{"id":7134,"date":"2016-11-14T06:50:03","date_gmt":"2016-11-13T20:50:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.privatefleet.com.au\/?p=7134"},"modified":"2020-06-20T00:48:29","modified_gmt":"2020-06-19T14:48:29","slug":"a-few-biofuel-myths-busted","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.privatefleet.com.au\/blog\/australia\/a-few-biofuel-myths-busted\/","title":{"rendered":"A Few Biofuel Myths Busted"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"E10\"Tons of research is being done in the area of producing biofuels, even if you might not know this when you go to fill up your vehicle.\u00a0 Heck, there\u2019s whole scientific journals \u2013 several of them, in fact \u2013 dedicated to researching biofuels.\u00a0 A lot of them cover obscure and hard to understand topics, like research to find particular bacteria that are capable of breaking down wood mass so it can be turned into ethanol, but someone\u2019s got to do all the fiddly research if we want something sustainable to put into our cars.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, there are still quite a lot of misconceptions out there to do with biofuels.\u00a0 Biofuels Association Australia, among other people, are doing their bit to educate the public and expose these myths for what they are.\u00a0 Some of these things might have been true in the past but all that research has changed things \u2013 but general thinking doesn\u2019t seem to have caught up.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a handful of these myths that we need to say goodbye to. How many are you guilty of believing?<\/p>\n

Myth #1: E10 and similar biofuel blends won\u2019t work in my car.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The truth: If your vehicle was made after 1986 and can run on regular unleaded petrol (91RON), it can run on an E10 blend (that\u2019s 10% ethanol mixed with the petrol) without any hassles.\u00a0 Higher proportions of ethanol and cars that need 95RON or 98RON may be another story and you\u2019ll need to talk to the manufacturers or the petrol companies about whether this will be OK.\u00a0 If you\u2019re not sure about your car and whether it can run on E10, check it out on the E10 OK website https:\/\/e10ok.initiatives.qld.gov.au\/<\/a>. (If you\u2019ve got a diesel engine, we can tell you right away that no, you can\u2019t use E10. E10 is petrol.\u00a0 Look into biodiesel instead.)<\/p>\n

Myth #2: You have to convert your car before you can use biofuels.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The truth: Once again, if your car was made after 1986 and can run on regular 91RON unleaded, it can take E10 without any hassles.\u00a0 The same goes for your lawnmower, your truck, your motorbike, your boat \u2013 anything with an engine.<\/p>\n

Myth #3: Biofuels aren\u2019t all that hot for sustainability because they compete with food crops for water, land and fertiliser.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The truth: This can be the case with biodiesel that\u2019s sourced from corn oil. However, the big push these days is to make the most of waste products from the food industry, such as leftover pulp and residues from Australia\u2019s famous sugar industry, wood chips from papermaking, brewery residues, etc., etc.\u00a0 In the biodiesel department, they know that the competing resources issue is a problem, so they\u2019re doing things like researching crops that produce food and biofuel feedstock at the same time, biofuel crops that grow on land that\u2019s no good for food or that can cope with less water, and algae that grow happily in your local sewage pond.<\/p>\n

Myth #4: Biofuels cause deforestation.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The truth: For a start off, this certainly isn\u2019t the case here Down Under, as the waste from the sugar industry keeps up a good supply of ethanol.\u00a0 As a matter of fact, this is also the case in Brazil, which also has a big sugar industry \u2013 no, they\u2019re not cutting down vast tracts of the Amazon to grow biofuel stocks.\u00a0 To be fair, they may have cut a bit down a long time ago, but most of Brazil\u2019s sugar industry is located a long way from the Amazon.\u00a0 It\u2019s kind of like saying that Queensland\u2019s sugar industry is causing deforestation in Kakadu National Park in Northern Territory \u2013 Brazil has about a million square kilometres than Australia, don\u2019t forget.<\/p>\n

OK, if you want to get really technical, some of the industries that produce the waste that gets used to make ethanol may have cut down bits of forest that they shouldn\u2019t. However, it\u2019s not the biofuel that\u2019s to blame here but the original industry.<\/p>\n

Myth #5: My vehicle won\u2019t have as much power if I use an ethanol blend in it.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The truth: Actually, ethanol has a higher octane rating than petrol, according to Biofuels Association Australia, so you may end up getting more power instead of less with a biofuel blend.<\/p>\n

Myth #6: Biodiesel is hard on fuel lines and gaskets.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The truth: this will depend on how old your car is and what your fuel lines are made of. If your vehicle is on the older side and\/or you\u2019ve got rubber gaskets and fuel lines, biodiesel will attack the rubber, as it\u2019s a stronger solvent than fossil fuel-sourced diesel.\u00a0 Have a wee chat with your mechanic to see what the innards of your vehicle are made of \u2013 if they\u2019re not rubber, you should be all good.<\/p>\n

To find out more about biofuels in Australia at the moment and find out the latest, have a browse around the Biofuels Association Australia website (http:\/\/biofuelsassociation.com.au\/<\/a>).<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

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  http:\/\/credit-n.ru\/offers-zaim\/webbankir-online-zaim-na-kartu.html<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tons of research is being done in the area of producing biofuels, even if you might not know this when you go to fill up your vehicle.\u00a0 Heck, there\u2019s whole scientific journals \u2013 several of them, in fact \u2013 dedicated to researching biofuels.\u00a0 A lot of them cover obscure and hard to understand topics, like […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[227],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7134","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-australia"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.privatefleet.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7134","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.privatefleet.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.privatefleet.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.privatefleet.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.privatefleet.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7134"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.privatefleet.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7134\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11469,"href":"https:\/\/www.privatefleet.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7134\/revisions\/11469"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.privatefleet.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7134"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.privatefleet.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7134"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.privatefleet.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7134"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}