MARKETPLACE: BIODIESEL
Broadcast: Nov 11, 2003
What smells like french fries and can power your car?
If you answered biodiesel, you're right. It's a fuel derived
from plants like canola and soy that burns much cleaner than
gasoline and traditional diesel.
Canola makes the best biodiesel and no other country in the
world grows more canola than Canada. Yet, you can't buy biodiesel
at the pumps in this country. You can in most other major
industrialized nations.
There are those in Canada who want to change that. They argue
that domestically produced biodiesel would go a long way to
helping Canada achieve its commitments under the Kyoto Protocol.
But they're facing a hurdle. Currently, it costs about $1
a litre to produce the stuff — that's substantially
higher than the cost of regular diesel.
The industry is calling for government help. They point to
$40 billion in subsidies provided to makers of fossil fuels.
They say a slice of that would go a long way towards making
biodiesel far more available.
Recently the federal government unveiled a $1 billion plan
to cut greenhouse gas emissions. Of that, $12 million was
earmarked for biodiesel.
Marketplace profiles two men who go out of their
way to run their cars on biodiesel and an industry that is
growing frustrated in its efforts to grab a slice of the market.
Biodiesel - read on
^TOP