The Vandal Clean Energy Club celebrated the completion of a project to revamp biodiesel production facilities with the grand opening of a new fueling system Friday.
The project to update outdated processing facilities in the J.W. Martin Lab and install a fuel pump for biodiesel-powered vehicles spanned the entire spring semester and was the result of countless hours of work from Vandal Clean Energy Club members, according to club member Adrien Malinowski.
“It honestly feels great seeing it all work out,” Malinowski said. “We’ve all been here multiple nights a week in our free time making it all come together.”
Sara Murphy, Vandal Clean Energy Club vice president, said the goal of the grand opening was to educate students and community members about biodiesel so they can make informed decisions about it being implemented on a larger scale.
Sara Murphy | Courtesy
But the club is focusing on the local scale for now – they want the university to switch all of its diesel vehicles to a 20% biodiesel blend, reducing each vehicle’s emissions by at least 20%, according to biodiesel research support scientist Chad Dunkel.
Biodiesel, an alternative to petroleum diesel made from vegetable oil, is completely carbon neutral and could assist in achieving the university’s goal of carbon neutrality by 2030, Murphy said.
“We are getting pretty close to 2030 now and here we have oil that we can’t burn fast enough,” Murphy said, gesturing to four 300-gallon containers of used cooking oil from the Idaho Commons food court behind her.
With a new president taking office this summer, there is new potential to further their goals and the sustainability of the university, said Melissa Marsing, Vandal Clean Energy Club president. She said the club intends to have a proposal detailing the program’s safety, efficiency and far-reaching benefits on the president’s desk on the very first day of his term.
“Clearly biodiesel works. We already power two vehicles entirely on it,” Marsing said. “We just need administration to understand just how amazing biodiesel can be.”
One major improvement featured at the opening event was an updated reactor which will reduce the time to make a batch of fuel from nearly a week to less than one day, Marsing said, while improving safety and quality of the fuel.
Melissa Marsing | Courtesy
Graduate student Brian Hanson led guests through each step of the newly completed production system, explaining in detail the function of each piece. One addition will allow for the reuse of methanol – an alcohol used in conversion – bringing production costs down to $1 per gallon, Hanson said.
The tour culminated with Marsing cutting the ribbon on a glossy 700-gallon fuel tank and pump intended to make fueling the club’s vehicles easier. To inaugurate the new pump, Marsing filled up the “Bio Bug,” the program’s signature Volkswagen Beetle, filling with the faint smell of fried chicken.
The a Sustainability Center grant provided a grant to fund the purchasing of a digital pump for the fuel. The tank and was in “absolutely terrible” condition when the club first received it, according to Murphy. Members gathered two or three nights a week for the entire semester to restore it to working condition.
Murphy said the passion that club members dedicated to this project and to the biodiesel program overall was one of their greatest strengths in the ongoing effort to implement a biodiesel mandate on campus.
“We need (administrators) to be in here, to see all of this, as soon as possible,” Murphy said. “And we want students to know about it so they can push for it too — they should know all the good things this can do for all of us.”
Riley Haun can be reached at [email protected]
Editor’s note: This article previously misidentified what the Sustainability Center grant helped purchase and misstated the size of the fuel tank, which is 700 gallons.