Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
You might say that if fossil fuels are a big, thick steak, then renewables like ethanol are an arugula side salad with low-cal dressing. The salad is better for your health and lighter on the land, but it’s not going to fill your belly.
…Let us drop the conceit that these are “problems,” and that they can be “fixed.” Let us instead try an experiment: let us dissociate from human history, and free-associate our way into the next chapter of natural history, which, let us bravely assume, a member of our ecologically challenged species will still be on hand to narrate.
Lester Brown: Ethanol could leave the world hungry /
Ethanol, Corn Users May Deplete US Supplies By 2008 /
Africa looks to shrubs and sugar to beat oil price /
OPEC President Discusses Ethanol
We are … biotechnologists, as well as chemical engineers and have successful processes going today… Our carefully considered view, for which we will be happy to provide abundant evidence is that severe barriers remain to ethanol from lignocellulose. The barriers look as daunting as they did 30 years ago.
(The latest salvo in the Khosla-TOD debate about biofuels.)
Prof. Paul Alivisatos on nanotechnology and renewable energy / Boatload of biodiesel shipping today / San Francisco’s clean energy revolution is here
Due Diligence: An Oil Drum reader’s response to Khosla (on biofuels) /
Deconstructing the Virdian case for ethanol /
China Targeting Growing Biofuels 12x by 2020; 15% of Transportation Fuels /
Biodiesel Boom brings Demand for Vegetable Oil to Record heights
Biofuels could only play a meaningful role in a society that lived with some ecological modesty argues Dana Visalli
In separate announcements over the past few months, researchers at the University of Johannesburg and at Nanosolar, a private company in Palo Alto, have announced major breakthroughs in reducing the cost of solar electric cells. While trade journals are abuzz with the news, analysis of the potential implications has been sparse.
Frankenstein fuels / Sugar, oil prices decouple as biofuel stocks grow / Sweden 2020
Why Wal-Mart wants to sell ethanol /
Imagining the Future of Gasoline: Reality or Blue-sky Dreaming? /
Environmentalists Burn Ethanol Hype as Empty Promise /
DOE To Invest $250 Million In New Bioenergy Centers
Investing a portion of today’s relatively abundant energy resources into technologies that will yield energy later on, when fossil fuels are scarce, will make it a good deal easier to provide that little when it’s most needed, and cushion at least some of the impacts of the Deindustrial Revolution.
Food prices would soar in biofuels switch, says Unilever /
Chez Kaiser’s food revolution: Hospital experiment putting locally grown produce on patients’ plates /
Micropropagation and sustainability
