to clean it up a
Biodiesel. You still need some petrodiesel or biodiesel fuel to run a vegetable oil car. bit, and then the two tinkerers pour the oil
The car has to start on diesel and it has to be shut down on diesel. So owning a vege- into a 55-gallon plastic drum with a spigot
table oil car becomes more of a tinker’s game. 6 inches from the bottom. They let the oil
Once the oil is hot, what’s the difference
between the two fuels?
Once the temperature of the vegetable oil
gets to 176 degrees, viscosity of the oil
comes down to the level of diesel fuel and it
becomes much like straight diesel fuel.

Will vegetable oil cars ever be a main-

stream mode of transportation?
In a word, no. I think using virgin vegetable oil
or waste vegetable oil is always going to be
a fringe sector of the transportation industry.
Automakers will never get behind it.

Which is better for the environment?

With biodiesel you have the farming and har-
vesting for the feedstock that’s eventually pro-
cessed to make the biodiesel. That has to be
taken into consideration in the overall formula
for the carbon released when you burn it.
Then there’s also the toxicity of the chemicals
used to make biodiesel — those can endanger
the environment. The beauty of using waste
oil is it’s something that’s already been used
and you’re giving it a second life, providing
low carbon and air pollution emissions.

Do you support one fuel over another?

I’m not a big advocate of using food crops for
fuel. Even if we exploited all the biofuel po-
tential in North America it would be no better
than enforcing higher fuel efficiency standards
for all vehicles. And does anyone really need Because vegetable oil is less explosive
a 300 horsepower car to get to work? Energy than gasoline or diesel at normal
efficiency first, energy generation second; that temperatures, carrying an extra jug of oil
is the sustainable path. in your vehicle is not hazardous.

114 Mother Earth News December 2007/January 2008

 greentransportation
Running a truck on vegetable oil does not decrease power significantly. This veggie oil
powered Ford F250 easily handles a camper trailer.
sit for a week before drawing off everything
above the dregs. Before they pour that into
their trucks, they filter it again.
Pollution-wise, the differences be-
tween burning new and used vegetable
oil are less stark. William Kemp, in his
book Biodiesel Basics and Beyond (see Page
135 to order), says that new and used oil
just about tie on soot and nitrogen oxide
emissions, while waste oil puts out more
carbon monoxide, and new oil puts out
more carbon dioxide.
When comparing vegetable oil emis-
sions to petrodiesel, the results are more
mixed. Diesel exhaust puts out more soot
than veggie oil, while putting out about
10 percent fewer hydrocarbons. But these
measurements, Kemp says, don’t account
for the biggest environmental argument
in favor of vegetable oil to fuel cars: global
warming. You have to grow plants to pro-
duce vegetable oil so the carbon dioxide
emitted by burning it is captured as a new
crop of oil plants grows.
Then there is veggie oil’s close cousin
(some would say rival) — biodiesel — which
is vegetable oil chemically processed to
work like petrodiesel in standard diesel en-
gines without modifications. It is available,
usually blended with petrodiesel, at hun-
dreds of filling stations across the country.
Biodiesel proponents say veggie oil fuel,
particularly waste oil, will always be a low-
volume, backyard enterprise.
shawn schreiner (2)
“People think vegetable oil and biodie-
sel are the same; they are not,” says Joshua
Tickell, author of Biodiesel America.
“Modern diesels are not made to run on
straight vegetable oil (SVO). The SVO
concept distracts from the huge potential
of the biodiesel industry. There is no pros-
pect for straight vegetable oil being a reli-
able fuel,” Tickell says.
There are numerous fans of veggie oil
fuel, though, who have come to the oppo-
site conclusion and feel just as strongly.
“Our conversion kits are developed and
tested by our engineers for each specific ap-
plication to ensure compatibility, and we
have many customers who have been run-
ning successfully for almost 10 years,” says
Justin Carven, founder of Greasecar.
(These contrasting perspectives are but
one example of the contentious and evolv-
ing debate about the short- and long-term
feasibility of biofuels. For more on their po-
tential compared to other energy options,
see Page 50. — Mother)
With all this in mind, the decision
to use vegetable oil for fuel is one to
consider carefully. Concerns about tax-
es and EPA regulations are significant.
And for many people, filtering the veg- 8666
gie oil and the potential for mechanical
problems would be inconvenient. But
for those who can embrace these chal-
lenges, veggie oil is a fun and empow-
ering solution.
www.MotherEarthNews.com December 2007/January 2008 115