College Tractor to Run on Vegetable Oil

Betty Gabrielli - May. 12, 2009

The next time you see an Oberlin College grounds person mowing the lawn you may pick up the whiff of fried foods emanating from the tractor instead of diesel exhaust. That is because veggie-oil powered lawn mowing has come to campus.

The brainchild of Oberlin Grounds Services Manager Dennis Greive and his crew, the changeover was implemented by Sam Merrett of Full Circle Fuels, who converted the vehicle to run on 100% waste vegetable oil from campus dining halls. Greive believes it is one of the first such conversions by institutions of higher learning in the country.

The project is supported by the Green EDGE Fund (Ecological Design and General Efficiency), which was created in 2007 to encourage sustainability projects initiated by students and community members.

Oberlin College vehicles, such as the grounds tractors, currently burn more than 3,000 gallons of diesel fuel a year, resulting in 66,000 lbs (33 tons) of CO2 emissions. The tractor conversion will reduce the College’s consumption of fossil fuels by at least 700 gallons and eliminate more than 14,000 lbs (7 tons) of CO2 emissions. The fuel expenditure also will be reduced by about $1500.

“Every ton of CO2 emissions we are able to eliminate is another step towards reaching our goal of carbon neutrality,“ says Nathan Engstrom, coordinator of Oberlin’s Office of Environmental Sustainability. “The more creative and innovative we can be, the sooner we'll reach that goal and the less money we'll have to spend to get there.”

Engstrom adds that although there are no concrete plans to convert additional vehicles, the success of the tractor conversion could well lead to other vehicles being converted in the future.