Biodiesel Fuel Adopted for Vehicles Participating in Dakar Rally 2009
Toyota Tsusho Corporation (Headquarters: Nagoya City; President:
Junzo Shimizu), Toyota Chemical Engineering Co., Ltd. (Headquarters:
Handa City; President: Fumio Inoue), Ohta Oil Mill Co., Ltd.
(Headquarters: Okazaki City; President: Shinzo Ota), and FEM
(Headquarters: Yokohama City; President: Mikito Wakamatsu) have jointly
developed a highly efficient and superior quality biodiesel fuel (BDF)
manufacturing process as an environmentally responsive recycling-type
business operation (press release issued on January 21, 2008). The BDF
manufactured by this process was adopted for vehicles competing in the
Dakar Rally 2008.
The popularization of BDF started primarily in Europe, as an
environmentally responsive and alternative fuel for diesel. We are
anticipating an increase in demand for BDF on a global scale, due to
the recent rise in awareness about environmental issues and global
warming strategies, as well as from the perspective of energy security.
BDF is based on the carbon neutral concept, which indicates that
the carbon dioxide plants absorb during their growth process offsets
the amount of carbon dioxide emissions during combustion, resulting in
a total carbon dioxide emission of zero. Furthermore, the newly
developed process has the following features:
(1) Because the manufacturing method uses no water, the equipment can
be installed anywhere, including locations without modern
infrastructure.
(2) No waste materials are produced or they are reused, including
discharged water.
(3) The equipment is energy conserving, with a simple configuration.
The system itself is also designed to be environmentally
friendly.
We intend to proceed in the future with considerations for
business models involving consumption and production within the same
region, for both domestic and overseas applications.
