INL research helps turn waste grease to fuel

Idaho National Laboratory
By Mike Wall, INL Research Communications Fellow

While oil companies drill deeper and deeper for increasingly hard-to-find petroleum, legions of mini-gushers lie untapped right on the surface. There's one behind every restaurant, for example, and in the heart of every potato-processing plant. Such businesses produce loads of waste grease, a precious resource that can be converted to clean, green biodiesel. And a company called BioFuelBox is doing just that, thanks in part to key research by chemists at Idaho National Laboratory.

Though a young company — its maiden plant in American Falls, Idaho, just started running in August 2009 — BioFuelBox has already made a big splash. BusinessWeek magazine recognized it as one of 2009's 25 most intriguing start-ups, and the World Economic Forum recently named BioFuelBox one of 26 "Technology Pioneers" for 2010. The accolades flow because the company, with INL help, has found a way to make the world's most environmentally friendly, socially responsible transportation fuel — and a profit at the same time.

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