Alternative Fuels for COOLFUEL: Some You Know, And Some You Don't

To make it the 16,000 miles across the country without gasoline, Shaun, Sparky, and the COOLFUEL team get pretty creative at finding fuel alternatives. It takes some serious effort at times, but they end up polluting less, and definitely spending less! Learn about the alternatives they come up with.

Surely you've heard about biodiesel by now, but in case you've missed out on what it actually is--it's an alternative fuel that results from combining alcohol, most often methanol, with some sort of biologically-sourced fat: vegetable oil, animal fat or recycled cooking grease. It can be mixed in (usually about 20 percent) with regular diesel, to reduce a vehicle's emissions, or used in pure form as a renewable fuel in diesel engines.

Biomass energy, or "bioenergy," is energy from plants and plant-derived materials, and has existed for eons. (Ok not quite, but at least since people began burning wood for cooking and keeping warm.) It can be used for fuels, power production, and in other capacities that would otherwise be filled by fossil fuels. Wood is the largest source for biomass energy today, but others include food crops, grassy and woody plants, agriculture and forestry residues, and the organic parts of municipal and industrial waste. You've probably heard of methane--produced in landfills and factory farms, among other places (as well as naturally occurring)--and this can also be used as a biomass energy source.

Cow power is generated from the methane gas from cow manure. An "anaerobic digester" uses bacteria to decompose the manure to produce the methane gas. Using this as a source of energy is a cost-effective approach to cutting down on industrial organic wastes, which is an important step as methane is a greenhouse-forming gas. Preventing methane from entering the atmosphere by converting it in the anaerobic digester thus provides a source of energy while cutting down on greenhouse gas emissions.

Ethanol is an alcohol (think beer or wine--or any other alcohol, for that matter. Take your pick!) made by fermenting any biomass that has a high carbohydrate content. It goes through a process similar to beer brewing. Ethanol is made from starches and sugars (you may have heard about the food vs. ethanol debate), but scientists are working to develop ways to produce ethanol from cellulose and hemicellulose, the fibrous materials that comprise the bulk of most plant matter. Ethanol is used mostly as an additive for vehicles to increase octane and to cut down carbon monoxide and other smog-causing emissions.

Geothermal energy is heat from the Earth that is found anywhere from shallow groundwater to hot rocks miles beneath the Earth's surface. Specialized power plants convert the heat into electricity and release few, if any, greenhouse gases. Geothermal is a reliable source of energy that can reduce dependency on foreign oil, and has yet to be tapped for its full potential as a source of power for the country.

Hemp oil can be burned as fuel or converted into charcoal, methanol, methane or gasoline through a process known as destructive distillation, or "pyrolysis." Hemp fuel is part of the category of "biomass" fuels, which not only burn cleanly and are virtually free of metals and sulphur, but also release carbon dioxide that is already in the air, and does not come from underground. The carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere thus remain unaffected, whereas when petroleum products are burned, carbon is added to the air--and to global warming.

Landfills are the largest source of human-related methane emissions in the U.S., and capturing and converting landfill gas into energy instead of allowing it to be released into the atmosphere would go a long way to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. It would also reduce odors and other risks affiliated with landfill gas emissions, and prevent methane from further contributing to smog and global climate change.

Solar power is produced by technologies that trap and convert sunlight into heat and electricity, which is called photovoltaic or "PV" solar energy. It can be used to charge electric vehicles and homes around the world, and recently, prices have been dropping and demand has been rising.

Sugar power is derived when sugar cane is crushed and the juice removed (to be converted into sugar), leaving behind a fiber known as "bagasse." This can be converted into a source of clean energy, and is often used as a primary source of fuel for sugar mills. It often supplies more energy than the mill actually needs, which means the surplus can be sold--as a clean, renewable energy--to the consumer electricity grid.

COOLFUEL Alternative Fuels Guide

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