by Felicity Bradstock (OilPrice.com) – Biofuels have grown increasingly popular in recent years as a way to reduce emissions when it comes to both transport and heating. -In the UK, around 1.7 million homes still rely on kerosene heaters, and the government believes those could be adapted to run on hydro-treated vegetable oil. -In Mexico, there is a major push to expand the use of biofuels from cooking oil for public transportation, which would be a low-cost alternative for diesel.
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But in recent months, the idea of using vegetable oil as a feedstock has gained more traction. In the UK, politicians are proposing the use of vegetable oil for heating in rural areas. A new bill encouraging the removal of duties on renewable liquid heating fuels, as well as incentives to reduce the use of kerosene in existing boilers, is being introduced to parliament by the former environment secretary George Eustice.
Around 1,7 million homes in the U.K. still rely on kerosene boilers, as they are not connected to the mains gas grid. There are already plans in place to ban the buying of new boilers from 2026, as homes switch to air-source or ground-source heat pump systems, but this new bill could help boost the uptake of green alternatives to kerosene between now and then. Eustice suggests that fitting new heating systems can be extremely costly, creating a “huge barrier” to uptake. This new bill would support homes across the country in the minor adaption of kerosene boilers to make them suitable to run on hydro-treated vegetable oil (HVO), which could reduce related greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 88 percent, according to Eustice. READ MORE