Basil Blasingame: Biofuels such as ethanol and biodiesel are merely the first generation of bio-fuels and suffer from only using the food part of the plant (sugar and oil) and not being exactly what's needed by existing vehicles though biodiesel is very close to diesel. The next generation of bio-fuels would be synthetic fuels with characteristics that are ideal for existing engines and synthesized from gasification/pyrolysis processes thereby utilizing the entire plant, trash, old tires, and dried sewage. Charcoal would be a byproduct for such biomass to liquid technologies which could be sequestered as biochar resulting in the synthetic fuels being carbon negative. With the next generation of bio-fuels, we can actually have a net reduction of atmospheric CO2....Show more
Chris Coggins: Bio fuels are are a horribly inefficient way to replace fossil fuel, and would probably wreck the environment. We would have to increase our crop size of sugar cane, corn, etc! , by over FORTY PERCENT to replace eight percent of the fuel produced by oil. where is the land mass going to come from to increase cultivation by forty percent? then along with that comes increased pollution from vehicles to cultivate and harvest the crops, and the massive amounts of energy used by the refinery to convert it to fuel, not to mention huge swathes of forests that would have to be cleared, and millions of tons of fertilizer that would be pumped into the environment to grow the crops.'Alternative' fuel vehicles are at best wishful thinking, along with most other ideas on replacing fossil fuels other than electricity, and most of the environmental community squirms when you mention the possibility of nuclear reactors, which are by far the most efficient energy source we have on the planet. Water is good if you have enough hydro electric dams, but you would have to flood vast areas of land for the added plants.Wind is only good when the wind blows, and solar is o! nly good when the sun shines. Also, lets say you wanted to go ! solar. The 'footprint' of solar panels you would need to replace one nuclear power plant would equal the area the size of vermont, as opposed to a nuclear power plant that covers about 20 acres, and all the reflected light heat is bound to alter the weather patterns around the solar power stations.About the only alternative fuel vehicle I would see that would be actually worth anything would be the 'back to the future' car that runs on household garbage. That is also possible today, except you expend more energy to produce the garbage into fuel, again, it is just too inefficient.Internal combustion engines have been around for over one hundred years now, and have been greatly improved over the years (well, some of them). Realistically we are stuck with gas and diesel, maybe propane, but propane reduces the engines power, so you use more fuel. The best way to beat this thing is to make the internal combustion engine more fuel efficient. You could also have hybrid cars that r! un on fuel and electric, but you still are confronted with what to do with reefs of expended batteries that cannot be recycled when they have passed their useful life span.Just about EVERYTHING we use in our society today is based on fossil fuel, you just cant shut it down overnight. It is used to make plastic, medicine, makeup, metal, cleaning solvents, computer chips, etc. without it, life as we know it would cease to exist.Here are some ideas i would implement if I were made 'benevolent dictator' of America. The Democratic process as we know it today just wont work as there is just too much political pandering. THE PLAN:1). The environmental lobby will have to get to the back of the bus for a while, and allow drilling off the coast of florida, California, and in Alaska. We still have some of the strictest environmental standards in the world. I used to work offshore in the oil fields, and we by far surpass other countries on environmental regulation.2). This would do two! things: a. make us 'energy independent' from fruitcake regimes lik! e Venezuela, and the Arab oil cartels. fuel prices would drop sharply, they would be choking on their oil and would have to pay US to take it from them. b. We have about 100 years worth of oil under our own soil if we completely relied on our own source, it could be more. If we had more fuel efficient vehicles, our fuel supply would last longer. This would give us time to develop alternative fuel sources, and ways to increase the efficiency of the internal combustion engine. Within fifty years, we would probably be 'back on top' of the world technologically, and be heading back to having products made in the USA.3). Start giving the oil companies tax incentives to develop technologies to take us away from fossil fuel. Face it, the stick approach wont work with oil companies, try the carrot ( M O N E Y ).4). Start trying to develop space based technologies. there would be new fields of science brought up over night when we start experimenting with zero G manufacturing ! and chemistry.5). Really push for some form of a fusion reactor (possible small enough for a car?), that would run on water. 'Cold Fusion' is really the wave of the future, if it can be developed, it is still all theoretical. Cold fusion reactors around the country that could provide power for the entire country and electric cars.6). Instal a 'mag lev' train system across the country the would rival the train system in Europe. Run by electricity, we could transport millions by rail across the country in about the same time as flying (given the extra time to get to the airport, find parking, go through security, wait for your flight, then get your baggage, etc).This would vastly save on fuel co...Show more
Carlee Tangaro: Ethanol can be produced by bacterial action on any carbohydrate and sugar. Similarly bio diesel can be made from any vegetable oil or used cooking oils. Before embarking on this manufacture you should also consider if we are diverting the food source ! to this manufacture. If so we are going to be short of food raw materia! ls. For example when they diverted the corn hobs for ethanol manufacture it is considered as an asset but when you started diverting the corn itself then corn became short supplied. Similarly when they made ethanol from molasses- a waste in sugar industry- it added value to the process but when they started diverting sugar cane as such, shortfall in sugar was seen.So by carefully selecting the material we can make maximum use of the agricultural out put to make alternate fuels....Show more
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