Vanderbilt Biodiesel Initiative

For the latest updates please visit the Vanderbilt Biodiesel Blog.
For more info or to get involved please contact Derek.

What is the Vanderbilt Biodiesel Initiative?

How can I help?

What is biodiesel?

How does production of biodiesel work?

Where can I get more information on VBI?

What is VBI? ...back to top

Vanderbilt Biodiesel Initiative is a self-sufficient, sustainable, student-run biodiesel production system at Vanderbilt University. The production system is used to convert Vanderbilt Dining Services waste vegetable oil into environmentally responsible biodiesel fuel that can be used in any of the university's diesel-fueled engines. These include vehicles such as student activity vans, medical center buses, and landscaping machinery. The goal is to curb the consumption of petroleum-based fuel by the Vanderbilt community with a system that is economically and environmentally sustainable. Also, the initiative aims to educate others about the viability of biodiesel as an effective alternative fuel.

Helping out with the Biodiesel Initiative ...back to top

As VBI is a student-run organization, we are always enthusiastic to have more help. We have lots of different jobs that need doing, so chances are we have one you can help out with. If you would like to be involved - please contact Derek - we'd love to have you!

Here are some things we are looking for people to help us out with:

Oil collectors: Help us get the waste veggie oil from dining locations. This means getting to drive our collection trailer around to campus dining locations in some sweet coveralls.

Biodiesel “Cookers” : Learn how to run the biodiesel production system under the guidance of one of our 'experts'. Maybe even become an 'expert' yourself and help teach others.

Have other skills? What about:

Soap Makers/Marketers: The biggest biproduct of the system is glycerol, which we'd like to put to use as soap. Making quality soaps from the glycerol and marketing them effectively would be a huge help both in bringing in funds for the project and making the project more sustainable by reusing what would otherwise be a waste product.

Publicists: We'd like everyone on campus to know about VBI's biodiesel work. We'd also like to spread the word beyond campus.

Quality Tetsers: Remember titrations fondly from chemistry lab? Want to do more? Make sure that our biodiesel is up to snuff by doing some lab testing on a smaller scale.

Educators: We are looking to teach as many people about biodiesel as possible. This includes not only making the system easier to learn for university students (both here and at other universities, as we'd like what we learn to be transferable), but also for other groups. For instance, one campus group is interested in doing a biodiesel experiment for high school chemistry students. We'd like some help making the system and production process simple to learn.

System Engineers: We now have a production system, but it can always be better, more efficient, simpler. And chances are we're going to want to expand it. Also, currently we need to get the production system running on a biodiesel-powered generator, to make the system more truly sustainable.

Researchers: The world doesn't know that much about biodiesel - we think it should know more. As Vanderbilt is a research university, we'd love to use the system to do some rigorous academic research on biodiesel - its effects on vehicles, its emissions, its cold-weather properties, how to minimize some of its shortcomings.

What is biodiesel? ...back to top

Biodiesel is a fuel that is created by a transesterification process of vegetable oil. Pure vegetable oil or filtered waste vegetable oil are combined with methanol and lye in specific proportions and heated. A chemical reaction occurs and produces biodiesel and glycerol. The glycerol can be turned into a useful soap product, and the biodiesel can be used directly by any diesel engine or can be blended with petroleum-based diesel in any proportion.

Biodiesel has been extensively studied by many universities including Vanderbilt. It has many advantages over regular diesel and few shortcomings. It burns cleaner, increases engine life, reduces engine noise, cleans the fuel system, eliminates the “diesel smell,” is safer to handle and transport, and transforms a waste product into a useful substance. Biodiesel has not become a viable alternative to petroleum-based diesel on a large scale because the price of vegetable oil has not yet made widespread distribution economically beneficial. However, small scale production and testing using waste vegetable oil has been happening for years.

How does production of biodiesel work? ...back to top

More updated information and pictures of the production system on this soon.

VBI has built a biodiesel production system and will be focused this semester on testing the system to establish the techniques and protocols necessary to eventually scale-up production in a safe manner. The “apple seed” system is currently set up in a plant operations facility on campus and VBI is working on making the system self-sustainable in energy. The goal is to have the energy required to run the production system come strictly from a small biodiesel-fueled generator.

Robin Midgett, an experienced biodiesel producer and electrical technician at Vanderbilt, has been involved in the design and construction of the system and will continue to assist the project in producing biodiesel. Robin has been producing and using his own biodiesel exclusively for three years and has agreed to help start the pilot system and expand the system as necessary.

Now that the pilot system is installed, Robin and Andrea George (sustainability coordinator for Vanderbilt) will help train VBI team members on how to safely produce high quality biodiesel fuel from waste vegetable oil. Our preliminary goal is to generate 100 gallons of fuel per week with the pilot system. Trained biodiesel “experts” will lead the biodiesel production while other interested students apprentice. This teaching style distributes the required work while simultaneously disseminating knowledge and training future experts. We will also be producing and publishing relevant materials on our website to help other universities follow our lead.

More Information ...back to top

The Project's Beginnings: Proposal for mtvU&GE's Ecomagination Challenge

The Initiative began in the Fall of 2006 when a group student instructors from the Wilderness Skills Course (WilSkills), decided to enter a campus greening grant contest hosted by GE and mtvU. The initial group also consisted of several students from the campus environmental group, Students Promoting Environmental Awareness and Recycling (SPEAR). The student group worked hard to assemble an application package for the mtvU GE Ecomagination Challenge in an attempt to win $25,000 to implement a campus greening project. The Vanderbilt application made it into the top ten out of more than 100 entries. In the end a similar biodiesel project at MIT ended up winning, but by that point there was enough student energy behind the Initiative that it was bound to succeed, even without the $25,000 prize.

Grant Proposal Materials:

Vanderbilt Biodiesel Application Video: QuickTime Large, QuickTime Small, Google Video, YouTube

Vanderbilt Biodiesel Written Application

Vanderbilt Biodiesel Entry Profile

List of Ecomagination Finalists

News Articles

VU Undergraduate Research Journal, May '07

SustainVU Article, Aug '07

Vanderbilt Register, July '07

Vanderbilt Orbis Article, Feb '07

InsideVandy, Feb '07

Vanderbilt Register, Feb '07

InsideVandy, Jan '07

If you are interested and would like to be involved, please contact Derek - we'd love to have you!