Here is the reply I sent to my M.P. in response to the letters Igot from Ian Mcfarlane and Mal Brough.


18th March 2005


Barry Wakelin M P
45a Playford Avenue
Whyalla 5600


Dear Barry

Thank you for the letters of response from ministers to my questions about excise exemption for home brewing of bio-diesel.

In the attached letter from Ian McFarlane, he stated that the government recently offered grants of 18.03 million dollars to three bio-diesel projects.

Would the minister like to explain to me why the government can give grants of that amount to big businesses but won’t consider excise exemption for home brewers of bio-diesel. I guess giving home brewers exemption would not give the government the exposure that $18.03 million in grants does. Where does the government think that big businesses come from, most start out small at home as an idea, hobby or interest, where would we be without the automobile and that started at someone’s home.

He goes on to quote Senator Helen Coonan saying that small-scale bio-diesel production cannot be compared with the excise treatment of home brewed beer. This astounds me, as I would say it compared almost exactly with home brewed beer, as both are made at home for ones own personal use and enjoyment, what more is there to say. As to go on to say there is no exemption for the distillation of sprits I would think that would only strengthen the case to make bio-diesel exempt from excise and any fuel that is made by distillation subject to excise as with home brew beer, wine etc.

In Mal Brough’s attached letter he says small-scale non-commercial production of bio-diesel is not desirable because of the hazardous nature of the chemicals involved. Would the minister care to explain how readily available common cleaners used in the domestic household and available from the supermarket are suddenly so hazardous, also is the minister aware that even bio-diesel that may not meet the quality standards has far less emissions when burnt than normal petroleum diesel.

All bio-diesel brewers strive to make the highest quality bio-diesel possible as do home brewers of beer. It seems that the government doesn’t care if someone dies from drinking badly made home brew beer, but are worried that someone may shorten the engine life of a vehicle they are running on home brewed bio-diesel.
Any diesel motor will run on straight vegetable oil with a few minor modifications and that does not attract excise, or is that the government’s next hidden agenda.

It is about time the government and members of Parliament came down to earth and realized that there are many people in this country that want to do and make things on a small-scale for their own satisfaction and enjoyment and not get into big business. Small-scale home bio-diesel producers not only help the environment by running bio-diesel in their vehicles but also their entire town or neighbourhood by stopping the dumping of waste oil and fat in landfill.

As I stated previously in this letter big business usually starts out at home as an idea, hobby or interest, then maybe a small business and it is quite obvious that this government is not interested in helping anyone start in small business. A hobby is the way many small businesses start and there are some home brewers of bio-diesel that could move into small business if only they could receive some help. The best, easiest and cheapest form of help I could see for them would be excise free up to a set number of litres per year, not offering large sums of money in the forms of grants to go into a large business.

Regards

His reply to me was that I had made some interesting and pertinent points about bio-diesel and small business and he would continue to raise the matter with his colleagues and lobby for the consideration of exise exemption for home brewing of bio-diesel.

Moonshine, good letter. Please keep the pressure up and let us know what happens.

The Government's position on homemade biodiesel is pure nonsense as you pointed out. They give heaps of taxpayer's money away to big business, then turn around and try to oppress the little battler with ridiculous licensing schemes and demands of piddly amounts of excise tax.

Here is an observation I made on my recent visit to Canberra. As I drove across the bridge over the man-made lake heading towards Treasury, I felt the need to take a pee. I would have been happy to go behind a tree. Luckily, there was a lovely manicured park off to my right so a pulled in there and noticed a set of loos. I walked up to the loos and saw that the building was an elaborate affair with touch buttons to enter. I pushed the button and the door slid back - just like in "Star Trek".

Upon entering this futuristic outhouse, I noticed the very modernistic fittings. The toilet had a sign that I need not flush as when the door opened upon leaving, the toilet would automatically flush itself. The sink was inset into the wall and was activated by placing your hands into the area above the basin. Sure enough, when I approached the door, the toilet flushed behind me and the door opened.

I figure this all electric, space-age outhouse must have cost the taxpayers a bloody heap of money to build and more to maintain it. This is just one example of why they want to squeeze each of us for whatever tax dollars they can get - so they can then turn around and flush the money down the toilet.

Here is a recent article in the Age. Costello has stated that Australia is running out of oil (duh!).

"According to the Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association, if current trends continue, Australia will be about 78 per cent dependent on oil imports in 10 years, compared with the present 30 per cent dependence."

Age article

Biodiesel Bob, I read the biodiesel article in the April, 2005 edition of "Overlander" (page 112). That is a bloody good article with lots of information for bringing people up to speed on the wonders of biodiesel.

Unfortunately, I couldn't get a look at either your face or the rego number on your vehicle -funny about that

If we could get more articles like that in the media, we could raise the interest in biodiesel and create a bigger lobbying base.

