Biodiesel is recognized as a clean alternative fuel. Because cultivated land is too limited to grow seed-oil plants sufficient to produce both food and biodiesel, non-land-based materials have been considered important sources for the production of the biodiesel.
I agree with Ibrahim Halil Yilmaz answer.
To complete about the food competition problem.
Producing biodiesel is more interesting if you can produce together fuel and food.
It is the case in France with Rapeseed Oil : it is used to produce fuel (by oil conversion) and food for animals from seed cake.
It is also the case for soya beans ...
We have looked into biodiesel and are very sceptical if it is produced from vegetable oil The only meaningful biodiesel -to my opinion - is derived from waste oil from restaurant or public collection, together with lard and other fatty waste.
please see e. g. https://www.carbonbrief.org/in-depth-the-challenge-of-using-biofuels-to-cut-transport-emissions
best regards
Johannes
To complete Johannes Fresner's answer.
Johannes Fresner is right when he underlines the use of waste oil. Pr. Mittelbach has been working on the subject for many years.
I just want to precise the french history in biodiesel production.
It started on 23th june 1973 : after a terrible drought affecting soya production in America, the United States announced an embargo on soya exports.
So, in France, started a reflexion on a way to replace soya seed cake as animal food. It was also a way to be independant of amican soya.
Rapeseed was a solution (in France) but producing it only for animal food (remember rapeseed oil at that time was not a good cooking oil) was not profitable. So producing rapeseed giving, seed cake for animals, oil for human diet and esterifying the oil excedent to produce biodiesel and glycerine was the scheme accepted in France.
The use of palm oil coming from abroad to produce biodiesel is another problem.
I have to remember that the production of biodiesel with a quality compatible (that is long term behaviour) with modern (direct injection) engines is not so simple as a simple esterification process with methanol. Ethanol is not used because it is more difficult and more expensive to produce ethyl ester than methyl ester.
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