I agree that VO and biodiesel seem like a good energy alternative. The main problem with that is most people don't own diesel cars.
I'm running my '03 VW Jetta on straight vegetable oil (waste oil that's otherwise thrown out after using it in a deep fryer). There are pictures at http://vw.ourwebstop.com
Soy is not the most efficient crop for producing vegetable oil. You can get around 100 gallons from an acre of Canola (rape seed). That will significantly alter your calculations. The other ingredients to make biodiesel are lye and methanol. I'm not sure where methanol comes from?
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...this classic column by Steve Ciarcia in Byte magazine from the mid-late 70's. http://books.google.com/books?id=DKajtHfqoRkC&pg=PA225&lpg=PA225&dq=ciarcia+home+alarm+story&source=bl&ots=-51QR-yF0A&sig=KJ7fYiy-dAL9RnRLBr4thoVLoVg&hl=en&ei=1uwXTL6kMJieMraWmYsL&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CB0Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=true
I agree that VO and biodiesel seem like a good energy alternative. The main problem with that is most people don't own diesel cars.
I'm running my '03 VW Jetta on straight vegetable oil (waste oil that's otherwise thrown out after using it in a deep fryer). There are pictures at http://vw.ourwebstop.com
Here's an interesting article regarding how we might produce all the biodiesel necessary to replace the energy we currently import. http://ww.unh.edu/p2/biodiesel/article_alge.html
Soy is not the most efficient crop for producing vegetable oil. You can get around 100 gallons from an acre of Canola (rape seed). That will significantly alter your calculations. The other ingredients to make biodiesel are lye and methanol. I'm not sure where methanol comes from?