Interview with Willie and Annie Nelson. New York City. February 29, 2007 Stephen Dignan: Can you say a little about your connection to biodiesel, how you discovered it, when you discovered it, and how you came to know it and support it? WILLIE: Well, I’ve been working with the farmers a long time and trying to figure out way to help the farmer come back, make more money. And when I heard about biodiesel, I immediately thought of the farmers. That this is something they can grow and, besides helping us by keeping us away from wars all over the world, we can grow our own fuel here at home. And so that was a big plus for me so I started, you know. And I’ve told the story 100 times about when Annie approached me about her car over there. She wanted to fill it up with some vegetable oil, a brand new Volkswagen. And I didn’t know if that was good idea or not. I wasn’t that up on it. So she bought the Volkswagen, it ran great on vegetable oil. I bought a Mercedes; it runs great on vegetable oil. So I realized we were onto something. That was about five years ago, very few people knew about it. And the ones that knew about it wasn’t talking. (Laughs.) SD: Why is using biodiesel so important to you and how is sustainable better than non-sustainable biodiesel? ANNIE: Well, actually, when I learned about biodiesel, I learned it about because we live on Maui and the first retail pump was through Pacific Biodiesel on our island. And it was created because restaurants could no longer dump their grease into the landfill because it was starting fires, and it seeps into the groundwater, and everything else. So Bob King took the waste grease and started creating biodiesel out of it. And we’re an island so we actually need some form of energy independence because we’ve been isolated. After 911, we were isolated for six days--no traffic in or out, boat, plane, anything. And so we do need to be able to balance our food with our energy needs. So I learned about biodiesel through Kelly King at Pacific Biodiesel and Bob. And I made so much sense to me because my husband’s president of Farm Aid and we’ve been together for 22 years. For those 22 years we’ve been trying to make a difference for the farmers. It’s not even getting a farmer more money; it’s getting a farmer enough money to sustain himself or herself, to live off of. So anyway, it grew and grew. And because of him and Woody Harrelson and Darryl Hannah and people like that, they did such a good job of educating people about biodiesel, that we realized we had a little bit of a problem here because there is a difference between sustainable and un-sustainable biodiesel. And so what happened is you get all these big conglomerates, the giant corporate Ag. Industrial Ag. Manufacturers that want to create these mega-zillion gallon biodiesel plants and it doesn’t sustain us. And the question I ask when we speak because Kelly and I go around and speak all the time is “what’s the difference between a middle eastern energy cartel and an American energy cartel if the victims are the same?” It doesn’t help America at all. In fact actually there’s problems right now within this industry because people from the rest of the world are angry at our lobbyists because they really created this u boating “splash and dash,” where they get subsidies on both ends and we’re exporting our energy. And so it doesn’t make sense. But what does make sense is the model that the Sustainable Biodiesel Alliance is promoting, which is the community-based model, where communities can create their own energy. Actually Rudolf Diesel that was his idea in the very beginning and really even Ford, because he was trying to do it with ethanol, but biodiesel we’re a little bit further along than ethanol. Ethanol’s got some issues and they’ll work theirs out. We tend to get lumped together, as biofuels, but there’s a huge difference. So anyway, the biodiesel end of it is this community-based model, that is working and has worked and does work. The city of Portland and now the entire state of Oregon has signed on, the California Biodiesel Alliance, and in the state of Hawaii we’re very sustainable. And so it doesn’t matter what it is. If we import palm oil--for instance-- from Indonesia, it helps no one here, no one. In fact it hurts all of us, because they slash the rainforest in order to grow this palm oil. Palm oil is fine. Even if you could pinpoint sustainable palm oil in Indonesia it would be fine for Indonesia, where you don’t have to export it. That’s their feedstock. It’s the crop that’s used to create the fuel is called your feedstock. So each community has their different native feedstock, whether it’s soy or rapeseed or recycled cooking oil or hemp or ditropha, or any of those things. They’re all regionally sustainable or un-sustainable. If you have to bring something in, then it’s not sustainable. And if each community has their own energy source then there won’t be a monopoly telling us how much we’re going to pay or whether we’re going to get it or not. That’s actually a true free market. A manipulated market, where you have to go and steal somebody else’s natural resource, or kill people to get it, or you have to have these lobbyists who are there to represent the interests of a few people as opposed to the masses, then that’s not a free market. That’s a manipulated market. So the community-based model represents a true free market where each group can set their pricing based on their season or feedstock or