Beth on the Bright Side: Fueling Clean Air

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Updated: 3:43 PM Jul 8, 2011 Beth on the Bright Side: Fueling Clean Air For this week's segment of Beth on the Bright Side, CBS19's Beth Duffy highlighted a Charlottesville-based company that is doing good by taking a product no one wants and turning it into fuel. Posted: 6:00 PM Jul 7, 2011 Reporter: Beth Duffy Email Address: beth.duffy@newsplex.com Beth on the Bright Side: Fueling Clean Air

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July 7, 2011

Green Light Bio Fuels takes cooking oil left over from frying french fries, and recycles it.

"Most of our customers are really excited about the opportunity to be a part of the solution, to convert what is waste to them to fuel for every day conventional diesel engines to operate," explained Jim Kingdon, of Green Light Bio Fuels.

Dozens of local restaurants participate in the program. Restaurant employees collect oil in sliver containers,and then the Green Light truck picks it up.

"We started with a few hundred accounts and now we have several thousand accounts from Maryland all the way to Georgia," said Kingdon. Locally, Mono Loco and Whole Foods have accounts.

"What we are doing at Mono Loco is to become as green as possible, and having a company that is willing to do it for me and I don't have to do much myself is just amazing," said Michael Lewis of Mono Loco.

"Regardless of whether we have a lot or a little, it is a wonderful opportunity for any business to look at what they are doing with their cooking oil and redirect it for a better purpose," said Kristen Rabourdin, of Whole Foods.

The situation is a win-win for everyone, not only is the oil re-used but, diesel fuel made from recycled oil burns cleaner with lower emissions.

Latest Comments

Posted by: Energy on Jul 9, 2011 at 04:56 PM

Realsville: Fact: the diesel engine was designed to run on peanut oil not petroleum products. Maybe you should do some research yourself.

Posted by: Pd on Jul 9, 2011 at 10:49 AM

Or, we could use our own resources, ie drill for oil, natural gas etc... And create tens of thousands of jobs in the process. There would be no "conflicts" if we were energy independent. Just like the pro biofuels people argue, we've come a long way in safely extracting resources from the ground. But I digress. I guess we would rather give country's like brazil tens
Of billions of
Dollars to drill just outside our waters.

Posted by: The Green Lantern on Jul 8, 2011 at 09:18 PM

I completely agree. Along with thousands of restaurants, the Navy has set a goal of converting 50% of their petroleum use into renewable energy resources,mainly biodiesel by 2020. They are one of the largest users of fuel resources in the world and this will greatly reduce our dependency on foreign oil and hopefully reduce worldwide conflict.

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