Get An Oil Change And Save On Gas
May 4, 2008 
Doug Fine is an adventure journalist and contributor to the Washington Post, Salon, U.S. News and World Report, Sierra, Wired, Outside, and NPR. The speaker of several languages, including suburban American, rural American, and Alaskan American, funny guy Doug Fine has sent panicky emails from Rwanda to the Arctic Ocean. He has also reported on the democracy efforts in Burma (read into the Congressional record), and is the author of Not Really An Alaskan Mountain Man and the recently released Farewell, My Subaru. Doug converted his diesel truck to vegetable oil, and has learned how to live sustainably in less than a year. Farewell, My Subaru is the author's account of what he did wrong, and what he did right in reducing his petro addiction.
You might think it ain’t easy being Green. That’s totally understandable. So much of what we read about people who attempt sustainable lifestyles involves things like eating Steamed Dirt in remote, unheated cabins while walking 17 miles to fetch pots of fetid water for the evening local “meal.”
Well, I have some great news, well-intentioned but comfort-loving citizens of the Digital Age: you don’t have to suffer to be sustainable. With no experience nor any construction, electrical, mechanical, automotive or plumbing skills to speak of, in less than a year I got upwards of 80% of the petroleum out of my life. And you can, too.
As I write in Farewell, My Subaru, my new Random House book (info about the book including a short film , once you get past some basic rookie green mistakes I made (or avoid them by reading Farewell, My Subaru), you can turn your home to solar, drive on waste vegetable oil and grow and purchase your food locally almost immediately.
And here’s the really lovely part: you won’t even notice the difference. You won’t miss being an oil customer. For example, on my Funky Butte Ranch, I have a washing machine, refrigerator, plenty of lights, a laptop, Internet, and most of all, booming stereo subwoofers – all of them powered by the sun. The only time I realize I’m on solar power is when the rest of my valley experiences a power failure, and my ranch is the only one with lights.
You can even keep your car while going Green – you’ll need to get a diesel engine vehicle, though, and have a mechanic convert it to run on straight vegetable oil (or, SVO). But don’t worry -- you’ll pay off the cost of the conversion in lower fuel costs within a year, probably even sooner. Here’s how it works: a second fuel tank is added to the vehicle (this is where the SVO goes). Then a heating system is installed, so the oil flows smoothly, rather than getting all coagulated like day-oil Chinese food leftovers. Then it’s just a matter of gathering the oil from the fryers of greasy restaurants. You can do this yourself with a pump and a filter, or your can buy the filtered oil, often from the installer who did the conversion of your diesel vehicle for you. Usually this will be cheaper than diesel fuel, and definitely more environmentally friendly. The only down side is your exhaust smells like Kung Pao Chicken, so don’t drive hungry: you’ll be pulling over at every take-out place.
The last piece of the puzzle is getting the “carbon miles” out of your food. This means, to give one example, the oil embedded in buying apples out of season from New Zealand, fish from Chile, and tomatoes from some far away hothouse. Believe it or not, something like 60% of the petroleum we use is “hidden” in non-local food we eat. More fantastic news here – you can have fun planning a garden, raising chickens, or just researching what food is local and in season in your region. Shopping at farmer’s markets is a great help here, too.
Follow these steps, which I write about in Farewell, My Subaru (and which I blog about), and you won’t believe how easy it is being Green.
Related: Cheap Gas Tips
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