CU and local transportation officials adopt biodiesel fuel

Cornell vehicles and city and county fleets will get a little cleaner this summer, thanks to an agreement with roots in Cornell's College of Agriculture and Life Sciences (CALS).

Tompkins Consolidated Area Transit, the Ithaca City School District, the Tompkins County Department of Public Works and the town and city of Ithaca have joined Cornell in committing to buy B5, a fuel made from 95 percent traditional petroleum diesel and 5 percent soy-based fuel. The agreement was finalized Dec. 22 and will become effective in August.

The first step toward adopting B5 to run more environmentally friendly transportation was jump-started last summer by CALS Farm Services supervisor Andrew Lewis, who researched biodiesel blends and found other fleets using a biodiesel blend known as B20 (made from 80 percent petroleum diesel and 20 percent biofuel). After receptive CALS administrators approved his proposal to use B20, Farm Services' vehicles made the switch in July.

Even with solid research behind the proposal, switching fuels was a slight leap of faith. "We were the guinea pigs," said Lewis. "But it's worked well. We decided we would test this for CALS to see how it would work over the next year. Now we have burned 8,000 gallons, and we have had almost no issues with it. We plan to continue its use."

In October, Ethan Rainwater '06, Cornell sustainability intern and CALS alumnus, learned about the Farm Services move and began working to bring biofuels to other Cornell and local fleets.

By coincidence, the state contract for fuel purchases was up for renewal in December. So Rainwater pulled together information on biofuels and decided to propose B5 to the larger fleets, since that blend is free from potential B20 quirks. (B20 may thicken in cold weather, for example, and using it may void some vehicle warranties.) He also called in a few experts, including Nathaniel Doyno, AAP '05, now executive director of Steel City Biofuels and Clean Cities coordinator for the Pittsburgh region.

Then he invited Cornell and local transit officials to discuss the option on Dec. 4. "It was really amazing," he said. "We put out the invitation, and everybody showed up."

The managers had the anticipated concerns about cost, engine wear and reliability, said Dean Koyanagi, Cornell's sustainability coordinator, but once they heard from Rainwater, Doyno and Farm Services officials, they were on board. "They had all the right answers to all technical issues," Koyanagi said.

B5 will cost more than traditional diesel, but participants in the agreement say they expect the large volume of the commitment -- 561,000 gallons over the next two years -- to drive the price down substantially. (The exact cost won't be determined until the state bids come in.)

Rainwater hopes the agreement will lead to other environmentally friendly changes down the road.

"This is a first step," he said. "We're hoping to ramp it up in future years as people start to think differently about their fuel needs. The goal is to get people rethinking these systems and how we get around."

Media Contact

Media Relations Office