Posted on 07/20/2006 11:09:05 AM PDT by presidio9
Wouldn't know, the lst movie I went to was about 50 years ago.
Actually, this is probably true. A couple of Israelis over the years found a way to turn garbage into recyclable crude.
Here's what they're not telling you, though. The process is NOT energy efficient. It probably takes as much energy, or more, to make the oil, as the oil is worth.
This kind of thing isn't new. As I said, the Israelis used heat and pressure to break down molecular bonds and then link hydrocarbon polymers. Whoop-de-doo, if it isn't an energy efficient process.
Ultimately, the only real way out of this is solar power, fuel cells and nuclear power. Nothing else would be efficient enough, of the stuff thats on the current horizon.
Unless someone has secretly developed a perpetual motion device, or mastered cold fusion.
NO WAR FOR KRILL!
OK, I take that back. Bottled water is more expensive than gasoline.
The University of New Hampshire is looking at similar technology:
http://www.unh.edu/p2/biodiesel/article_alge.html
Plants already exist that produce power from methane gas. I once built a miniature replica when I was in high school, for a science project. It does work. Its just not efficient.
You need a vast garbage dump to power that kind of thing. And jokes about New York or San Francisco or Hollywood aside, it's just not a realistic possibility at the current stage of affairs.
You can produce oil from a lot of stuff. The Japanese and Israelis, the usual hi-tech suspects, have had ways for years. But they aren't efficient, and there's no obvious or clear way to make them more efficient.
Actually what egg is to chicken. All petroleum originates from saltwater algae and related life forms. It's amazing to me how many people don't know that.
I thought it came from dinosaurs.
There is also a species of algae that emits hydrogen gas instead of oxygen when deprived of sulfur. So not only could we make unlimited biodiesel from sunlight and saltwater but hydrogen fuel as well.
`So the pytoplankton absorb CO2 as they grow, reducing CO2 in the atmosphere. What happens when you burn the fuel?
I'm still waiting for the Spanish to prove they can make food from Paella.
Nope, not one drop.
I'm sure Lavoisier and equivalent exchange will dictate something has to be sacrificed in order of this to work.
Nothing is free, we often create more of a problem than a solution.
I refuse to believe you.
Google it then.
Here's a chocolate-covered girl....
I don't want to know otherwise. Next you'll be telling me we'll never be able to clone T-rexes from mosquitos trapped in amber.
Until there is verified cost data, this article is worthless. Alternatives that are far more costly than existing energy sources are magnets for governments subsidies and companies with lots of PR and red ink.
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