Heat treated vegetable oil

quare hawk

Is HVO a sustainable and viable alternative to fossil fuels e.g. diesel and home heating oil and if so why is it not being promoted ?

mikeecho

Hydrotreated Vegetable Oil (HVO)

Macha

All of these waste and residue based fuels have a fundamental issue which is volume. We simply won't have enough of them to replace liquid fuels at the rate we're using them.

Well and actually they have another problem which is there are cheaper and more efficient solutions to many of their current uses, ie electric cars intead of fossil cars and heat pumps instead of oil-based heating (good god, are people still using these?)

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058308755/heat-treated-vegetable-oil

No

We don't produce enough waste oil to cover demand so eventually we'll be growing crops specifically for fuel oil production

The biofuels bandwagon gets waved about every so often as the solution to all our woes but the simple truth is that producing enough crops would seriously cut into the available land for food production

It was estimated a few years ago that it would take an area similar to Australia to produce enough biofuel for the airline industry alone

Poorer countries are currently struggling with the price of grain competing with richer countries, imagine the situation if they were also competing with the oil industry

This is all skipping past the fact that HVO has all the same air quality problems as any diesel engine. So even if they can be produced completely carbon free, you'll die of respiratory illness before you get to see the benefits

Biofuels (including biogas and biomass) in general will have some applications, things like emergency power or higher latitudes that have very large heating demands

In general however the answer is electrification and renewables like wind, solar, hydro and batteries

Capt'n Midnight

A while back there was a German study into biodiesel. Between the fertilizer and other fossil fuel inputs and it didn't save any carbon. It's better now with more renewables in the mix but still not totally clean.

Palm oil is an ecological disaster in places where they clear out existing bogs in which case it can take over a century to recapture the carbon released.

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120962244#Comment_120962244

This

One of the biggest oversights to biofuels is the carbon released while producing or transporting them

A lot of the lobbyists will basically say the fuels are carbon neutral because the plants they're harvested from absorb carbon in the atmosphere

What they don't take into account is the fuel used by the farm machinery to plant, maintain and harvest it

And then add the electricity consumption to process the crops into fuel

Also because we've yet to invent teleportation, the crops and fuel need to be transported, generally by a diesel consuming truck

Oh but you can use the biofuels to power the production and transport? Well that multiplies the amount of fuel/crops/land you need which means you need bigger processing and more trucks. So it snowballs out of control pretty quickly

There's a reason most international oil shipments are done via boat or pipeline after all

Also, it turns out that one of the biggest carbon footprints from biofuels is from tillage. Apparently disturbing the land releases a lot of carbon and there's no way around it

It is possible to make biofuels in a pretty low carbon way, but it's pretty difficult to do it commercially and is probably more suited to small scale production for personal use (generally only makes financial sense if you "forget" to pay the fuel excise duty as well)

magicbastarder

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120962384#Comment_120962384

One of the biggest oversights to biofuels is the carbon released while producing or transporting them

not just biofuels, i think? i won't be able to find it now i suspect, but i once read a study that the extraction/purification/transport of petrol and diesel is almost identical in carbon cost, as the carbon released when they're burned.

i.e. if you think your car produces 120g CO2/km, that's only what's directly coming out of the exhaust. the real figures is roughly double that.

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120963642#Comment_120963642

I haven't seen that study but Fully Charged did a great video on it a few years ago

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mk-LnUYEXuM

You're correct it is something which is often overlooked. A lot of fossil fuel lobbyists will say EVs are bad for the environment by pointing out the energy used to power them could come from dirty fuels like coal

But in the same sentence they don't count the carbon released during production of the same fossil fuels they're pedalling

Back on biofuels, Engineering Explained did a great video about why corn based ethanol is a bad idea

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=F-yDKeya4SU&feature=share

Admittedly, not all of the stuff applies to HVO but the commentary around using farm land for growing fuel crops and the carbon released from tillage is all very relevant

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120962384#Comment_120962384

Absolutely all of this is taken into account in calculating the ghg savings of biofuels.

