Local companies are making biodiesel as a cheap and ready-to-use home heating oil additive. But they need more government help.

According to Gov. Jodi Rell's office, home heating oil could reach $5 per gallon this winter.

So what can you do to avoid the petroleum madness?

Aside from slapping solar panels on your rooftop or planting windmills in your backyard, you can tap into a homegrown product available right now that can be used without modification in standard oil furnaces and costs about the same as regular home heating oil: Biodiesel.

The juice has actually been around for about a century. Not to be confused with virgin vegetable oils or waste vegetable oils used in some modified diesel engines, it's a product made from a chemical reaction involving methanol and lye, and an organic oil with fatty acid chains. Chemically known as methyl ester, it's biodegradable and non-toxic and it creates significantly fewer emissions than standard petroleum-based diesel when burned.

Biodiesel was once a clean though expensive petroleum alternative, but since petroleum prices have gone through the roof, it's quickly becoming more affordable. Today, more and more oil heat companies are offering fuel oil with biodiesel as an additive. Locally, there are several companies that provide the eco-friendlier service including Santa Fuel, Hale Hill Farm Biofuels, Greenleaf Biofuels, and Devine Brothers.

Devine Brothers of Norwalk was a pioneer of bioheat in this area. Following the guidelines of the National Biodiesel Board, the company's recipe mixes five percent of the natural ingredient with its premium low-sulfur home heating oil. Greater concentrations of biodiesel are possible but have not been fully tested.

"It began when I read about a bio-heat convention being held in Palm Springs," recalls Mike Devine. "It was very appealing to me-an American product that was better for the environment."

Devine says that "biodiesel has two wonderful benefits. It's high in lubricity, which means it moves through the heating system much easier, and it's a natural solvent that cleans the system as you use it. From a performance standpoint, it creates a better heating oil without needing to modify existing furnaces. And from an environmental standpoint, it reduces fossil fuel emissions, cuts down on what we need to get from the Middle East, and creates jobs right here in the U.S. using non-toxic renewable energy." The biggest downside, he says, "is that it needs to be stored at higher temperatures, which is one of the reasons for blending it with standard oil."

Currently, Devine Brothers sells its bio-blend at the same cost as standard home heating oil. But as public demand for this cleaner fuel increases, will the price drop?

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