Farmers, area restaurants and energy-conscious drivers could benefit from a pilot program to develop homegrown biofuels in the mountains. Blue Ridge Biofuels, AdvantageWest, Biltmore Estate and other partners have been awarded a $130,000 grant from the Biofuels Center of North Carolina in Oxford, NC for a yearlong study of the F3 or “Field to Fryer to Fuel” program. Blue Ridge Biofuels will produce edible oils from regionally grown oil seeds, sell these oils to restaurant partners for their frying needs and then recycle the used fryer oil into biodiesel.
Under the pilot program, Biltmore Estate will plant 50 acres of canola, expecting to harvest 126,000 pounds of canola seeds next spring. Appalachian State University and N.C. State Mountain Horticultural Crops Research and Extension Center will offer their expertise in growing oilseed crops. ASU will lease its mobile oil pressing equipment to Blue Ridge Biofuels, and the first bottles of pressed oil could be used in Biltmore’s restaurants and other local dining next summer. Blue Ridge Biofuels would then collect the used oil and recycle it into more than 5,000 gallons of biodiesel. The Biofuels Center of North Carolina is interested in seeing if the program could work elsewhere in the state. The center received 34 applications for projects. The AdvantageWest-sponsored project was one of only 12 projects receiving some $1.5 million in funding.