UTAH BIODIESEL COOPERATIVE - About Us

We are always looking for volunteers to help with our efforts! If you are interested in helping out at all, whether you are a member or not, contact us!

Utah Biodiesel Cooperative is a group of people who are mostly in the northern Utah region (Salt Lake City and surrounding areas, though we have members in Moab, Idaho, etc) who are interested in using and/or producing biodiesel for a variety of reasons, whether they are economic, environmental, or just something fun to do.  We have members of all levels and backgrounds, and as always, regardless of your experience and available time, you are always welcome.

Our principle focus and the base of membership to our organization is providing economic incentives to our members for buying, brewing, or using biodiesel. We are not a biodiesel club though we do run some programs for people who are looking for the "club experience" though these events, like all aspects of UBC, are optional (participation is not mandatory). An example of this is a social night we do every other month and an annual "biodiesel car show" in June. Our goal is to allow you take from our organization what you would like as long as it hopefully involves biodiesel. There are no requirements other than simply paying your annual dues and abiding by our bylaws.

It is important to recognize that we are not a traditional cooperative. A traditional cooperative is usually a business model where each member owns a part of the business whereas we are a non-profit organization and becoming a member does not buy you ownership. Our model of organization is based around these major factors:

  • Our principle focus is to encourage use of biodiesel community-wide. The method that we are currently doing this is by building a large and hopefully strong group of regular biodiesel users (aka UBC members) which we can hopefully support to allow them to regularly use biodiesel. We believe having a "team" of biodiesel enthusiasts versus a more traditional non-profit with limited staffing and resources can be a more successful method of spreading the word about biodiesel.
  • We have two (**we have eliminated category 3**) basic types of "members" though we do not choose what category each member is in with the exception of "category 3" members who will have to apply for this status. Businesses, indivuduals and groups can be members of UBC and choose to conduct themselves in each each of the theoretical membership categories below:

These categories are:
  • Category 1 - The Individual. This status of membership is for someone not interested in the traditional "cooperative" aspect but is still interested in the discounts. This person could be a brewer or a simple consumer of biodiesel by buying it from commercial sources.
  • Category 2 - The member looking for a more "Cooperative" experience. We purposefully do not run a central cooperative-like sccenario of pooling labor, materials, funds, etc, because they are freqently known for having internal conflict. However, we do not want to discourage this approach either so we suggest that we do it on your own terms. In the membership are several groups of what we call "mini-cooperatives" of groups of 5 or 6 people who have pooled together themselves to brew biodiesel. This is also how we believe we can successfully call ourselves Utah Biodiesel Cooperative. Several of these groups are scattered around Utah including several in Salt Lake City, one in Park City/Heber City, and one in Moab.
  • AS OF AUG, 06, WE HAVE CHOSE TO ELIMINATE THE CONCEPT OF "CATEGORY 3" -- Category 3 - Authorized Producers of UBC. This category has not been setup yet so it is not currently available yet. You will also have to apply to be a category three member. This category is designed for people who want to be legal biodiesel producers (ie sell biodiesel legally) but do not have the resources to get the required federal, state, and local requirements. UBC will shoulder these costs and in turn, by becoming a category three member, you can gain access to these. The details and logistics of this have not been setup yet however we are playing around with some concepts. If this type of membership interests you, feel free to contact us with questions.
We have several long term goals. These include:
     
  • We are currently not a 501(c)(3) organization though we are a legal non-profit organization in the state of Utah. Our goal is to become a fully-accedited 501(c)(3) charitable organization and as a result have the ability to solicit tax-deductable donations and engage in grant writing. This will allow our organization to be sustainable, much like the fuel we use.
  • We have no centralized location. Our goal is to establish a central facility somewhere in the Salt Lake City area that can have multiple purposes including facilities to brew biodiesel and a variety of large-vessel processors.
  • Over 200 members someday allowing our membership to become a "mini-economy" of buyers, users, and sellers and become the center biodiesel activity in Utah and the surrounding area. We believe our members will provide the spirit and bulk of activity throughout the state themselves, truly making this a "grassroots" movement.
We do not discriminate on age, gender or political beliefs or religion.  We also require that all members follow these same rules.  We are also strictly a non-partisan organization.

We try to get together every other month "officially" as a group, and individual interactions between some members (mostly to brew biodiesel together) happens often.  We communicate through an email list and occasionally through the Utah Section of the biodieselnow.com chatroom.

JOINING
If you are interested in joining click here.