Some French motorists are dodging the near-record price of conventional oil by illegally using pure vegetable oil as a substitute for diesel, a French sunflower oil distributor said.
"At least 2,000 to 3,000 French motorists are using between 50 and 100 percent pure vegetable oil in their tanks right now," said Alain Juste, manager of Valenergol, a south-west-based sunflower oil distribution company.
Despite the European Union pushing for the development of pure vegetable oils as an alternative to traditional fuels, they have never been legally permitted in France. Motorists who use them risk being fined. But in Germany, trucking companies are increasingly using normal rapeseed oil as a cheap fuel alternative to higher-grade rapeseed biodiesel.
Juste, who is also president of the Pure Vegetable Oil Institute, said he based his estimate on the 700 small-sized crushing machines currently in use. "Most of the oil production goes in car tanks," he said.
Juste, who has been producing vegetable oil for motorists for the last 12 years, says the interest in pure vegoil has multiplied by 30 in the last three to four months, when pump prices started to take off.
"Vegetable oil, which is either made from rapeseed or sunflower, costs 0.70-0.80 euros per litre against 1.18 euros ($1.42) per litre for diesel," he added.
"Many motorists are also going straight to supermarkets to buy vegetable oil destined for human consumption," he said.
However, usage of human consumption oil should not exceed 50 percent in one's tank and should be filtered, Juste warned.
"Over that limit you could have injection problems in your motor," he said.
Juste noted that damage can occur unless the right adjustments are made inside diesel engines. "This is especially true in the winter because the oil starts to solidify at three degrees celsius and congeals at minus 17 degrees celsius, " he said. And the more recent the car is, the more expensive those kits become.
"For cars with indirect injection systems, if you use over 50 percent of vegetable oil in your tank, you have to put a kit in place that costs around 200 euros," he said.
He added that for cars with direct injection systems, motorists needed to pay over 300 euros if they wished to consume over 50 percent of pure vegetable oil.
The cost more than triples for last generation motors, he said. "For a vegetable oil usage exceeding 5 percent in those motors, motorists will have to spend between 600 and 1500 euros," he added.
He said the cost was exactly the same for cars using Diester (France's main biodiesel producer).
"We think that it is about time to end the French exception that goes against European wishes and lift the TIPP (special petrol tax) on those oils as well as make them legal," Juste said, adding that Valenergol had been asked to pay a hefty fine for not paying the tax.
He added that the petrol lobby was doing everything in its power to make sure it would profit as much as possible from the French race to boost its biofuel output.
The government has announced it aims to reach 5.75 percent biofuel content in fuels by 2008, 7 percent by 2010 and 10 percent by 2010.
Biofuels in France are spilt between ethanol, a combustible fuel made from sugar beet or cereals that can be blended with conventional fuel, and biodiesel, mainly produced from rapeseed, which is then blended with diesel.
"It's outrageous that biofuels such as ethanol and biodiesel should get tax breaks when we are not even allowed to commercialise our product which is far more friendly to the environment," he said.
"The development of the pure vegetable oil sector could be an incredible opportunity to attract young people to the farming profession at a time of depopulation of the countryside," Juste added.