(crossposted from biofuels-biz)At 01:23 PM 5/30/2003 -0700, you wrote: >Hi levent, > >Just a few comments on home quality control: > >Levent wrote: > >I do not know the situation in USA. > >I agree that home brewers can destroy the market if they produce and sell > >bad-products. >mark wrote: >Are you speaking from experience with 'bad homebrew?'
I also want to point out that homebrewers don't generally 'sell' fuel- so there's no huge danger in terms of the market. Co-ops of homebrewers do make fuel for their own internal use, but the minute someone approaches 'selling' on any scale that matters (ie bigger than a coop), they're subject to more scrutiny about compliance with regulations regarding ASTM testing, etc. One big fault of Graham Noyes' original post which started this 'homebrewers destroyed the market' rumor- is that the rumor was simply untrue. Several of us who are VERY familiar with the homebrewers AND the industry in the Western US, explicitly asked Graham what part of the country he was talking about - what state, etc. As usual there simply was NO situation fitting his description. He eventually backed down from that assertion, as Keith pointed out in the recent quotes he posted from Graham. It seems that it is not entirely clear this time, that there simply has NOT been a case of this (widespread bad homebrew distribution (see caveat in my next post)) causing acceptance problems for biodiesel, whereas there have been several cases of industry causing similar problems. In many ways, it is much easier for industry to do damage than for homebrewers to do damage, due to the difference in volumes handled. Most 'consumers' are at least at first somewhat skeptical of homebrew and tend to ask questions about it, so the choice to use potentially untested homebrew or a DIY vegoil method is usually more of an informed decision- and of course it's our responsibility to represent homebrew, commercial, and SVO methods accurately at all times to people we're educating! ******************************* lessons about consumers: If you follow the link to the biodieselnow discussion on the bad quality World Energy fuel- http://forums.biodieselnow.com/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=941 you will see a few very irate arguments from the man who bought the 'bad' stuff from World Energy. I think that this thread contains some good lessons for us: One of his big points is that he pays a premium price for the fuel- and that for that price, the stuff should have at least met spec. (I hear lots of people say they're willing to take risks on homebrewing themselves since it's not costing them much by the way) The bigger worry for me, is that he is also suggesting that it is the fault of WVO-derived feedstock, and that this would not have happened if it was soy oil biodiesel. the rest of the men (?) on the thread in that forum are trying to convince him that it is not the fault of the yellow grease feedstock, and that he is confusing high gel point/cloud point- ie natural characteristics of the type of fuel- with some of what he is seeing. A few more of these situations can actually 'ruin the market' for yellow-grease derived biodiesel. And it's not homebrewers who are doing it. It is also a good example of how a small distributor could probably do better education, than a large one like World Energy. Yokayo Biofuels, (www.ybiofuels.org), a small distributor in northern california, gives all their customers a huge info packet to read, which talks about filter changes, biodiesel properties, where to get more information, materials compatibility, emissions tests... I've suggested that they add 'virgin oil derived fuel characteristics versus recycled content fuel' characteristics, so as to educate consumers about basic stuff like "why the heck is this garbage so dark???" (an actual reaction that many people have on seeing recycled content for the first time, the man in the post above keeps saying "I knew it was bad fuel when I first saw it" and my guess is that it's just the dark red color which worries him.) After hearing this same reaction several times, I've started to we bring samples of fuel that are several colors with me when I do basic fuel demonstrations, bring it to fairs, etc, when I am talking to consumers. It never occurred to me that people are put off by the red color if they are used to virgin soy fuel... so we now make a big point of saying' 'the color doesn't matter' which sometimes leads into a nice discussion of oil characteristics and how they carry over into the resulting biodiesel. on another consumer education topic: Yokayo Biofuels (my model of a good local biodiesel-focused, non-petroleum, non-renderer, non-Big Ag-connected company, therefore one I presume has the best chance of focusing on biodiesel customer service only since that is their primary business) recently filled a tank for a new filling station that is about to open in our area. This filling station decided to carry biodiesel as a result of a prolonged grassroots campaign- Coby Smolens of the Marinbiodiesel email list, and a number of other people, and Yokayo, have been lobbying the owner of a new gas station to start selling B100 for over a year. the owner eventually agreed. One of the campaign focuses has been on 'who is going to fill the tank?'. the choices of distributors in our area were: a petroleum company that distributes the same exact producer's fuel as Yokayo, Yokayo, who was a part of the entire education campaign from the beginning and who would lose some of their retail customers once the gas station opens, and another biodiesel-only company from out of state. Eventually economics won if I understand correctly- Yokayo was able to provide a cheap price, plus there has been a lot more recent letter-writing by various local activists and members of the regional lists, who tried to pursuade the poor gas station owner that we're all going to support him partly because we are Yokayo customers (yes it is very complicated, and I'm sure he's never dealt with customers like this in his gas-selling career!). Anyway, one of the things that we were worried about, was that if the petroleum company got the contract, that they would 'pump and dump'- fill the guy';s tank, give him some nice pretty sign about 'american made biodiesel', but not give him any real signage or handouts or further support, warning consumers about filter plugging, cold weather issues, etc. It's a gas station where people can just drive up and pump, unlike the other options in this immediate area which require more of a commitment (the other filling station option is a 100 gallon prepay at Olympian, or a small business dispensing Yokayo fuel in a non-gas station manner) We were all worried that it could be a setback for biodiesel if curious consumers drove up in mid-winter, filled their tanks, went to the mountains, and then got filter clogging or gelling and irate mechanics, if they didn't also receive proper information at the pump about the special considerations of biodiesel, so we were VERY concerned about being involved in how this information gets out. it was a big part of why there was public pressure to ensure that the gas station owner used the Yokayo distributors rather than petro company one- we had trust that they could do the education/support job properly. INterestingly, many of us were homebrewers- and we were out there lobbying about a gas station, because we worried about industry 'ruining the market' and ruining public acceptance of biodiesel in this area... VERY ironic in light of Graham's postings on industry worries. The good news is that Yokayo have already demonstrated that they are committed to educating their customers and they are working on signage or handouts for filling station customers, so it should not be a problem in this case. This is the first 'ordinary' public pump in the area (ie not the 100 gal prepay or a non-gas station arrangement) so this is a very good precedent for how this should happen. mark ------------------------ Yahoo! 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