New fuels lab opens where future is fueled

February 27, 2025 | Kriss Nelson

Focusing on renewable fuels, the Iowa Central Fuel Testing Laboratory supports the fuels industry.  Among their clients are producers, marketers, labs, consultants, transportation organizations, research groups and consumers.

Earlier this month, Iowa Central Community College held a ribbon-cutting and open house to celebrate its new Fuel Testing Laboratory.

The new 9,200-square-foot facility will have the capacity to test 500 samples monthly. In addition to the lab being a teaching facility for students attending Iowa Central, it also has 15 full-time employees.

“This is the nation’s only independent fuel testing lab. Iowa Central is here to serve our community, workforce needs as well as economic development opportunities of this region. With Iowa’s Crossroads of Global Innovation ag industrial park west of Fort Dodge, this ensures global and international companies have the opportunity for quality, reliable and affordable fuel testing right in their backyard,” says Jesse Ulrich, Iowa Central Community College president.

With the new facility comes enhanced capabilities, including jet fuel testing and in-house cetane and octane testing.

“What I am most excited about the new facility is the future,” says Iowa Secretary of Agriculture, Mike Naig. “The new lab’s expanded testing capability to create new Sustainable Aviation Fuel opportunities for the state of Iowa is huge, and we need to make sure we are doing everything we can to position Iowa to take advantage of that opportunity to add more value to the crops we produce here.”

Iowa is the nation’s leading biodiesel producer. Producing nearly 400 million gallons of biodiesel, which adds 13% of the net market value to the prices of soybeans.

“That is important to soybean farmers, biofuel producers and small towns and to have a fuel quality testing lab like this has made a difference in creating confidence in the industry, especially in those early days, and now the biodiesel industry is well established and continues to grow into other markets like renewable diesel and Sustainable Aviation Fuel. We are looking forward to continuing to put all of these together for energy’s future to help our agriculture, our economy and our state,” says Grant Kimberley, Iowa Soybean Association’s senior director of market development and Executive Director for the Iowa Biodiesel Board.

In the beginning

The lab’s origin was a 2005 teaching lab located in the community college’s greenhouse. After being approached in the fall of 2006 to help conduct the “Two Million Mile Haul,” a B20 biodiesel field trial with Decker Truck Line of Fort Dodge, those efforts attracted the interest of several parties who collectively formed the idea of creating an independent fuel testing laboratory at Iowa Central.

ISA gave initial support for the lab to get started. Jim Kersten, vice president of external relations and government affairs at Iowa Central Community College, worked with ISA to get the state legislature to provide $250,000 in funding for testing equipment.

Governor Kim Reynolds recalled the efforts of public, private, local, state and federal partnerships that worked to start a lab to help answer the question of how biodiesel performs in comparison to petroleum-based fuel.

“Many assumed the price discount of biofuels must come at a cost. Don Decker, with Decker Truckline, wasn’t satisfied with the speculation of biodiesel which is so important to his business,” says Reynolds. “He wanted facts. He turned to Iowa Central and its biofuels technology program, and the result was a Two Million Mile Haul – a groundbreaking study that shattered unsupported myths and revealed biodiesel is every bit equal to its traditional counterpart. It confirmed renewable fuels had a real role at the national level.”

In 2009, the lab opened its doors in the new Bioscience and Health Building and eventually became the first laboratory in the nation to achieve the BQ-9000 Lab designation for quality testing of biodiesel products.

The Iowa Central Fuels Lab has served as the official fuel testing laboratory for the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship’s official fuel testing laboratory for more than a decade.

“The facility also fills a critically important role for the private sector,” says Naig. “It gives fuel producers and retailers a fast, affordable way to test their motor vehicle fuels. That independent verification goes a long way toward supporting consumer confidence in fuels they are purchasing.”

Driving innovation

Reynolds says not only is she impressed with the educational aspects of the fuel testing laboratory but also the way the lab drives innovation in one of Iowa’s most important industries, working toward the next breakthrough in cleaner burning, more affordable, homegrown biofuels.

“Such breakthroughs are not only an important piece of American energy, they also support healthy, robust, rural economies in Iowa,” she says. “They add value to the crops our farm families grow and support high-quality industrial jobs in the renewable fuel sector.”

The state of Iowa invested $2.2 million for the lab to purchase equipment that is capable of testing Sustainable Aviation Fuel.

“I am proud to help the lab and industries they support write its next chapter,” says Reynolds. “Just as the Two Million Mile Haul helped prove the viability of biodiesel as a genuine alternative to petroleum, the future of fuel continues to run through this laboratory two decades later.”

---

Back