Do you have any idea how many coconuts it would take to fuel just one car? Or how many trees it would take to grow those coconuts? Or how long it takes for a tree to mature?

Sure you can burn ANY vegetable oil in a diesel engine. Otto Diesel who invented the Diesel Engine planned on running them on Peanut oil. Coconuts are NOT a good substitute for the masses as they do not produce well, and do not grow outside of tropical climates. Soybeans, peanuts, and a number of other oil producing plants are a far better plan.

every country and government these days has a program to say their local cash crop will compete with saudi oil! oh, what a tragedy to say the least for the subsidies and funds that are handed out on these false hopes.

This is very funny.

Originally posted by etotheitheta
every country and government these days has a program to say their local cash crop will compete with saudi oil! oh, what a tragedy to say the least for the subsidies and funds that are handed out on these false hopes.

This is very funny.

iawtc texas tea, the original and still best.

their gonna need billions of coconuts, go with sugar cane?

new Guinea can grow it there right?

Yes, any vegetable oil, without further refining, can be burned in a diesel engine, in Germany there are truck fleets running on it in a rapidly increasing scale since it hasn't been taxed like motor fuel, though that of course is changing now.

The biodiesel & ethanol industry is a complete waste of energy & tax money, it only works because it still involves the conventional petroleum industry & even brings in the big agricultural corporations like Monsanto etc, if there were no interest of any big lobbying group this nonsense wouldn't happen.

Buy an old diesel pick up or rabbit & you'll be able to drive for a long time to come, it's gona be expensive, but there will be fuel available.

One problem in the mad dash for Palm oil in Indonesia is that the Rain forests are being cut down to plant Palm Oil plantations.
That is depriving the Oranutans of their natural habitat and also massively depleting the rain forest.

A bog standard non turbo diesel car or van will run perfectly well on a 90% mix of veg oil and 10% diesel in summer and at least a 20% veg oil/diesel mix in winter with no modifications at all. You could fit a heater system allowing you to run on 90% Veg oil in winter if you so wanted.

Rape seed is easy and cheap to grow and grows very well even in Northern climates like the UK, the oil it produces runs very well in Diesel engines.

I have amongst others a 1996 VW T4 Van. 2.4 diesel that I currently run on 70%SVO (Straight vegetable oil) at around 45-50p a litre and it runs fine.
Ill drop this to around 20% when it gets colder.
The only problem is that when the engine is hot and I stop at the lights I get hungry as the exhaust smells like a BBQ

[edit on 18/9/07 by Chorlton]

[edit on 18/9/07 by Chorlton]

Originally posted by Chorlton
One problem in the mad dash for Palm oil in Indonesia is that the Rain forests are being cut down to plant Palm Oil plantations.

You're a victim of disinformation. The rain forests in Indonesia are still intact. The mangrove swamps by the coasts are the ones that were cut down. Mangrove swamps are not orang-utan habitats. And it was cut down decades ago. The problem now is that with all this disinformation, there are no investors to help replant the area with any tree, palm, mangrove, whatever.

So what happens next? The Indonesians plant some of the area with paddy fields and soya bean and at the end of the season, practice open burning to clear the area for replanting, much to the chagrin of neighbouring countries like Malaysia and Singapore. Then the fires get out of control and burn more peat land from the cleared mangrove swamps. And then the yearly haze problem begins. It's a running joke. When the skies turn hazy, we start thinking, "oh no, the Indonesians are burning stuff again..."

Worst still, the Indonesian government is reluctant to let their neighbours help combat the fires. And every year they promise to tackle the situation. Every year they say the problem won't repeat. Nothing gets done. And guess what? The burning has started again. Just do a quick search on Google for the keywords "hotspot fire indonesia". There's your greenhouse gas emitter right there.

Meanwhile in Malaysia, there are no new forests being cut down. The palm oil plantations that were set up during the British colonial era are the ones that are being cut down, to make way for housing development. Those statistics about clearing the land for oil plantations are skewered. The land cleared was originally rubber plantations, again set up during the British era. Rubber is no longer that profitable now, with the advent of synthetic rubber and better rubber recycling methods.

The whole palm oil smear campaign started when palm oil began competing with soya oil as the cooking oil of choice, mainly because it was cheaper. Cheaper to produce, cheaper to process, higher yields. First they said palm oil has cholesterol. Rubbish, considering that it's vegetable oil. Then they said we're decreasing orang-utans habitats. Also nonsense considering no new rainforest clearing projects are being undertaken.

Now the smear campaign is still going on considering palm oil produces three times as much oil as soya. It's a better option for biodiesel production compared to soya. It has always been about competition with soya. I don't hear any complains about clearing mangrove forests in Indonesia for soya. Doesn't that seem odd?

The only problem with orang-utan or rhino habitat loss we have right now are coming from illegal loggers and poachers. And those are dealt with to the fullest extent of the law. Public shaming is also included. Most illegal logging activity takes place in Sabah, in East Malaysia at the border of Indonesia's Kalimantan state, in Northern Borneo.

Our park rangers have trouble pursuing the loggers and poachers because they'll slip past the border to Indonesia. I'm not sure what the Indonesian government is doing on their side. Probably not much since it's a good source of income for a poor country.

While you are all reading from second hand sources with an agenda, I've got the benefit of living in the region for over two decades. If they really wanted to call attention to the situation from an ecological angle, they would have highlighted habitat loss of various water fouls and crocodiles. Crocs aren't as cute and human-like as orang-utans, which locally means "jungle person". They would have also highlighted the fact that coastal mangrove swamps provide a water break to dampen the effects of tsunamis. You don't hear any of these, because it doesn't fit the agenda.