In 1995, the soybean checkoff funded key research on soy biodiesel quality. The same year, Yellowstone National Park began serving as the soy biodiesel testing ground for the National Park Service. A decade later, the market for soy biodiesel is flourishing, and its use has spread to more than 20 other national parks and among thousands of other diesel users such as farmers and truckers.
United Soybean Board director Chuck Myers of Nebraska and Jim Evanoff, Environmental Manager for Yellowstone National Park held a press conference Tuesday from Jackson Lake Lodge in Grand Teton National Park to talk about the use of biodiesel in our national parks.
“We’re here to recognize ten-plus years of successful use of biodiesel in Yellowstone National Park and Grand Teton National Park,” said Myers. “It confirms that biodiesel can be used successfully in one of the harshest all weather climates in the United States.”
“Yellowstone, being the world’s first national park, we feel an obligation to be first at doing the right thing environmentally,” Evanoff said. “The most successful has been the introduction and advancement of biodegradable fuels in Yellowstone Park.”
You can listen to the opening statements of Myers and Evanoff here: 
Biodiesel Parks (6 min MP3)
According to the state of Montana, the use of biodiesel by Yellowstone has reduced the amount of carbon dioxide emissions by 500 tons per year.
The use of biodiesel in the National Park Service now includes 23 parks nationwide with over 1,000 different diesel applications including conventional diesel vehicles, boats, heavy equipment, and stationery applications such as boilers and stand-by generators. Blends range from 2 percent to 100 percent biodiesel.
Indiana Lt. Gov. Becky Skillman honored the first three recipients of the Paul Dana Leadership in Biofuels Awards on Aug. 28 in a ceremony at the Indiana State House.
Got a call today from 
President and CFO Alex Conger owns this bright yellow Hummer, named “Ethyl,” that runs on 98 percent ethanol using the FullFlex system and he says he actually gets better fuel mileage with ethanol using the system than with regular gasoline!
The US Secretaries of Agriculture and Energy last week were out promoting the upcoming Renewable Energy Conference in St. Louis.
Biodiesel’s role in improving air quality was the focus of a lung association forum last week, according to a release from the 
The race is over and it was an exciting one. As usual this season, ethanol wins.
Here’s an early shot as the Team Ethanol goes by after getting the green flag.
The race is on. The weather seems to be cooperating.
On the podium for this morning’s press conference on ethanol are (l – r) Jeff Simmons, #17 Team Ethanol driver, Les McTaggert, IRL Senior Technical Director and Tom Slunecka, Executive Director for the Ethanol Promotion and Information Council.
Les talked about the conversion to ethanol as a fuel blend this year and going into next year. He describes the challenges it presented and the testing required to make sure it would meet the demanding performance needs of IRL cars. He said that race cars using 100 percent ethanol would be tested on the track within the next month.
I can hear engines rumbling as I write this post and that’s a good sign. Maybe the weather will give us a break for a while so we can get this race off.