Terry,

Thanks for the feedback on the article.

we are looking to do a radio segment on 4wd radio (local club-based radio station in mebourne) on biodiesel...

so we'll see how that goes.

cheers,

Aussie Biodiesel bob

Having read the ATOs publication Meeting your biodiesel obligations, it the second paragraph, Who needs an excise licence for biodiesel, it states you only need a licence if you manufacture biodiesel for use in diesel engines, so in actual fact you don't need a licence to manufacture biodiesel you only need a licence if you use it in a diesel engine. So if you manufacture biodiesel for any of it's many other uses and then you don't need a licence.

Yes, we it appears that we don't need an excise license if we just make biodiesel for our stoves and our turbine engines - all I have to do now is convert my truck to use a turbine engine .

Hmm, I wonder about fueling a steam engine? Wouldn't that jerk the ATO's chain?

Yes, and if I am not mistaken, there is also another Loophole
Which has to do with the definition of "Biodiesel"

MM Legend

Michey Mouse, Please explain.

I can not locate the specific information

But If you can find the exact legal Australian definition for Biodiesel and exactly what it is that you have to make before it is taxable, it may become obvous.
Or perhaps it is just an ethanol misunderstanding I am having. It has been a year or so since I thought I spotted two loophole, the one about making "Cutting Oil/ turbine fuel/home heating oil" that you just pointed out to the tax office. and a possible one concerning the definition of Biodiesel.

MM legend

It looks like a few more Australian politicians have discovered "Peak Oil". Here is a short blurb from John Anderson -

Anderson

And here is a website in Oz that has a short essay on "Peak Oil"

Running out of Time

quote:

Originally posted by Mickey Mouse:
I can not locate the specific information

But If you can find the exact legal Australian definition for Biodiesel and exactly what it is that you have to make before it is taxable, it may become obvous.
Or perhaps it is just an ethanol misunderstanding I am having. It has been a year or so since I thought I spotted two loophole, the one about making "Cutting Oil/ turbine fuel/home heating oil" that you just pointed out to the tax office. and a possible one concerning the definition of Biodiesel.

MM legend

From the ATO explanation...

quote:

What is biodiesel?
Biodiesel is fuel for use in an internal combustion engine that is manufactured by chemically altering vegetable oils or animal fats (including recycled oils from these sources) to form mono-alkyl esters.

heh heh... mono alkyl translates to methyl (not ethyl) ester... or I've forgotten everything.

Damn; Oil Can Harry is before his time....

We need to get a bit of clarification on this point with Neutral. I always thought that mono-alkyl esters referred to a single molecule alkyl ester made from an alcohol, whether it is ethyl or methyl alcohol. Here is a definition I dug up that doesn't seem to be on point, but does clarify the alkyl definition.

Naming Alkyls
The naming convention for alkyls is much the same as alkanes. The suffix is always -yl. The prefix depends on how many carbon atoms are in the molecule. This uses the same system as for Alkanes as shown in this table (taken from IUPAC nomenclature):

Number of carbons 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
Prefix Meth Eth Prop But Pent Hex Hept Oct Non Dec Undec Dodec

For example, the first three alkyls are called Methyl, Ethyl and Propyl.

OK, so they are all alkyls. So what then is a mono-alkyl ester?

On reviewing some of the writings about mono alkyl esters being made with ethanol and methanol it seems you may be right Terry a mono alkyl may not mean "Methyl"...

"So what then is a mono-alkyl ester?"

Good question. It seems a strange use of the word mono. If we ask ourselves what a di-alkyl ester is we get a clue. It would be an ester made with an acid which had two carboxyl groups (a dicarboxylic acid) and in which both groups were esterified with an alcohol. As you can't get these from animal or vegetable oils a biodiesel producer wouldn't be using them. The word mono is therefore redundant but not incorrect.

A more informative name would be a fatty acid alkyl ester. To just call it an alkyl ester is too wide open: it could be methyl benzoate for instance, which is certainly not biodiesel.

Well Mickey mouse, speak up...was this your idea of a loophole in the definition or another?

We wait with baited breath...

Yes, I made a "Reading Mistake" all those years ago!

I mis-read mono-alkyl ester as methyl ester.

Oh well, back to the ethanol!

MM legend.

I just got off the line with ABC radio in Wagga Wagga. They are doing a story on a local farmer who is producing his own biodiesel for his farm and isn't eligible for the excise rebate.

I gave the interviewer the BEER information, including a link to this thread. She is interviewing Minster Mal Brough later on.

Although we talked for about 15 minutes, the final interview will be a 'cut and paste' of about 3.5 minutes for myself and 3.5 minutes for Brough.

I'll see if I can get a link to the interview to post here.

Terry,
I will be looking for it.
Tony

Minister is Clueless

"At this stage Australia's fuel security is still good," [Minister Ian] Macfarlane said. "Do we need to find more oil? Yes we do. But short of finding more oil I don't know what the solution is." ...

Hey Ian, as this thread has already demonstrated you really didn't need to admit publicly that you are clueless.