Peter Aziz, of Valiant Energy based in Waterbury, Connecticut, is proud of both his business and the direction the home heating fuel industry is taking in the region.
“Our mission is to save customers money by helping them use less energy in their homes. We’re also pioneers in the BioHeat® Fuel market, and we haven’t sold a single gallon of unblended heating oil since 2005,” Aziz explained during a recent episode of the Mission Possible: Delivering Cleaner, Greener Fuel podcast.
“We’ve only sold a 20% renewable biodiesel blend mixed with ultra-low sulfur heating oil (ULSHO), which is very clean burning. Soot is now a thing of the past,” Aziz added.
Today’s ultra-low sulfur heating oil reduces sulfur to just 15 parts per million (ppm), compared to 3,000 ppm prior to 2014. When blended with high amounts of biodiesel, the fuel burns cleanly.
Compared to traditional heating oil, ULSHO reduces emissions by:
• 97% of sulfur dioxide emissions (a major contributor to acid rain and smog)
• 85% reduction in particulate matter
• 15% of nitrogen oxide (NOx) emissions
• Biodiesel reduces carbon dioxide (CO2) by nearly 80%
“In the 80s and 90s, heating oil was a very sulfurous blend, which meant it burned much dirtier. It had a heavier carbon footprint, produced soot, and created a lot of challenges. But all of that changed with the introduction of ultra-low sulfur fuel,” Aziz noted. “Today, when mixed with a 20% biodiesel blend, it’s even cleaner than natural gas over a 100-year life cycle analysis.”
Aziz went on to say that his customers are happy with the direction the industry is taking.
“We first introduced BioHeat® Fuel nearly 20 years ago, and our customers are proud of the progress. They’re proud to be part of a virtuous solution to one of the world’s biggest challenges. And they still want the price to be competitive,” Aziz added.
Aziz has worked with Connecticut Energy Marketers Association (CEMA) and the National Energy & Fuels Institute (NEFI) to keep the cost of biodiesel affordable by lobbying to maintain the biodiesel tax credit and the blender’s credit, among other things.
“We’ve saved about 12 million gallons of heating oil from being burned since we first started blending biodiesel. That’s like taking 20,000 cars off the road. The impact is significant.”
You can hear the entire episode with Peter Aziz on Mission Possible on YouTube, Spotify, and other podcast platforms like Amazon Music and iHeartRadio.