You’d think that with highway diesel fuel rolling past $4 per gallon, alternative fuels harvested from corn, soy and other crops would be a natural: good for the budget, good for the environment, good for a tour trucking company’s image. But crop shortages have pushed prices for harvested oils to record highs. And growing awareness of the connection between biofuels, high food prices and deforestation, coupled with indignation over government subsidies and mandates, have created flashpoints of controversy.
With headlines like “The Clean Energy Scam,” mainstream publications like Time magazine have labeled some biofuel sources, such as corn ethanol, “environmentally disastrous,” leading to food shortages for other commodities like soy, and the destruction of forests and wetlands in Brazil and Indonesia to produce biofuels from sugar cane and palm oil. Other influential publications like The New York Times have blamed food shortages and high prices around the world to the rise of “demon ethanol and other biofuels,” calling “the subsidized conversion of crops into fuel” a “terrible mistake.”
“It’s the law of unintended consequences,” says Sean O’Rourke of San Francisco-based Roadshow Services, of the negative side effects. Although the company has actively supported the efforts of early bio-diesel proponents like Neil Young and Willie Nelson, and remains ready to support artists with a pro-biofuel agenda, Roadshow is not in the business of promoting any particular fuel as the answer to all the world’s problems. “We’re just a trucking contractor,” O’Rourke says.
Even if the hidden problems of the recent push into biofuel are emerging, the basic concept — like recycling — is tantalizing enough to spur further exploration and development. Potential advances include a boost in yield and oil content of energy crops and the cultivation of biofuel sources that can be produced on marginal lands or on water, with little or no requirements for petroleum-based fertilizers, such as oil-producing switchgrass and algae. Researchers are also tinkering with ways to use enzymes to extract ethanol from garbage.
Although their sustainability has been called into question, biofuels are probably here to stay. The recently enacted U.S. Renewable Fuels Standard (RFS), part of the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007, calls for the production of 36 billion gallons of biodiesel, ethanol and other biofuels annually by 2022 — about 25 percent of the total energy fuels consumed in the U.S. today.
Currently, biodiesel accounts for less then 1 percent of U.S. diesel consumption, and 2 to 3 percent of diesel consumption in Europe. There are now over 500 retail outlets that sell biodiesel to truckers and consumers, and that number is growing, but limited geographic availability still requires that trucking companies have a game plan for refueling. After all, it doesn’t make much sense to make a high-profile commitment to biodiesel blends if you’re going to be burning part of it up in a fruitless search for a refill.
John Limatola, operational supervisor at Janco Ltd., Wayne, N.J., says “about 95 percent” of Janco’s 80 tour trucks are biodiesel ready. But the lack of readily available biodiesel on the road, coupled with concerns about biodiesel that has degraded due to exposure to air and moisture, has prompted
Janco to arrange for tanker trucks with biodiesel to drive 20 to 100 miles or more to supply its tour vehicles at each venue.
Another biodiesel issue facing trucking companies is the question of whether outlets selling alternative fuels on the road will have sufficient quantities available when the tour bus and trucks stop by. Upstaging Inc., based in Sycamore, Ill., has been learning through experience where biodiesel is available, and in what quantity, according to Upstaging account manager Chanon DiCarlo.
Different artists are also voicing preferences for specific biodiesel blends, DiCarlo says. Some, for example, don’t want to fuel up on biodiesel made with palm oil, because of its possible link with deforestation in Southeast Asia. Another complication is the need for fuel additives to keep biodiesel from gelling in colder climates, although DiCarlo notes that additives are often necessary in freezing climates for regular diesel as well.
Most of Janco’s biodiesel-fueled tours fill the trucks and tour bus with B10 or B20 blends, according to Limatola, referring to biodiesel mixtures of 10 to 20 percent of renewable oil and 90 to 80 percent petroleum-based diesel. For an upcoming Jack Johnson tour, however, the artist has requested that Janco use B99, a blend that is almost entirely renewable fuel.
