Saturday morning two weeks ago, Philippe, Gervais, Jean Luc and I sat around an old power sprayer unit.Four bolts on top of the tank show where the gas motor was mounted.The rubber hoses are crumbled.The pressure gauge is clouded with grime and age.Remarkably, the original blue paint, though dulled a bit, has resisted the years with only a little rust.And the pump still works (though one would have to spin the pulley wheel pretty fast to make it useful.)This is one of three units sitting on a pile of old nuts and bolts, discarded gas stove burners, three-point hitch attachments, and other miscellany.They have probably been there 35 years, odd artifacts of the 1960 era farmer's training institute that Congolese never considered useful.But we're not really interested in a sprayer.

We are looking for a key to modest prosperity for palm oil producers.We need a reactor tank for an experimental biodiesel production plant that might create a new market for local palm oil.

In Europe and North America, manufacturing diesel fuel from renewable vegetable oil has become commonplace.Soybean and rapeseed oils are the favorite feedstocks, but a wide range of vegetable oils can be used – including palm oil.And oil palms have the highest yield of vegetable oil of any major crop.When we learned about this eighteen months ago, we began to wonder whether the process could be adapted in rural Congo for the benefit of local oil producers.Sitting around an old sprayer signals the transition from dreamy visions to vigorous wrestling with the technical challenges.

In December, a small group of missionary types from different regions of Congo formed an informal biodiesel working group.The first experiments in biodiesel production will be conducted here at Lusekele, using ethanol and local palm oil.In Kinshasa others will look at the feasibility of small-scale ethanol production from waste agricultural products.The hope is that we can come up with an economical design for a small production plant that uses local palm oil and local ethanol to produce biodiesel that can be marketed throughout the country.

Essentially the process mixes palm oil, alcohol and caustic soda (lye.)The alcohol-caustic soda mixture reacts with the palm oil, producing a diesel fuel substitute and glycerol.(Glycerol in its refined form is used in soaps, cosmetics and medicinal formulas.)The reaction takes about 2-3 hours.Though success requires attention to detail, the chemical reaction is relatively simple.We're hoping that this simplicity will give us (or someone else) a chance to carve a small niche in the otherwise super-sophisticated world of fuel production, bringing the profits back to farmers.

Nothing worthwhile comes easy.In two weeks the mixing system has gone through five different redesigns.By next weekend, the sprayer tank should become a serviceable reactor vessel with an electric mixing pump (thanks to

Lukas Dill and Maurice Briggs at the Vanga Mission Aviation Fellowship base.)The following week we start the first laboratory scale test batches that we will scale up when our alcohol supply arrives.By the end of April we hope to have our first batches of test biodiesel to show local farmers. The results should give us an idea of whether or not making biodiesel in Congo is feasible and profitable.

God has created an amazing world.Chemical reactions that transform palm oil into diesel fuel are a part of the remarkable complexity of opportunities that exist for humankind.The Christian technicians of Lusekele, like Gervais and Philippe are dedicated to turning these opportunities into tangible improvements in the lives of rural families. Who would have ever thought that palm oil could become liquid gold that helps to feed, clothe and educate a farmer's family?

Praise God for His wonders,

Ed Noyes