whatever. It would be based on the price of production and not a commodity price of crude oil, petroleum oil. Because they don’t have anything to do with each other; they are separate from each other. And this government, because the petroleum industry’s lobby is so powerful, we get lumped into that and it doesn’t have to be. Our biodiesel on Maui is easily a dollar cheaper than anywhere else on the island and the state actually. It’s ridiculous to base it on those kinds of prices. You know we’re the “frogs in the warm water”, it’s just getting us used to it, these conglomerates who’ve controlled our petroleum now are going to controlling our, what they call “renewables.” Well it’s not renewable if the end run is that we’re going to kill ourselves. It’s about producing an energy resource that is sustainable cradle to cradle, instead of cradle to grave. WSD: You run the bus on biodiesel. Can you talk a little bit about how long you’ve been doing that? Where you fill up? How do you know where to fill up? WILLIE: Well, it’s changed fortunately, over the years. When we first started trying to find biodiesel it was hard because very few people had it. More and more people are getting it these days. But it’s still, you have to know who to call, where to go. But our drivers, pretty well know if they’re going from here to L.A., to Ohio, back again, they have people they can call who can come find us along the way. If we’re playing in Toledo or something tomorrow night well then we can have biodiesel trucks there at the venue filling up right there, all the buses. It’s very convenient and it save a lot of trouble going in and out of truck stops for one thing. And plus the biodiesel that we get, sometime it’s soybeans, sometimes it’s vegetable oil, whatever we can find, sometimes we have to get palm oil which a lot of the times is not a, it doesn’t….. It gels in cold weather. A lot of biodiesel does gel in cold weather and sometimes you have to have a blend. But an 80/20 blend of 80% diesel, 20% biodiesel is pretty much accepted all over the country as any kind of weather biodiesel. You can go anywhere with it. ANNIE: In his bus too one of the things we’re trying to combat at the Sustainable Biodiesel Alliance at www.fuelresponsibly.org is that the big industrial corporate guys are going into communities and they’re giving a farmer a few more cents than a local small producer can pay to put the local small producers out of business. And then they have all this feedstock. And then when they don’t need it anymore, not only is the small producer who would be a true fair trade market, not only are they gone but the don’t need the farmer anymore. So not only do they pay the farmer less, they don’t pay the farmer at all. So now the farmer’s cut off. When he’s been getting a few cents more but long term he ended up losing. And so we all end up losing because then there aren’t those producers in different areas where we can get biodiesel like he’s saying. You know we had a lot of co-ops and people that would come out and fuel us and our organization is here to fight to keep those guys and to have those guy win because we don’t have the lobbyists that the other guys have, so we can keep them, so they are able to go from town to town to town and get their fuel based on the regional feedstock and actually have a fair market price for it instead of a commodity price. If we put these guys out of business and just these few people own it, that’s the new monopoly and we aren’t in control any longer of our energy. And our truckers are the backbone of this country and people who actually move our products that do have to be moved for health reasons or whatever and if they can’t make a living moving that then we’re all in trouble. SD: You started the Sustainable Biodiesel Alliance how long ago? ANNIE: We’ve had our 501(C) 3 for a year now. It was in August. And Darryl Hannah, Kelly King, and I saw what was happening and Woody Harrelson’s wife, Laura Louie, they’ve all been involved and they’re involved in our organization. We’re all directors in the organization. But we saw this coming. We saw what was happening to the small producers because, for instance, Bob and Kelly they build plants for those small producers, two million gallons. And so we saw what was happening and we saw the articles that people are writing now about you know “Is biodiesel bad?” Well, if it’s unsustainable, it is bad. If we’re chopping the rainforest to grow more palm, to import then export, and a few people win. It’s basically green washing, and the only true green thing about it is the money that goes into a few people’s pockets. As opposed to all of us being safe in our own country, creating our own energy sources. A lot of this “splash and dash” stuff is leaving the country. Fifty percent of what’s produced leaves the country. The stuff that we’re subsidizing is leaving the country to glut other country’s markets and they’re mad. So international law has changed, they’re not going to be able to do too much of that coming up, but it’s still going to, they’ll find another way to do it unless this model succeeds. And we need to keep that from happening because it is economic security if communities are doing well, we’ll all do well. If we can get farmers back on the land they’ll be growing food and fuel. If we are growing our own energy then we’re safe from a national security standpoint. So we have to do this and it has to succeed or else we won’t. Our debt, we’re