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Barriers that are currently preventing the use of greater percentages of biomass-based diesel fuel blended into petroleum diesel have been identified, along with strategies to overcome them, according to researchers at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL).

The bio-derived diesel fuel in use today is blended into petroleum diesel at a relatively low percentage, typically from 5% to 20%. An NREL team investigated the performance of much higher blends of biodiesel into both renewable diesel and petroleum diesel. They specifically examined blends of 20%, 40%, 60%, and 80%.

A switch to using higher percentages of biomass-based diesel fuels would reduce the amount of greenhouse gases emitted by the transportation sector. Biodiesel is an oxygenate made from fats, oils, and greases. Renewable diesel is made from the same feedstocks but processed to be a hydrocarbon chemically similar to petroleum diesel.

"It's amazing to me, but there are thousands of papers published every year on biodiesel, and almost nobody looks at blends over 20%," said NREL Senior Research Fellow Robert McCormick, corresponding author of the newly published research paper titled "Properties That Potentially Limit High-Level Blends of Biomass-Based Diesel Fuel," which is published in the journal Energy & Fuels.

"This research addresses a major data gap regarding biodiesel blends, both because it looks at high-level blends and because it looks at blends with renewable diesel as well as petroleum diesel. Biodiesel blends with renewable diesel are 100% renewable."

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