How To Make Biodiesel From Camelina

Camelina is a new product out these days that can be used to make biodiesel, it is friendly to our environment and is an alternative to diesel fuel. Producers of camelina say that it can be produced for a much lower price than other biodiesel crops, for the first time ever it is making the fuel competitive when it comes to price with its petroleum counterpart.

Due to the fact that gas prices continue to soar at the pumps, there has been increased interest in alternative fuel sources so that the nation won’t have to depend on foreign oil as their source. The crop is ideal for many different areas. Farmers just simply have to get used to growing it.

Camelina is great because it is very tolerant of cold weather and can also be planted as soon as tractors are able to get out onto the fields. It can be harvested during the month of July, and it has a high possibility of being double cropped.

In Ireland, camelina is something that they are definitely looking into. One of the principal barriers that has to be dealt with when thinking about the development of Irish biodiesel is the cost of the rape seed. The rape seed is used as feedstock for the biodiesel plant.

The financial viability of any biodiesel plant always depends on the cost of the feedstock which is used in biodiesel production. In Ireland, many alternatives have been considered for the reduction of feedstock costs, one of these is the use of a lower cost oil seed like camelina.

Camelina can be grown very successfully in Ireland. Typically the seed yields 3 tonnes per hectare during winter. During the spring it yields 2.5 tonnes per hectare. The crop doesn’t really have high fertilizer and pesticide requirements when you compare it to rape crops even though the oil yield of Camelina seed is quite similar to that of rape seed. Because there are lower inputs required for camelina production, the result is a lower seed cost and therefore making it a more favourable energy ratio than rape seed.