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121096500#Comment_121096500

Is it? Because I've seen plenty of marketing blurb saying Biofuels are carbon neutral which seem implausible

I'd like very much to see the research which shows the carbon released from biofuels when the production chain is taken into account

Perhaps it's achievable with the right investment, but I feel quite confident that the farm machinery and trucks which are harvesting and transporting the feed crops and processed fuel are at best powered by a blend of mostly diesel and biofuels and not pure biofuels

magicbastarder

the OP certainly doesn't seem to have been interested in contributing to the discussion.

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121096813#Comment_121096813

Yes. Farming activities, tillage, fertiliser usage, harvesting, transport to crushing, crushing, refining, transport to biofuels refinery, processing and converting to HVO all have a ghg attached to them and it all adds up. The standard for crop based biofuels is closer to 60-70% savings over fossil. Some are able to get it higher by changing farming practices (e.g. not tilling the soil or double cropping). 100% is incredibly unusual but possible with very restrictive farming practices or growing crops (generally non-edible ones) on previously non-arable land.

100% ghg saving biofuels from crops exist, and are marketed far more than they should be, but in reality it is an absolutely tiny volume.

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121096838#Comment_121096838

I'd be tempted to question the ones achieving 70% reduction, what they're accounting for and, more importantly, what aren't they considering

Not saying it isn't true, just when the numbers seem that good it's worth asking the question as to why

I agree 100% reduction isn't feasible, if it doesn't make financial sense to farm food crops in that manner (which are arguably an even more captive market than fuel) then it probably doesn't make sense for fuel crops either

The only way to accomplish it would be to link it to a system of incentives, for example give a tax break for biofuels but only if producers sign up for carbon neutral production

In any case, I think biofuels have had their day before it ever really began. They were always competing with a massively profitable fossil fuel industry and never really got off the ground except in a few markets

And now with the move to electrification, there's the possibility for similar or better GHG reductions and without the problems of air quality that still exist for biofuels. Personally I'm happier with buses that are both good for the environment AND don't trigger an asthma attack when they drive past me 😁

Even if we all switch to EVs, and install solar panels on our houses and have lot of offshore wind, there's still going to be some degree of burning stuff in society. There'll be some industries that are too difficult to unstick, so they'll probably end up using biofuels (which I'll arbitrarily widen to include biomass and biogas)

However, even still they'll be spending a lot more for fuel than they were before given the vastly smaller production needs. So then it'll probably push them more towards electrification than before

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121097102#Comment_121097102

To be clear, there is obviously an element of carbon capture accounted for, and that helps with the 70% reduction calculation. Ultimately the calculations aren't particularly secret, if you google them you will probably find a good approximation. But they account for every km driven, and every bit of the process in the refineries. If you get steam from renewable sources for heating as opposed to burning fuel you get a lower ghg etc. It's all audited once a year. Which is not to say it's perfect, but the numbers are not picked out of thin air.

Food crops don't care about the carbon intensity/ghg emissions. It's completely biofuels driving that. There are already incentives in many places - the better the ghg savings often the more you can charge for the product.

There are two types of biofuels to be clear, the first generation "biodiesel" which is a bit rubbish and then HVO. HVO production is ramping up massively, particularly with a focus towards aviation fuel (SAF) in the future. It is still used a lot in transport fleets etc. There is no way to hit mandated ghg saving targets in countries without using it. the business is far, far, far from dead.

In general for HVO, crops are not the primary feedstock anyway. Animal fat, used cooking oil and other wastes are.

Robert333111

"bio fuels":

'Burning biofuels results in emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2), a greenhouse gas.'
Source:
(I'm not yet allowed to post Links, but the latter information is from a "U.S. Energy Information Administration" webpage. The reader can use a Search Engine and search (without the quotes), for: "EIA AND Biofuels and the environment").