While some may fear that using blends higher than B20 might void engine warranties, others point out that biodiesel fuel suppliers are responsible for ensuring that the products they sell are free of contamination, and they may be liable if it is not. Generally, biodiesel that is free of contamination does not harm engines.
Due to their lower content of sulfur, a “biocide” that contributes to acid rain, biodiesel blends do have a shelf life. To extend that shelf life, operators need to limit biodiesel’s exposure to air and moisture. It definitely requires more thought and care than traditional diesel fuel blends, Limatola says.
So far, the most significant maintenance concern Janco’s had with biodiesel is its solvent-like properties. “It cleans out an engine’s gook, grime and rust,” Limatola says. This means that fuel filters can get clogged more readily than with regular diesel fuel. Tour drivers keep extra filters and other parts on hand, and Janco makes sure newer trucks get used for tours where biodiesel is the fuel of choice to keep the filtered gunk to a minimum.
Another consideration is the cost of the biodiesel blends, which tend to be priced at a 10 to 15 percent premium to regular diesel, Limatola says. But while some biodiesel critics have also complained about limited power and fuel mileage, Limatola is not one of them.
“There are no issues there,” he says, noting that biodiesel burns hotter than regular diesel, which also helps trucks belch fewer particulates in the air. “It’s a more complete burn. Every drop. If anything, there is a slight increase in power.” He’s more concerned about possible issues down the road with gaskets and seals resulting from the hotter burn, although few of those problems have emerged so far.
If government mandates will play a big role in biodiesel’s growth, touring musicians were instrumental in creating the groundswell of interest that made those mandates politically feasible, creating demand for a fuel choice with hardly any advertising at all, Limatola notes.
One of the earliest and most prominent proponents of biodiesel was Willie Nelson, who owns a stake in the company that supplies truck stops in seven southern states with a seed-derived blend of biodiesel branded as “BioWillie.” Nelson has touted biofuels primarily for their ability to free the U.S. of its reliance on foreign oil — and America’s need to get involved in foreign wars to protect those supply lines.
Adam Gardner, guitarist and vocalist for Guster, a grassroots folk band, is another ardent supporter. He and his wife founded Reverb (www.reverbrock.org), which has used biofuels as part of an effort to “green” tours for artists including Alanis Morissette, Avril Lavigne, the Beastie Boys, Bonnie Raitt, the Dave Matthews Band, Fall Out Boy, Jason Mraz, John Mayer, Kelly Clarkson, Linkin Park, Norah Jones, Panic At the Disco, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Sheryl Crow and The Fray, among others.
If biofuels succeed at addressing one environmental problem only to create new ones, they’re not that different than recycling. The solvents used for the de-inking process for recycled newspaper, for example, produces a carcinogenic sludge. The toxic sludge requires less space in a landfill than the paper itself, but creates a new waste disposal dilemma. Newspaper recycling is also powered by coal or petroleum, whereas virgin paper production is often powered by steam produced by burning wood bark.
Likewise, as food crops are turned into fuel, and as food commodities in general double or triple in price, there are new pressures to turn biodiverse wildlands into pastures and farmland. Farms are better for the environment than parking lots, but they can still threaten biodiversity, create runoff problems and usually aren’t as carbon-rich as the wildlands they displace.
Biofuels from soy and corn made a lot more sense in an era of grain surpluses than they do right now. But the general concept of using the sun’s power to grow energy will always hold promise, especially if it can be executed in a way that minimizes the negative side effects.
One of the positive effects of any “green” effort is that it gets people thinking of other ways to conserve resources. Biodiesel, for example, isn’t the only way that Upstaging is hoping to reduce its appetite for fossil fuels. The company has also invested in Auxiliary Power Units (APUs) for all its vehicles, according to DiCarlo.
These APUs provide heat and air conditioning without requiring that the truck engine idle for hours on end, reducing emissions during idling time — and maybe even saving enough fuel, over time, to offset the carbon deficit created by a killer light show.
