SANTA CRUZ -- Customers of The Green Station, the only biodiesel station in Santa Cruz, Monterey and San Benito counties, saw prices spike 86 cents, or more than 22 percent last week, due to a months-long congressional failure to renew a tax credit that has helped keep biodiesel producers in business.
For a few days, customers were promised conditional rebates based on whether Congress renewed a 5-year-old tax incentive program but, when record-keeping proved too cumbersome, the company dropped prices partway, deciding to float losses for now in the hope they would be recouped eventually by a tax credit extension.
(The success of the biodiesel fuel industry relies heavily on biodiesel testing <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s32Ke2VzrqU>, not only at the production level but at the consumer level, where degraded fuel may cause engine failures. Of major concern to diesel and biodiesel users is the very real possibility that water has contaminated their fuel. (See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YcczdvPyAk). The potential catastrophic impact of this problem is discussed at length in this video at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lh4qhXc_5s&feature=youtube_gdata.
Fleet Fuel's family of inexpensive biodiesel test kits is just a click away on the internet at:
<http://fleetbiodiesel.com/biodiesel_testing_and_supplies.html>)
