I know Sandra has been posting about us converting a Delica van to run on waste vegetable oil (wvo).  Over the next little bit I hope to document what I have been up to and what I will be doing down the road.  Beyond driving the Delica that is …

In some ways I really feel like I have gone off on a tangent … what does converting a van to run on WVO really have to do with building an earthship?  At first glance maybe not very much … but in my view of the world tonnes (of CO2 that is).  On a side note about the earthship … No we have not abandoned the project!  Since the fall so many other things (work, school, kids, fatigue) have all contributed to us slowing down on construction.  With winter once again here we are delighted to see how the earthship handles the cold weather and somewhat disappointed to be observing its success from our cold, drafty, small, energy in-efficient (you get the idea …) dwelling.

Having vowed to be in the earthship for Christmas (and still standing by this vow, although now adding ‘some’ into the last sentence), we decided that rather than hang around here for Christmas we would visit family.  I am from back east and the kids do not see much of this side of their family so we decided to drive east for Christmas.

We have been thinking about converting a vehicle to WVO for almost a year now, but have been slow in translating thoughts into action.  Deciding to go on this trip cemented the idea for me … we would travel back east on WVO (or at least as much of it as we could).

To that end I have been busy over the last couple of weeks … and yesterday was successful!  The van ran on canola vegetable oil.  Today I hope to tidy the conversion up and see if we can take the van for a test drive.

Over the coming weeks I hope to document what I have done …