A HUSBAND and wife team who set up a business to provide an eco-friendly alternative to fossil fuel for Worcestershire drivers has stopped producing biodiesel after just a year due to soaring costs.

Retired Malvern outdoor education centre manager Keith Falconer and his wife Lynne set up Bransford Biodiesels as a non profit-making business with £40,000 of their own money.

The idea was to prove it is possible to run motor vehicles on recycled cooking oil or locally produced virgin pressed vegetable oil and make an environmental gesture.

They started producing and selling biodiesel from used cooking oil in October 2006 and, while demand for the product soared with regular clients like Malvern Town Council and Worcestershire Wildlife Trust, so have the costs - making it uneconomic to continue.

Mr Falconer said: "We made the decision because we were losing too much money. We just realised that the business was not a viable proposition. I wanted to promote the idea of using biodiesel and our sales were doubling every four to six months. It was growing dramatically but we found we could not get hold of enough oil to make it economic."

He said that the price of methanol, which is needed in the production process, shot up and this added to the problems. "We could not sell biodiesel above the cost of fossil fuel."

Mr Falconer said other biofuel businesses are struggling at the moment but there may come a time when it becomes more economic to produce it. "When we are paid to reduce carbon that will be the point at which biodiesel will have an economic advantage over fossil fuel."

He was very glad he set up the business as he had learned a lot and had made many good contacts.

He is now running courses for people interested in making their own biodiesel for home use, which is exempt from tax.

The next course is on Saturday, February 16. For information log onto www.bransfordbiofuels. co.uk or call 01886 830155.