up to our necks, all of us, our children are born in debt and it’s to China, Japan, and Saudi Arabia. It doesn’t make sense. And so if you don’t think there’s a conflict there, and it’s not about money, then ask why we can’t visit Cuba but we’re trading with China and China owns us and we, in fact, are so excited to have the Olympics in China. You know I don’t have anything against them, but, I mean, come on, it’s common sense. Seventeen out of the nineteen hijackers that hit the towers in 911 were from Saudi Arabia, and yet this administration wants to turn our port security over to Saudi Arabia. I mean none of it makes sense. If you don’t look at what they’re saying and you look at what they’re doing, then it doesn’t add up. So we need to protect ourselves. And American needs to stand up for the small farmer. SD: Self-reliance, that old idea of Henry David Thoreau? ANNIE: Yeah. We need to stand up for our security. We are so brilliant. And for us to be sending our intellect out of the country to be able to do these things is just frankly stupid. SD: I just was wondering if you comment on other things you do to lead a green lifestyle? WILLIE: (Passes the mike to Annie again) ANNIE: We have solar electricity, we have wind energy. All of our vehicles run on renewables and sustainable biodiesel. We don’t use shopping bags, ever. As a matter of fact I just left this little drug store with all my stuff in my pockets because I forgot my bag. And I know I looked like on of the Beverly Hillbillies, but she understood. And just every way you can you try to offset whatever. You know it’s the footprint thing. I mean my husband is Native American; it’s all about leaving a light footprint as light as possible and none if you can. SD: (To Willie) Are you part Native American? WILLIE: Yes. SD: I am too. It’s funny because in my family it kind of not talked about. But if you look at the family bible you see this one person who’s kind over here who’s kind of erased. WILLIE: With feathers in his hair. (Laughter.) …… SD: Can you say something inspiring about the importance of helping the environment? WILLIE: Well everybody’s wondering what they can do. As this whole thing unfolds, people are realizing, they’re more knowledgeable about biodiesel, they’re more knowledgeable about what’s going on in the world and why it’s important to raise our own fuel and to have our own alternative energies. And it’s just a matter of education. People are being educated thank to internet, thanks to people like yourself writing and talking about it. And I do a radio show, every Wednesday; in fact I’m getting ready to do it today. XM Radio. I do a radio show where I talk to the truckers out there on XM radio, channel 171, the Bill Mack show. And we’ve been doing this for a couple three year now. These guys are the ones who, in my opinion, are most responsible for spreading the word about biodiesel. They’re out there in their trucks looking for it. And they’re Americans, they’re patriots, they want to do something for their country, they don’t want to see all our oil money going to the Mid East, they’d like to see some of that money or all of it stay here in the country. And they’re willing to pay a cent or two more a gallon to do it, but what we’re trying to do is figure out ways they can do it without having to pay more for it. And I think that can be done, too. With the price of oil going sky-high. It’s up over 100 dollar a barrel today, I think, so the higher it gets, the more probable it is we’ll be able to compete with biodiesel and biofuels. But the main thing is to talk about it. There’s nothing like the spoken word to get the message out. ANNIE: And I would add to that, to kids. Don’t believe everything you hear. You know it’s a really simple matter to look up… You know we’re all told in sound bites now, what to think and how to feel, how we’re supposed to vote, how we’re supposed to act. If you want to have anything to do with your own future, whoever’s representing you, and even the people who aren’t whoever you think is working for you or against you, it’s a simple matter of not believing what they say, you can look up on the internet in three second how they vote. And that matters. You know if they’re voting for giving corporations more and more welfare through subsidies then they’re probably not the guy for your future or your children’s future because it’s the wealth of a few versus the health of a nation, economic health and security health. So I would tell young people, just really do your homework. We’re being dumbed down. They want you not to have critical thought. And it’s really easy to do, the critical breakdown is easy, all you have to do is look it up. It’s there. You know. WILLIE: Google it. ANNIE: Yeah, Google it. Do you want to be told what to think or do you want to actually be informed. And it’s information is power, knowledge is power. And we’re at a critical point now. We’re in our Kodak moment. And I would say the argument for doing what you can toward a sustainable future is really the simple question of do you love your kids, do you love your grandkids. Because it’s like what they say about “pooping on your own back porch.” Quit voting against your own best interests just because you’ve been sold a bill of goods. No matter what your reason for the environment mattering, it’s really come down to would you choke your kids because that’s really what we’re doing. It’s shaken baby syndrome, only we’re all the babies.