How to Use Biofuel or Biodiesel in Cars

Cars and petrol have gone hand in hand almost since the car was invented.  It’s the convenience of cars (and everything else that’s dependent on the internal combustion engine) that has sent workers out on oil rigs in harsh North Sea off the British coastline and has made the fortunes of people in Texas and the Middle East (and a few other places).  However, petrol won’t last forever.  The earth’s crust only has a limited amount, and it’s one of the ironies of political economics that the area with the most oil is also one of the most politically volatile (i.e. the Middle East).

What’s more, petrol and the like are also implicated in global warming/climate change because they release all that carbon which has been underground for millennia into the atmosphere.

But what are we going to do to get around if we don’t have petrol?  Do we all get around on bicycles?  Well, while that would be a start, the reality is that the motor car is here to stay, especially if it’s raining or you have a lot of people and/or gear to cart around.  Enter the biofuel car.

Using Biofuels and Biodiesels in Cars

A biofuel car, quite simply, is a car that runs on biofuel.  Biofuel is any fuel that is produced from easily renewable sources, which usually means plants or algae (which, technically speaking, are plants).  A biofuel car can run on:

• biodiesel,
• ethanol,
• woodgas,
• vegetable oil.

Biodiesel is produced from algae or from oil-producing plants (palm, soy).  The oil used to make biodiesel is refined like rock oil to make something that is pretty much like regular diesel.  And this means that any diesel engine can be a biofuel car.  Biodiesel is usually mixed with regular (i.e. diesel from crude oil) to stop mould growing in it.  One small problem that you may find if you are using an older diesel car as a “biofuel car” by running it on biodiesel is that the biodiesel corrodes the rubber gaskets and hoses more, so keep an eye on what your engine is doing.  B100 biodiesel is pure biodiesel, while B50 is a mix of 50% biodiesel and 50% regular diesel.

Ethanol as Used in Biofuel Cars

Ethanol fuel is widely used for biofuel in cars throughout Australia.  Ethanol is sourced not from plant oils but from plant sugars (some plants and algae produce both oil and sugars).  Ethanol is usually blended with regular petrol, allowing normal unmodified petrol engine cars to become biofuel cars.  The ethanol you often see at petrol pumps in Australia is E10 ethanol, which means a blend of 10% ethanol to 90% petrol (usually 91 octane petrol).

Burning Vegetable Oils in Cars

Straight vegetable oil can be burned in an internal combustion engine, but this will need a specially modified biofuel car.  Sometimes fresh oil from specially grown crops (e.g maize or soybeans) is used in this sort of biofuel car, but waste oil from your local fish and chip shop can also be used.  Some non-food vegetable oils can be used to power a biofuel car, such as linseed or castor oil.

Woodgas as a Biofuel for Your Car

Woodgas can be used to substitute for petrol in ordinary cars – as long as the car in question has a special wood gasifier attached to it.  To “fill her up,” with this biofuel car,you fill up the gasifier with sawdust, charcoal or wood chips – which can include prunings of all sorts.  The fuel burns incompletely, and the resulting gas passes through a filter (which removes soot and ash) and into your engine to burn as normal.  This sort of biofuel car has been around for a long time – one was doing the rounds in 1901 – but only now are they regaining in popularity, probably because regular petrol engines don’t need to have ash removed on a regular basis and are lighter.