Here's the thing...
When I decided to start writing this blog back in September of 2006, my first entry was about my hunt for an alternative fuel car. To hybrid, or not to hybrid. Biodiesel? Not because of the sky high prices of gas at the time, but more because my wife and I were tuning in to the real dangers of global warming and we wanted to do something to lessen our carbon footprint. The Jetta TDI we picked up back then has been a rockstar for us. We run it exclusively on B-99, which means that only 1% of the fuel is petroleum product, the rest is biodiesel. And even with the wacky winter weather we had - the freezes, the snow storms - we only blended the biodiesel with petroleum diesel a couple of times. You see, biodiesel, like other vegetable oils, clouds or gels when it is heavily referigerated (or frozen), so when temps drop below freezing, it is recommended that you mix in petroleum diesel. Otherwise, your car may not start. And I admit, there were a few mornings where I crossed my fingers as I turned the ignition - but it was all good and I had no problems.

Last week, I drove down to Portland and back on less than 3/4 of a tank of Biodiesel. Not too shabby, really. And while we aren't getting the 40+ miles to the gallon that we had hoped for, it is usually more like 33 in city, 36 or so on the freeway, I really have no complaints. Recently, when I saw the gas gauge was low and headed to the pump, I was more than happy to see that the $3.04 I'm paying for biodiesel was less than the cost of regular unleaded by a few cents.

Here in Seattle, driving a biodiesel car is pretty easy. There are several places to fill up, the weather rarely gets too cold, and the price is right. Plus there are loads of biodiesel chat rooms, listservs, and info available. So, check out biodiesel for your next car. Help the environment and save some money at the same time. And I am not even going to mention foreign oil...