Making Biodiesel from Animal Fat

Recent studies state that in economic haste to power vehicles with biofuel, crops productions now are geared away from food consumption. This disturbance in the law of supply and demand has forced institutions to look deeper into other options for fuel, bent toward making biodiesel from animal fat.

Other options must be furthered considering soy oil, chicken fat and tallow present potentials as biodiesels as well. Close to half of the projected over one billion gallons of biodiesel in 2012 could be attributed to biodiesel. Developing stories like Tyson Foods’ push for a renewable energy division could very well contribute over 2.3 billion pounds of chicken each year! Loosely said, when that time comes, Tyson Foods could produce 300 million gallons of biodiesel!

Even oil giant Conoco Phillips is looking seriously into a scheme with Tyson Foods, targeting production of 174m gallons of low-sulphur biodiesel. Conoco Phillips aim to benefit from the fat byproducts the cows, pigs and chickens which Tyson Foods processes into its finished products. At present, these byproducts are bought by the cosmetics and pet food industries. The new venture of both will find Tyson shipping a large part of animal fat to the refineries of Conoco Phillips for the latter to process it into biodiesel.

Many studies have stated animal fats perform better in biodiesel, prompting many private companies to venture or invest in companies producing animal fats. Commonly used animal fats tallow and lard are used for biodiesel because they are largely composed of saturated fatty acids. Other advantageous to this form of fuel is that animal fats have as high as 74 cetane numbers, translating to better diesel engine performance. Animal fat also lessens exhaust and emissions, have greater engine efficiency.

The cost issue is settled on animal fat as it results to better engine performance and competence. Moreover, biodiesel from animal fat has very minute harmful emissions and noise pollution when put against other forms of biodiesel.

True, the energy crisis won’t be solved with all the fat from thousands of slaughterhouses around the world. With such unbelievable usage of diesel use, the successes of making biodiesel from animal fats are just a pinkie! But if more and more countries and government pursue this method of fueling industries and cars alike, a great revolution would begin. Clearly, when biodiesel becomes a way of life for many cultures, greenhouse gas emissions are decreased and use of fossil fuels will be a thing of history.