Bi-o-diesel: The San Francisco City announces B20 use, Biofuel Recycling Program

The City of San Francisco is now the largest city to use a 20
percent blend of biodiesel (B20) fleet-wide. This announcement, made by Mayor Gavin Newsom
at a biodiesel retail pump today, appropriately comes just two days after Earth Day.
“Every City bears responsibility for taking local action to address our global climate crisis, and
vehicle emissions are a major source of greenhouse gases,” said Mayor Newsom. “When it comes to
the use of alternative fuels, renewable energy sources and greening our city fleet, San Francisco is
demonstrating leadership and commitment on every front.”
“The city of San Francisco departments have announced various strategies using biodiesel to
reduce air pollution and greenhouse gases, and to use local resources to produce biofuels,” said
Randall von Wedel, a biochemist representing the National Biodiesel Board (NBB) in state
regulatory affairs, based in the San Francisco area. “We are grateful to Mayor Newsom for his
initiative,” said von Wedel, “and we hope that San Francisco will serve as a model for other
large cities on how to make a difference in reducing air pollution, greenhouse gases and
dependence on petroleum fuel.”
The city’s “Biofuel Recycling Program,” also announced today, will collect waste grease and
cooking oil from area restaurants. Regional biodiesel plants will process the separated cooking
oils into biodiesel, while the grease will be fed to anaerobic digesters to produce methane gas for
electric power generation at the city’s waste water treatment plant.
The city started the pilot program using B20 in various locations such as the San Francisco
International Airport and the San Francisco Fire Department (SFFD) in 2006. The program
tested the fuel in the Bayview Hunters Point area, which has some of the poorest air quality in
San Francisco. This B20 use complies with the mayoral directive, “Climate Action Plan,” for city
diesel vehicles to run on B20. So far, all the public works vehicles, street sweepers, utility trucks
and more are running on B20. The city also announced all 325 of the waste management
company’s trucks are running on B20. That is in addition to the 2,000 city-owned vehicles that
will be running on B20 by the end of this year.
Other plans to increase biodiesel use in San Francisco include an EPA grant program, through
the City College of San Francisco and local biodiesel firms; to train distributors and fleet
managers. New biodiesel retail pump stations are set to open, with several other initiatives as
well. Partners in the city’s goals have included the Region 9 Environmental Protection Agency
(EPA) and various city agencies. Today’s biodiesel announcement is part of a series of
environmental initiatives touted by the Mayor at yesterday’s Annual Mayor’s Earth Day
breakfast.
Representatives of the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, EPA and the San Francisco
Department of Environment spoke at today’s event, held at the Olympian fleet fueling station at
3rd Street and 23rd. In previous years, this station served as the nation’s first B100 (pure
biodiesel) retail pump in the continental United States. Tellurian Biodiesel, a member of NBB,
now manages the distribution of B20 to the station, part of a network of new B20 stations
planned for that pollution-impacted area of the city.
"The city of San Francisco has made great progress on its goal of converting 100 percent of its
diesel fleet to B20 by the end of the year,” said Eric Bowen of Tellurian. “It is ahead of schedule
with almost 40 percent of the fleet already running on biodiesel. San Francisco is leading the
way toward a more sustainable future," he said.
During the National Biodiesel Conference held in February in San Antonio, NBB honored
firefighters from the San Francisco department for their personal influence in starting SFFD on
B20. Mike Ferry and Brie Mathews received NBB’s “Inspiration” award for their efforts.
Mathews used biodiesel in her personal vehicle and Ferry developed and managed the B20 pilot
program for city fire engines and emergency vehicles, on the committee instituting city-wide
B20 use.
Biodiesel is a renewable fuel that can run in any diesel engine in blends of 20 percent or lower,
blended with diesel fuel. It can be made from any vegetable oil or animal fat through a chemical
process that removes the glycerin. Biodiesel has added fuel refining capacity to the U.S. with
more than 105 biodiesel plants operating currently. Biodiesel significantly cuts harmful
environmental emissions, including carbon monoxide and life cycle carbon dioxide. Production
tripled between 2005 and 2006, from 75 million gallons to about 250 million gallons.Source:-http://www.biodiesel.org/resources/pressreleases/fle/20070425_sanfranb20.pdf