Hazmat placard question - soybean oil

[nkalanaga]

Soybean oil, like any vegetable oil, will burn, but does it need a hazmat placard?  If it does, is it Flammable or Combustible? 

I know that not everything that will burn is placarded, think wood and coal...

[jnevis]

I have the hazmat guide at the house.  I'll check to see what number/class it is when I get home.

[Spikre]

 
   really doubt there would be more than clean up instructions on soy oil,
  or any other veggie oil,but havnt been close to any of those cars for a
  long time.
    Hazmat seems to cover the really dangerous type loads,including really
  bad things like nuclear waste, or spent nuclear fuel.
    Spikre
     

[Scottl]

Veg oil is a bit like diesel fuel.  It is hard to ignite, but it will burn.  I'm sure it has a haz mat code.

[nsbob]

It is considered a biodiesel, a combustible liquid, and in bulk transport, a combustible red placard displaying number 1993 would be required.  If I remember correctly, a container in excess of 110 gallons in considered a bulk container.

[Bob Bufkin]

Waiting for the day a railroad decides to use biodiesel.  Once followed a truck using it and the smell of french fries was making me hungry.

[Catt]

There's a college kid here in Grand Rapids that converted his old Honda to use veggie oil.It is so funny watching people trying to figure out swhere that French fry smell is coming from when he drives by.He said he saves enough on fuel (the local restaurants give him their used veggie oil) to buy his books and clothes for school.

[jnevis]

It is considered a biodiesel, a combustible liquid, and in bulk transport, a combustible red placard displaying number 1993 would be required.  If I remember correctly, a container in excess of 110 gallons in considered a bulk container.

Basically what I could dig out of the ERG too.  Flammable/Combustible Liquids are Class 3s, most fuel oils are 1993 and gasolines are 1203.

[C855B]

There's a college kid here in Grand Rapids that converted his old Honda to use veggie oil.It is so funny watching people trying to figure out swhere that French fry smell is coming from when he drives by.He said he saves enough on fuel (the local restaurants give him their used veggie oil) to buy his books and clothes for school.

That's still possible? There was a big dust-up locally because somebody was helping themselves to the waste oil pit of several restaurants, and in the end was arrested for theft. It turns out that (at least in our region) the restaurants are paid by the rendering companies for their used cooking oil. They make a profit by reprocessing the oil for fuel mixing. There's actually a big enough market for that.

Other side of it is the popular homebrew conversion processes require hazardous chemicals, especially strong alkalies to render the fats. Not exactly neighbor-friendly.

[nkalanaga]

Thank you.  My hazmat guides are from the 70s, before biodiesel came along, and don't list soybean oil, vegetable oil, or anything similar.

Spikre:  You'd be surprised what IS in my big guide, titled "Emergency Handling of Hazardous Materials In Surface Transportation", from the Bureau of Explosives, 1977.

According to that guide, a "Flammable Liquid" is specifically any liquid with a "closed cup flash point" less than 100 degrees Fahrenheit, while a "Combustible Liquid" has a flash point of at least 100F and not more than 199F.  So, while biodiesel qualifies as a combustible liquid, raw vegetable oil probably wouldn't, or it would be an explosion hazard in normal cooking.

According to Wikipedia, Gasoline's flash point is about -45F, diesel's "between 126F and 205F, depending on exact composition", and soybean oil's is "somewhere above the smoke point of  320F".  Biodiesels are up to 266F, again depending on composition.  All they give for soybean oil, and other vegetable oils, is the cooking "smoke point", with the note  that the flash point is higher than the smoke point.

Would you believe "Hair, Wet, Flammable Solid"?  "Liable to spontaneous heating and ignition", so make sure you dry it well next time you take a shower!

Or "Potassium Hydrogen Fluoride Solution", corrosive, acidic, a colorless crystalline solid dissolved in water, corrosive to metals and tissue.

"Compounds, Wall or Wallpaper Cleaning", can be either flammable of combustible liquids.

"Charcoal Screenings, made from 'Pinion' Wood", flammable solid.  No entry for charcoal screenings made from anything else.  There are several pages of various kinds of charcoal, activated and nonactivated, including one for "Charcoal, other than Animal or Wood, NEC, Not Activated", flammable solid.  Animal charcoal?

No Methylethylshurtudianol though...

[Blazeman]

My company ships an epoxidized soy bean oil and it is not regulated. Inbound oil is not placarded.

[jnevis]

FYI

[nsbob]

After Blazeman's post, I did further research on some additional websites.  It seems that soybean oil has a high enough flash point that it does not need to be placarded in rail transport.  However it appears that companies that handle it are required to keep a Material Safety Data Sheet available in case of a spill. 

[nkalanaga]

Thank you.  So, I won't need to placard my one soybean tanker, just find a destination for it.  That could be a problem, as I can't imagine any of my businesses wanting soybean oil, except maybe Harvey's Bar and Grill.  And they don't need 20,000 gallons of it!

jnevis:  My guides don't have picture pages like that.  I can see how they'd be useful, though, especially with fewer members of the public knowledgeable about trains or trucks than in the past.

"Epoxidized Soybean Oil"?  Any idea what it's used for. and how one mixes epoxy and oil?

[GaryHinshaw]

"Epoxidized Soybean Oil"?  Any idea what it's used for. and how one mixes epoxy and oil?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epoxidized_soybean_oil