Coop of Coops

It appears to be that time of year again. The grassroots world is abuzz with yet another conversation about forming the “Coop of Coops.”

Forrest and I were discussing this a couple of weeks ago. He brought it up at Industrial, and my enthusiasm for the idea was as it has always been: “Fantastic, if it can help small producers hit ASTM, and if it can help on the EPA front, it needs to happen.”

Every brewing cell I know has someone who would gladly throw in the towel on their day job to become a fuel maker. And almost every cell I know could provide economic sustenance for a fuel maker if they could sell their fuel legally.

If a half dozen volunteers at a half dozen locations around North Carolina became paid fuel makers, this state’s production of commercial biodiesel would easily jump from zero to fifty thousand gallons a year. That’s my back of the envelope numbers—probably conservative—because I don’t know every home brewer in the sate.

But for that to happen, the same old two roadblocks are in the way: Most of us are not making ASTM quality fuel, none of us have a good way to know—and we lack a membership in the NBB.

Forrest hates it when I take his altruism and distill it to the bottom line, and he pushed back with some “non-commercial” reasons for why there should be a coop of coops.

We had a chance to confer on that at the kitchen table the other night. He is interested in seeing a 501(c)3 that would understand biodiesel and could act as a better fiduciary agent than some that are currently used. We use the foundation at Central Carolina Community College, which is okay, but a dedicated biofuels organization might be preferable.

We also talked about grassroots conferences, and tours, and such. The vision we were tossing around was basically a grassroots version of the NBB, which may have value in and of itself. Again, my preference would go to any organization that could help people get legal such that they could sell their fuel.

Our conversations were merely a sparring exercise (we both enjoy the argumentative arts), but when Mark Baard’s article came out in Wired, “Biodiesel Boosters Plan Co-ops,” the online biodiesel world lit up nicely. I’m delighted to report that this blog left the lower blogosphere for the first time, with over eleven hundred unique readers. Normally it has been hovering in the six and seven hundred per night range—with some sub one thousand spikes during this year’s NBB coverage.

Once again the pro-bono lawyers emerge, conversations of toppling the NBB’s monopoly on human health effects data re-appear, and away we go. Girl Mark reminded everyone of an interpretation from NBB that indicated a shared membership may be possible. She’s probably trawling the archives in pursuit of that conversation as this is being written.

The nay-sayers to the idea of a coop of coop have long held legitimate positions:

One is that any organization can become defensive in the name of self preservation, and therefore any organization should be avoided. I like this line of thinking. Today we are like guerillas. We emerge from the mists, strike our points, and dissolve back into the jungle. Without an organization, we are exceedingly hard to target.

Another is that no one is capable of speaking for us. I find this weaker than the first objection, but it comes from savvy warriors and long time champions of the movement, most of whom have watched their coops fold in the absence of a united voice.

Whatever the case, the conversation is on again, and it is as interesting and compelling as always.

Posted by Lyle at March 15, 2005 07:30 PM