Biodiesel Co-ops: A Community Industry 

PART 1: This workshop aims to educate participants on why biodiesel is so great and on the history and current state of localized cooperative biodiesel production. Other topics may include the national community of “sustainable” biodiesel production and the challenges and opportunities of the movement within a broader “corporate” biodiesel industry.

PART 2: How and why to start a biodiesel co-op in your community. This will be a detailed tutorial of the process of making your own fuel and, perhaps more importantly, how to do it at a scale such that a viable worker cooperative business can direct it. This session will include overviews of two “successful” biodiesel co-ops with many do's, don't's, and anecdotal stories.

Tycho Dan is a co-founder of the Ithaca Biodiesel Cooperative and an all around nice guy. Sociologist, community organizer, organic farmer, father, wisdom seeker, and rebel altruist he has spent most of his adult life investing his energy in systemic changes to benefit humanity and the skills necessary to bring them about. Drives a gold mercedes wagon on straight vegetable oil and is no longer bitter about “doing the things that nobody else wants to do that need to get done.”