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Carbon Friendly Transport to and around Cornwall

BioTravel - a brief history, it’s not easy being green!

We started BioTravel 2 years ago.  It was originally called Explore South West, and our primary aim was to transport our corporate and group holiday clients to and around Cornwall. 

We decided to apply for the Fifteen Cornwall contract which we duly won along with the Watergate Bay Hotel contract.  Initially we were using normal petroleum diesel as we didn’t really know about biodiesel, or any other alternative fuels.  We had thought about LPG but due to the lack of a reliable source close to our base, we knocked this idea on the head.

After the first year operating as a taxi and minibus company in Cornwall, we worked out that we were using around 4000 to 5000 liters of diesel per month!  This astounded us and as very environmentally minded people (we all surf, kitesurf and generally love our Cornish environment) we could not go on as a taxi company polluting the world as we were.  We decided that something had to be done!

We studied, searched, bugged and begged governing bodies for advice on how to lower our emissions.  We got no help at all.  We wrote literally thousands of emails and letters but to no avail.  We even wrote to Prince Charles who has been running his vehicle using biofuels for about one year.  We received wishes 'Good luck with your venture' but that was it.

With no help but a strong desire to do something different, we decided to give Biodiesel a go.  We gathered as much information from the web as possible (although this was often contradictory and not very much help at all) and decided it was tijme to sink or swim.

Biodiesel - First batch

We received our first batch from a local supplier and mixed it with 50% fossil diesel just to be on the safe side.  The vehicles ran very well and we dared to think that it could be easy being green.  We endured some very cold temperatures with this first batch, but only noticed a slight impairment when starting from cold.  All in all, apart from a few blocked fuel filters which are par for the course, we were very optimistic about this new fuel.

Biodiesel - Second batch

The second batch was delivered, and as before, we mixed it with 50% normal diesel as it was still very cold.  We had major problems as soon as we filled the vehicles up.  The minibuses were spluttering, and the cars were barely starting at all, and when they did there were clouds of smoke bellowing out.  We contacted the supplier who told us that the fuel was fine.  We took several samples out of our fuel storage tank and vehicles.  They were absolutely full of a white sludge, which we later found to be glycerol, or soap.  We contacted the suppliers again who reluctantly came to empty our fuel and sent off their own samples to a testing facility.  There was no offer to help with the cost of repairing our vehicles!  It took us a whole day to clean the soap out of our tank, and cost about £1000 clean all of the vehicles engines.  Biodiesel all of a sudden wasn't looking so sweet.

Biodiesel - Third Batch

Needless to say we changed supplier to another local small scale company and had another delivery with absolutely no problems and as it was getting warmer, we decided to use the biodiesel in its pure form, known as b100.  This worked brilliantly, and the only noticeable difference was the chip shop smell!  We continued using this supplier for a while until.......

 A new batch arrived that had been processed using new equipment that was supposed to make biodiesel to the EU standard when used properly.  We filled up one of the taxi vehicles, which immediately took a dislike to the new fuel.  Smoke was flooding out, starting was a nightmare and the car sounded awful.  On the way to the garage to get the fuel drained, the car lost all power and would only rev half way.

The garage was at a loss, and so we took the taxi to a diesel injector specialist in Cornwall who found that the fuel system was clogged from tank to piston.  15 weeks on and the taxi is still off the road!

Solution

Maybe we are glutens for punishment, but we were still sure that biodiesel and helping the environment must be the future, so we decided to keep using it.  The supplier from the last batch notified us that he wasn't totally sure how to use this new equipment and this would have been the reason for the bad batch.  Thanks for that, a great help!

It seemed that the problems we were having were down to bad biodiesel, and the only way that we could be sure that it was a good batch, was to filter it ourselves.  We therefore went ahead and designed and built a filter system to filter the fuel down to 1 micron which should be small enough to stop any lumps clogging the engine.  We also decided to add a small percentage of diesel (15-20% in the summer and 25-30% in the winter) to make sure that we didn't lose any more vehicles and go bankrupt.

We changed supplier to a larger company that could meet our demands and also tested their fuel on a regular basis to make sure of the quality and we had to build heated storage facilities to make sure the fuel stayed above a critical temperature.

So far we have been operating successfully with this new system which in real terms has costs us thousands of pounds to arrive at.  However, the cost is insignificant when we think that our experience could help to save the planet.

Update

We are now well into our third year and have well over 1,000,000 miles under our belts.  During this time we have learnt a few more things about biodiesel. 

The main point is that you still can not garantee the quality, no matter where you get it from.  You have to be increadibly careful when you use it that you mix it with the right amount of diesel to irradicate any problems that it may cause.

Secondly, a 50% year round mix presents the fewest problems and is usually enough dilution to sort out any impurities.  VW sharans that are make up the bulk of our fleet run quite hapily on this mix with the exception of coked turbos which has been the bain of our lives.  Every 6 months or so, the turbos have to be stripped, and completely cleaned due to carbon build up.  This is at a cost of around £300 per time.  When you have 10 vehicles that need doing, it really adds to your costs.

Thirdly, any time that a car experienced problems such as poor starting, lumpy performance or loss of power, we immediatley isolated our fuel station for inspection, and diluted the offending vehicles with diesel to thin out the bio as much as possible.  9 out of 10 times this sorted the problem, and we just had to add more diesel to our storage tank, leave it to settle, and then continue using it.  1 out of 10 times we had to drain 2,500 litres of bio/diesel blend into IBCs and mop out the tank, settle and filter the IBCs before adding the fuel again.  What a pain!

Fourthly, biodiesel is more expencive than diesel, since waiste veg oil has become such a popular fuel.  expect to pay 5 to 10p per litre more than normal diesel.

Future

We are currently in the process of building a brand new filtering station in order to have a turn key solution for refining all biodiesel down to 1 micron on sight before it gets mixed in our main tank.  This will increase the reliability of our fuel, and make it much easier and less time consuming to do.