Buffalo Biodiesel warns of rising used cooking oil theft as grease becomes a valued feedstock
Buffalo Biodiesel is telling western New York restaurants to guard their grease. The company says thefts of used cooking oil from behind restaurants are on the rise, with thieves pulling oil out of collection bins that recyclers pay for.
Used cooking oil is a feedstock for biodiesel and renewable diesel, and it earns a premium under low-carbon fuel programs because its carbon score is low. When something gets stolen off the back dock, it is because it is worth money. For US operators, rising grease theft is a signal that low-CI feedstock is tight and bid up, which is the same pressure that has been pulling renewable diesel producers toward tallow, corn oil, and imported feedstocks.
Beef tallow B100
The other feedstock story ran a truck 500,000 kilometers. JBS says it powered a heavy truck that far on B100 biodiesel made from beef tallow, with no fossil diesel, turning slaughterhouse waste into fuel for heavy cargo.
JBS is a meatpacker, so this is a company demonstration, not a US market mover. It matters to a US operator only as a feedstock read. Tallow is one of the animal fats that renewable diesel plants on the Gulf Coast and West Coast already buy, and it competes with the same used cooking oil Buffalo is worried about. More demonstrations like this point to feedstock demand staying firm.
Gasoline at $4.15
Retail gasoline moved up into Labor Day. One report put the national figure at $4.15 a gallon ahead of the holiday, and a Texas paper flagged local prices ticking higher.
The politics rode along with the price. Bernie Sanders tied the level to Trump's Iran war and called for it to end. A separate report said farmers are going broke on higher gas prices while the Agriculture Secretary profits off them. None of these are biofuels items on their own, but they set the backdrop: pump prices climbing into the fall driving season keeps blending economics and RIN values in play, since every gallon of gasoline carries an ethanol obligation under the RFS.
What to watch
Whether grease theft spreads past New York. If recyclers in other states start reporting the same, it confirms feedstock values are climbing broadly and renewable diesel margins are getting squeezed on the input side.
Watch the crude and gasoline direction through September. If pump prices hold near $4 or higher, ethanol blending stays economic and RIN demand stays supported. If crude eases and the Iran situation calms, some of that pressure could come off, and the feedstock scramble is the thing to keep an eye on either way.