Biodiesel

An environmentally superior alternative to petroleum diesel, biodiesel can be used in any diesel engine and as home heating oil. Biodiesel is typically produced from animal fat or vegetable oils through a process called transesterification.

Benefits include:

  • Biodiesel emits 78% less carbon dioxide than petroleum
  • Biodiesel reduces particulates, a leading cause of respiratory illness
  • Biodiesel is produced domestically, and reduces America’s dependency on foreign sources of energy
  • Sources of biodiesel are renewable
Currently, biodiesel produced in the U.S. is derived from food-based vegetable oils, primarily soybean and canola oil. In recent years, prices for these feedstocks increasingly mirrored energy prices and have been subject to unprecedented volatility. Also, there is increased awareness of the danger of worldwide food shortages if arable land is used for fuel instead of food.

Renew produces biodiesel from waste vegetable oil, a relatively inexpensive, non-food based feedstock.

How Renew enhances shareholder value with biodiesel

Renew’s business strategy is to integrate the procurement, production, financing and off-take of waste vegetable oil-based biodiesel for domestic distribution. Utilizing better process technology and test equipment, Renew can produce high quality biodiesel from waste oils and grease. While the supply of waste vegetable oil and brown grease is not sufficient in agriculture producing areas of the U.S. (established rural locations for ethanol and biodiesel production facilities), large metropolitan areas do have sufficient quantities. To this end, Renew has formed partnerships with companies that are currently collecting waste vegetable oil and brown grease.

The U.S. Northeast home heating oil market alone is estimated at approximately 12 billion gallons per year. Just a 2% blend of biodiesel will create a demand far in excess of the 30-40 million gallons per year of biodiesel that are being produced in the NE at this time.

What Renew is doing now with biodiesel

Renew Energy has partnered with The Doe Fund of NYC to develop and operate a 5 million gallon capacity biodiesel facility. Legacy Oil LLC will convert used cooking grease collected by the employees of the DOE fund. This partnership melds the best strengths of Renew and The Doe Fund, and is a significant project for Renew in 2008 and 2009. More information about DOE can be found at www.doe.org and www.rwaResourceRecovery.org.

Renew is promoting additional projects with suppliers of waste feedstocks across the U.S.

 

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