DIESEL TO HAVE BIODIESEL MIX FROM USED COOKING OIL

India on Tuesday began experimenting with doping diesel with a small portion of biodiesel extracted from leftover cooking oil in kitchens to cut reliance on imports as well as reducing carbon emissions.

Diesel, India's most used fuel, is made from crude oil, for which the nation is 85 per cent dependent on imports. Imports can be reduced if a portion of diesel extracted from fossil oil is supplemented by an equally combustible diesel.

Bio-diesel can be produced from vegetable oil, animal fat, tallow and waste cooking oil, Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) chairman S. M. Vaidya said at a function to launch diesel doped with used cooking oil (Uco).

To start with, 7 per cent biodiesel extracted from Uco is being doped in diesel and the supply of such fuel was started on Tuesday.

As much as 23 million tonnes of edible oil is consumed in the country annually. Out of this, 3 million tonnes of oil is discarded after use and is called used cooking oil, he said. "There is a potential to generate 222 crore litres of Uco annually but no structure exists for collection of waste cooking oil," he said.

To encourage this, the oil companies floated an expression of interest (EoI) seeking biodiesel made from Uco, offering a fixed price for five years and a guaranteed offtake for 10 years.

As many as 30 LOIs have been issued at the industry level (by IOC, Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd) which will give 26.62 crore litre of biodiesel in years to come, it was informed at the function.

India consumed 72.7 million tonnes (about 8,000 crore litres) of diesel in the fiscal year 2021.

The first lot of used cooking oil-based biodiesel blended diesel was flagged off by oil minister Dharmendra Pradhan.

New Delhi, May 4: