Posted on 04/09/2008 8:11:54 PM PDT by Josh Painter
ScienceDaily (Apr. 8, 2008) — Researchers have made a breakthrough in the development of "green gasoline," a liquid identical to standard gasoline yet created from sustainable biomass sources like switchgrass and poplar trees...What's that I hear? Why, it's the music track from the Lemon Pipers' 1968 hit, "My Green Tambourine." I've altered the lyrics slightly...While it may be five to 10 years before green gasoline arrives at the pump or finds its way into a fighter jet, these breakthroughs have bypassed significant hurdles to bringing green gasoline biofuels to market...
"Green gasoline is an attractive alternative to bioethanol since it can be used in existing engines and does not incur the 30 percent gas mileage penalty of ethanol-based flex fuel," said John Regalbuto, who directs the Catalysis and Biocatalysis Program at NSF and supported this research.
"In theory it requires much less energy to make than ethanol, giving it a smaller carbon footprint and making it cheaper to produce," Regalbuto said. "Making it from cellulose sources such as switchgrass or poplar trees grown as energy crops, or forest or agricultural residues such as wood chips or corn stover, solves the lifecycle greenhouse gas problem that has recently surfaced with corn ethanol and soy biodiesel."
Beyond academic laboratories, both small businesses and Fortune 500 petroleum refiners are pursuing green gasoline. Companies are designing ways to hybridize their existing refineries to enable petroleum products including fuels, textiles, and plastics to be made from either crude oil or biomass and the military community has shown strong interest in making jet fuel and diesel from the same sources...
I don't need no oil from Saudi sheikhs Or from those crazy Persian freaks It's the coolest thing you've ever seen Watch me while I burn... my green gasolineSong parodies are lots of fun, but energy is a serious issue. What do we do while we wait five to ten years for green gasoline to make the long journey from biomass to the pumps in front of the local convenience store?Take this message to the Mid East, dude And tell Chavez what to do with all his crude Hear them cryin' while your hear my engine sing And watch me while I burn... my green gasoline
Corn was made to eat and not to burn When will the politicians ever learn Don't need no ethanol in my machine Watch me while I burn... my green gasoline
The smart thing would be to ramp up our domestic exploration, production and refining capacity so we would have plenty of American oil to help us make the transition to biomass gas and other alternative fuel technologies. We should start tapping the undrilled oil fields in Alaska's ANWAR and off the Gulf Coast. There's billions of barrels in the Jack Field some 270 miles south of New Orleans and billions more in the Cuban Basin 50 miles off of Florida's coast. The Chinese are going after that Eastern Gulf oil, but the Democrats, under the thumb of the environmental lobby, would have us idly stand by and watch the Chinese and Cubans exploit those fields while we do nothing.
With oil going for $100 or more a barrel, suddenly extracting crude from shale and tar sands has become economically feasible, and we are sitting on such oil deposits in Colorado, Utah and Wyoming. Billions of barrels are believed to be just waiting to be extracted from the Baaken Oil Formation which covers parts of North Dakota, South Dakota and Montana. Just how many billions will be the subject of an eagerly-awaited report from the U.S. Geological Survey. Horizonal drilling technology is allowing several oil companies to begin tapping crude oil and gas underneath North Dakota's Lake Sakakawea.
With billions of barrels of crude oil and trillions of cubic feet of clean-burning natural gas under our feet, it is pure stupidity not to rebuild a strong domestic oil and gas industry in the United States. Making ourselves more self-reliant on energy is more than simply an economic issue - it is a security matter as well. If we have the foresight to exploit our own plentiful energy resources, the U.S. can avoid any potential disruptions in our energy supply due to political factors abroad. This ain't rocket science. It's just common sense.
-JP
Good luck on your new switch grass harvesting business.
One, I read every article and comment that I reply to. I think most freepers do also, so stop insulting them, it's rude.
Two, a fast growing weed or corn for ethanol use fastly depleting land for growing food.
Stop insulting your fellow freepers, you're just making enemies. I have a feeling that's your agenda so feel free to ignore my comments.
So, in our haste, we have embraced the bio-fuel ethanol and what has happened? Unintended, though predicted, consequences of higher food prices, food shortages, a move to more aggressive but not sustainable farming and all for a product that takes almost as much energy to produce it as it yields.
And, if we use it, it's more harmful to our environment than what it is supposed to replace. Even the environmental groups are coming to their senses about the impact of making and using ethanol instead of gasoline. Moreover, if we removed our subsidies, there is no way ethanol could compete against gasoline in the free market.
Even sillier, we let the government cast "big oil" as the new villain and we then accuse them of screwing us over with their high pump prices. If people would stop and THINK, they'd realize that a large chunk of the pump price is TAX! People might also realize that supply and demand are still at work, but it is government who is mostly at fault for the supply problem, not big oil or the middle east. There is real and growing competition to buy oil. Why should we buy it from others when we could pump our own? Because the government say No. As it is, we don't even get the majority of our oil from the middle east, but from our neighbors to the north and south.
And then we have to refine it. How old are our refineries? When did we build the last ones? How many pipelines? Does anyone else see a problem? Katrina hits N.O. and the east coast has a gas shortage. That's not OPEC's fault. And this supply problem is going to be solved by ethanol? Not likely. It's far more difficult to move than gasoline.
Very well said. Thank you.
Well excuse me as you enjoy your switchgrass sandwich(which is a non-food crop and grows on land that is not suitable for such crops as wheat and corn). JMO, with your kneejerk reactions against anything non-petroleum to get the US off OPEC oil, says to me you either work for the petroleum industry or have major stock holdings in the petroleum industry. The buggy whip manufacturers could only dream of the influence the petroleum industry now has.
Also back in the 1880's Edison had many critics that his light bulb wouldn't take off, thank God he didn't listen to his critics.
One could draw far more assumptions from your non-stop shilling for illegals, Dane.
Butimpugning the motives of other posters is your favorite tactic. Very Clintonian of you.
Butimpugning the motives of other posters is your favorite tactic. Very Clintonian of you.
All I did was pointing out to rudder that switchgrass and poplar trees are not food sources and are grown in places where food is not grown.
Yes I think corn ethanol is a boondogle, but that doesn't mean you throw out the baby out with the bathwater when it comes to bio-fuels and bio-diesel.
JMO, anything that gets the US off OPEC oil is fine with me and that means more drilling, coal, nuclear, solar, hydrogen, bio-fuels from weeds and uly trees, bio-fuels from algae, etc. Just because I promote such thing as hydrogen doesn't mean I'm kissing al gore's ring, either.
And also one must face the fact that if there is a hydrogen car, the oil industry is going to lose out, and the oil industry does employ a lot of people, a lot of people have oil stocks in their portfolios, and has a lot of influence in govt.
That said I do believe that some posters do have an interest in oil and dismiss any oil alternative out of hand because of that interest.
Oh, you did a lot more than that, Dane. You then turned around, in your usual snot-nosed manner, and implied that Jean must be associated with oil producers. Just like you imply that those who are opposed to illegal immigration must be a bunch of sheet-wearing racists. And it's tiresome, and does nothing but turn threads into flame-a-thons. Given how often you pull these stunts, one must wonder if that is what you enjoy - causing conflict.
Well, once we find a hydrogen mine, please ping me.
Until then, hydrogen is a energy transfer mechanism and not a source of energy per se. It might be viable to generate hydrogen by cracking it off hydrocarbons, but the hydrocarbons still have to come from somewhere. Likewise, it can be generated through electrolysis, but the electricity has to come from somewhere.
Since when do fighter jets run on gasoline?
Wow, I’m gonna be rich! We’ve got a bunch of poplar trees.
Move over Jed Clampett!
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