Some folks are using everything from used french fry grease to virgin canola oil to power their diesel vehicles, and sometimes they even get it for free. They say that beats paying the skyrocketing prices at the gas pump.

Biodiesel is a fuel produced when organic oils are combined with alcohol or blended with petroleum diesel fuel. Another option is to use fuel made purely from organic oils like soybean, rapeseed oils, animal fats or waste vegetable oils. A conversion kit that allows a diesel car to run on used vegetable oil sells for about $800, according to Greasecar.com.

John Leo, of Juneau, drove a van from Massachusetts to Alaska using straight vegetable oil. The vegetable oil required minor adjustments on the vehicle to operate effectively, but Leo was able to collect oil from restaurants all along the way up north. Filtering bits of food out of his fuel while on the road was a challenge, but he made the whole trip with no prior experience in using vegetable oil to power his van.

“I did it,” Leo said in an e-mail interview, “because the world needs to know there are options besides non-renewable oil.”

On a handwritten sign in the Wood Center, Fred, who was unwilling to share his last name, proclaimed the benefits of using biodiesel and provided a recipe and a phone number. Fred wants to promote an alternative to petroleum-based fuel. In his junkyard, he has made a makeshift biodiesel plant consisting of a barrel with a spigot on it and a paint mixer. This is where he mixes the biodiesel he puts in his diesel vehicle.

Biodieselamerica.org states that homemade biodiesel can be made for as cheap as 50 cents per gallon, as long as the cooking oil has been provided for free. Fred said he makes about 16 gallons of fuel at a time by mixing methanol, lye, and used fryer grease from restaurants. The fryer grease is often free, because restaurants generally have to pay to dispose of it. Lola Tilly Commons, for example, fills a 50-gallon barrel with used grease several times a month. Fairbanks Pumping and Thawing hauls it away for about $150 each time. Fryer grease must be kept warm to mix but is relatively harmless. The other ingredients have harmful fumes and can irritate the skin.

Biodiesel can be used in place of diesel but has some setbacks in very cold weather. Biodieselamerica.org says that wax crystals can clog fuel filters in all types of diesel fuel, but biodiesel has a higher gelling temperature, and is more susceptible to this problem. The site suggests using a block heater, a fuel tank heater and other heating mechanisms to keep the vehicle operating effectively. Fred claims that as long as his vehicle is plugged in, the engine runs fine—even in Fairbanks's winter weather.

Using vegetable oil as an alternative to fossil fuel is a national trend embraced by a broad spectrum of people. Countless sites offer information and help to anyone interested in making their own fuel, and campaigns for biodiesel on a much larger scale are also on the move.

Biodiesel America is a non-profit campaign to convert 100,000 school buses to biodiesel by 2010. Soybean farmers in the Midwest grow beans which are converted to soy diesel and sold commercially at fuel stations like regular diesel. These people are not only on a mission to help solve the country's energy problems, but they also want to save the planet. The National Biodiesel Board reports that carbon monoxide emissions from biodiesel “are on average 48 percent lower than carbon monoxide emissions from (regular) diesel.”

Four years ago, UAF economist Hans Geier began investigating canola oil, a common cooking oil and possible component of biodiesel. Though he does not use canola oil to power his diesel pickup, Geier wanted to investigate the possibilities of growing canola oil in Alaska. He has discovered that canola plants have good potential. The brighter growing season produces much higher oil content than in the Lower 48. This is important because it shows that producing canola oil in Alaska would be much more efficient and opens up possibilities for biodiesel. Other states across the nation have utilized their farming land for biodiesel through using various virgin organic oils such as soy. The price of this version of biodiesel is more expensive and sometimes exceeds the price of petroleum diesel fuel. It can get as high as $3 a gallon and will only become a viable alternative if the price of diesel increases further.

Using biodiesel is not as convenient as fossil fuels, but Fred says alternative energy is definitely worth it. “It isn’t the solution to the (nation’s) energy problem, but it can be your solution.”