Marc Lindsey is a row-crop farmer and poultry producer who signed up for the biodiesel class held this week at the Tift County High School agriculture department.

His operation, just over the Tift County line in Berrien County, consists of two chicken houses and a 200-acre farm.

“I have a small operation,” Lindsey said. “There are about 11,000 birds in each of my chicken houses.”

The 33-year-old Lindsey said he has been in business for two years and became a poultry producer for Sanderson Farms in Adel after responding to an ad in The Tifton Gazette. Lindsey said he is a specialty breeder and has hens and roosters. He sends the fertilized eggs to Adel. Once hatched, the day-old chicks are sent to another facility to be raised.

“I’m looking for a cheaper source of fuel,” Lindsey said of his reason for signing up for the biodiesel class.

“Lights and ventilation,” he said, are his two big energy needs at his chicken houses. “Without ventilation they die.”

Lindsey said he has a stand-by generator that is diesel-powered.

“I know when Katrina hit in Louisiana they had to run for six weeks on stand-by,” Lindsey said.

Lindsey said he also requires fuel for the four tractors he uses to grow soybeans, corn and wheat. “I probably spend $1,000 a month of fuel,” Lindsey said. He said he tries to conserve fuel and does “strip tillage” to conserve both fuel and moisture in the soil.

Lindsey found the biodiesel class very helpful and the “recipe” for the biodiesel “very simple and easy.” He said he is presently paying $2.25 a gallon for off-road fuel and he can make the biodiesel for about $1 to $1.50 per gallon.

“The cost of fuel is just going higher,” he said. “Especially now with summer demands.”

Lindsey thinks he can get the basic used cooking oil for free. Used cooking oil is the basic ingredient for the biodiesel.

“People are paying to have 500 gallons hauled off,” he said. “The vast majority of it ends up in the landfill as waste.” Lindsey thinks there is enough waste available to cover most of the demand for biodiesel.

Lindsey said that if he could produce 500 to 1,000 gallons of biodiesel a month it would cover his needs. “I would just need four or five batches per year,” he said.

Speaking of engines designed to be used with biodiesel, Lindsey said most U.S. engines are B-20 and they need to be B-100 to run 100 percent biodiesel. “Europe has B-100 engines,” Lindsey said.

“By 2010 the Marine Corps will be running 100 percent biodiesel.”

Lindsey said the problem with using peanuts for biodiesel is that they have to come up with a variety of peanut that lends itself better to biodiesel manufacture.

“On August 7 the peanut lab in Dawson is having a field day and I am going to go over for that,” Lindsey said.

Lindsey said he is very optimistic about the prospects of converting to biodiesel for fuel.

“It’s going to take a grassroots effort to get it to happen,” he said.

Lindsey said Brazil is now 100 percent fuel independent. “We need to do like Brazil and protect our renewable fuels and let them get a foothold,” Lindsey said. He said he thought in the near future we would see a “shifting in crops more for biofuel production.”

Lindsey said people from a biodiesel refinery in Camilla were at the class he took at TCHS. “All the biodiesel they produce is used by oil companies to supply their super tankers for crude oil transportation,” he said.

“Mr. Cargle is to be commended for a very good program,” Lindsey said.



To contact reporter Jana Cone, call 382-4321, ext. 208.