Greasy Rider

By Greg Melville

When it came time to get a second car, freelance journalist Greg Melville fancied a big shiny red pickup truck. His wife Ann Marie nixed that idea. Instead she suggested he get an old diesel vehicle and convert it to run on waste vegetable oil. So Greg bought a 1985 Mercedes diesel station wagon for $4000 and then spent about another $4000 getting it repaired and getting the veggie oil converter installed.
Then Greg got a brilliant idea. Why not take that car and drive it across country, from his home in Vermont to California, running it solely on oil scrounged from the grease dumpsters of restaurants? Since Greg is mechanically challenged, he talked his buddy Iggy, who is good with cars, into coming along.
So they load up the wagon with several gallons of oil and they headed to California, making stops along the way at various locations where people are trying to reduce energy consumption. Iggy also challenged Greg to continue to explore greener alternatives in various side trips taken after the jaunt to California is over.
Among some of the places visited are Al Gore's mansion in Nashville, Tennessee; where it appears Gore is all talk and no action especially when Greg finds out Gore's huge mansion uses about 190,000 kilowatt hours of electricity in a year compared to about 10,800 for the typical family home.
They also stop at Fort Knox, where a conversion of the heating and cooling to ground source heat pumps has cut the heat & air conditioning bill by about 50%. Another stop is a wind farm in Minnesota and a "green Walmart" in Texas.
One of the highlights of the trip has to be the Google headquarters in California where they have gone all out to make their operation not only Earth friendly but also employee friendly. The perks their employees get must make working there a dream.
The hardest part of the trip is getting and dealing with the waste grease. Often the grease is rancid and they have to live with the foulness of it, which they keep stored in the car. They often end up smelling like garbage. Plus the grease has to be pumped and filtered and stored in 5 gallon jugs and if it has any water in it, it can ruin the car's engine. It is really hard on the car's suspension, carrying those big jugs of grease and it eventually goes out. Still the trip goes on and they do make it to California.

This was an interesting book, entertaining while being informative. His description of the benefits of wind generated electricity made me wish I had a wind powered turbine to provide my home with free electric. It was also inspiring reading about the changes that green technology can bring about. I do have to say that the grease car did not appeal. Handling stale, often spoiled grease, pumping it, filtering it, storing it, the stench; it just sounds like too much. But it makes for a good story.

New Word

Swiftboat: To attack a politician with specious claims; To trick, scam, or swindle. '"They want to swiftboat Al Gore, not get the truth."'