It’s fortunate that ethanol, biodiesel, photovoltaics, wind turbines, and other systems can all be employed at the same time and actually complement each other. It’s unfortunate that the monetary power of the US is not being spent on renewable energy research and is instead being drained away to pay for other very non-renewable activities.

Ramping up corn won’t make it. Fertilizer runoff from upstream cornfields has already been blamed for rapidly spreading “dead areas” in coastal regions. Killing off our oceans won’t help our national security a whole lot.

I think conservation is the key in tackle the oil problem and it is definitely not a bad ideal to improve the fuel economy. Your view that ” Increasing fuel economy by 20% is not necessarily even possible. ” unless hugh technology break through seem to be a bit extreme as hybrid car do improve fuel efficiency more than that and the technology have been there at least since 1997. And they have very good safety feature as well. Besides, just compare the mileage of Japanese cars to the big three’s and you’ll see the problem here. Lai
Aug.27,2006

Some good points but some very misleading/misguided in my opinion. ASAP, I personally would like to see a diesel-hybrid that can run on ethanol/vegetable oil/etc and plug-in would be nice… Everyone is realizing hybrids are not the final solution but is definitely a step in the right direction.

While I agree with:
‘It is not constructive to examine each alternative as if it were a standalone solution and shoot it down based on it’s weaknesses.’

We should not employ something that is highly likely only going to make things worst! From what I been reading, ethanol is not a bad choice but corn-based ethanol is.

Point 1.) Do you really expect consumers to buy a car and can’t drive it because there is no fuel? Fueling stations would have to exist before wide-acceptance occurs and this is an area government should help. Of course, FFV can run on 100% gasoline just fine. We definitely should be looking at other source of energy.

Point 2.) Ideally, government wouldn’t have to do anything which include letting gas and food prices go as high as they can, etc. Maybe everyone will just grow corn instead!

Point 3.) True but there is a lot of studies finding all the improvement for the past 10~20 years have been put towards heavier vechiles so is not like the technology is not there. Plastic cars… we could limit the speed limit to 5 mph?! Better now. Even less boxy cars can improve fuel economy a lot but that is what American consumers wanted when gas was cheap. Still Ford and GM responded way too slow to changing demand.

Sorry, but your assesment is umm… wrong. Most of the energy input to making ethanol comes from a process I like to refer to as “photosynthesis”. True there is energy required to plant and process the corn as well as in the distillation process, but this amounts to small portion of the energy that is created.

Herschel people like you have the “silver bullet” mentality – along with most of the bloggers on this site. No one in the bio fuels crowd is telling everyone else to take their ideas and go home. Ford is working on both PHEVs and bio-fuel technology. Now I seriousely doubt that ethanol will be an end all solution. In fact I think that E85 is setting the bar a little high… but E50 or something along those lines is perfectly attainable for the mass market.

1. since problems can only be solved by going at least one level up, I suggest http://www.bpf.org/tsangha/loy-market.html

2. in order to see clearly, the underlying structures should be explored. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=477657687600676437&q=the+corporation is a good start

3. since cellulose ethanol is not yet here and direct action is expedient, focus on bio methanol seems logical.

Think of using the next 15 years for changing the $100bln forest mis management problem in Minnesota (http://www.cfr.washington.edu/research.Forest_Energy/projects/Andreu_2005_WA_Senate_5883_files/frame.htm) into $120 worth of bio methanol, by sustainable forest exploitation (where the latter trem has unfitting overtones; it’s man harvesting in harmony with nature).

Think also of the promising methanol fuel cell (http://sydneypeakoil.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=4273&sid=cf49762874f27f89e58aed7390d571bb)

4. re drive train effeciency:
– http://watthead.blogspot.com/2005/12/mitsubishi-continues-work-on-miev.html
– http://www.viamichelin.com/viamichelin/gbr/tpl/mag4/art20050201/htm/michelin_hylight.htm
– http://www.e-traction.com/

5. PHEV’s fit the picture of a sustainable future, especially since they seem well positioned to inspire China, India & all other industrializing regions, due to their elegant line of thought.