"we need to focus on zero emmision coal plants"

That's like trying to make water-free snow.

Soybean is the least efficient of all crops for producing biodiesel. The Europeans use mostly sunflower and rapeseed and maybe some other crops which yield a lot more gallons per acre. Lately there's been excitement about algae which appears to be by far the most productive. Though I agree our biodiesel production can only meet a small percentage of our diesel needs at this time, the fact is biodiesel production has been growing exponentially year after year, and with diesel engines' better fuel economy and biodiesel's better energy balance, it just makes so much more sense than just ethanol. I'm not blasting ethanol and I think it's a lot better than gasoline, but it's not the greatest thing since sliced bread as Bush would have you believe.

I didn't watch the whole speech because I was in the gym working out at the time, but I did catch glimses of it and then I read about it on the news. He also mentioned again that he will cut the deficit in half by 2009. Yeah right.

And yeah, what is that zero-emission coal? Sounds like magic.

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2004 VW Jetta TDI (manual)

Past MB's: '96 E300D, '83 240D, '82 300D, '87 300D, '87 420SEL

http://www.jatrophaworld.org/

I have the luxury of having a botanist in the family and the only places it can grow are in a hot dry climate......


Any ideas?

And you all gotta give "dubbya" credit for finally attempting to see the light.

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Owen

87 300TD 603 I-6
94 Jeep XJ I-6 4.0 (see the pattern)
89 750il
seventy-two hundred feet above sea level (kinda cold up here)

forgot to hit the spellcheck button,,,,,,,sorry

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Owen

87 300TD 603 I-6
94 Jeep XJ I-6 4.0 (see the pattern)
89 750il
seventy-two hundred feet above sea level (kinda cold up here)

Just the other day, I heard Gov. Pataki (NY) saying that he is proposing to have tax-free biodiesel and ethanol sold at the thruway rest stops.

Also, this morning on NPR, some guy was saying that current ethanol production procedures require more fossil fuel energy than they provide (Although I think his calculations go as so far as considering the energy required to build the farmer's tractor.)

Please look at this site.
http://www.counterpunch.org/anwr.html
In it, you will find that big oil and government talk out of both sides of their mouth. One thing this country could do to reduce our dependiency on foreign oil is to stop selling our alaskan oil to other countries.
I haven't heard this mentioned in any press conferences.

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84 500 SEL (307,xxx miles)

It was clear by reading the title of this thread that it would get political in a hurry and it has. Can we please move the thread to Open Discussion?

Don’t be silly Guage. The sky isn’t falling. Though it does seem to be getting heavier. I fly in it almost every day, and have found it’s actually just turning a funky brown color, and not falling at all. Chicken Little I’m not. The only thing chicken around here seems to be those too chicken to realize the obvious., and care enough to do something about it. Perhaps my post should have got the “YAWN” comment and not Austin’s.
Speaking of falling. How have Detroit’s profits been? Compared to say the more fuel efficient/reliable Japanese auto makers? And I don’t care that Exxon made 10.71 billion dollars in the last quarter. Good for them. But when you put it all together and use a little common sense, it’s obvious we aren’t going in the right direction here. If you can’t see this on your own, you never will. And, I’m not going to waste my time trying to explain it.

My apologies to the others for getting a little off the Bio course here. But, I do feel it’s related. Quite closely in fact.

Ethanol as a fuel has a lot of problems. Some of them have been mentioned above. One that I didn't see is the way Ethanol Alcohol is capable of absorbing water - this does a lot of damage to fuel delivery systems.

I can't quote a source at the moment, but I believe the US Dept of Agriculture subsidizes the price of corn for the American farmer by promising to buy up enough of the supply each year to keep a target commodity price. Sometimes the corn is donated or sold to another country, sometimes it just rots, etc. Very similar thing happens to wheat also I believe.

So, I want that "excess" corn turned into corn oil and our municipal diesel vehicles (such as the bus lines) converted as necessary to run on it exclusively. I want to be able to grow corn in my back yard and be able to sell it on a bushel/price basis to producers of corn oil - I want the right to contribute to the "power grid" of bio fuels.

I found it economically useful to burn soy oil last summer after Katrina, and I expect the same will be happening this coming summer due to economic sanctions against Iran.

Hmmm. I wonder how fast and far I can go with a corn pellet-fueled boiler on a steam car?

Ken300D

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1982 300D at 351K miles
1984 300SD at 217K miles
1987 300D at 370K miles

Has anyone watched CNN lately? OMG they are totally bashing Bush on every aspect of his speech. Yes I did watch the whole thing, it was total BS.
He CUT education spending but claims it as a priority.
There is no level playing field in free trade.
Our borders are almost non existant

The Democrats stood and applauded when he mentioned his Social Security reform didn't pass Congress. I could not believe they could act so childish at such a high level. It was embarrasing to watch.

Anyway back to the topic. I also believe it will take more than one solution to remove our dependence on oil.
Hydrogen is going to probably be the best when the technology improves. It is already being used on the space shuttle and some civilian use. I know Disney uses hydrogen generators.

We should also be looking at South America and their use of Ethanol. They should be our role model. The best thing is ethanol takes very little modification for gas burning motors to run it. I believe all you need is to remap the ignition. Most South America cars have a switch built in so they can run either ethanol or RUG.

I know we all have a bias for biodiesel here but how many people are going to make the jump to diesel to run it? It would be best for the trucking industry but I believe civilian use would turn to ethanol instead.

One thing is for sure, things have to change.

DAnny

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1984 300SD Turbo Diesel 150,000 miles

OBK member #23

(\__/)
(='.'=) This is Bunny. Copy and paste bunny into your
(")_(") signature to help him gain world domination

Americas un written energy policy is to burn oil until it becomes more expensive then the alternitives. This is a crummy policy but 95% of the population wants their big trucks and doesn't want to pay extra to save fuel.


For example say you had to full size SUV's.

One used a regular V8 that ran on regular gas and GM was having a fire sale of $10k off sticker.

The other had a fuel cell and was priced $5k over list with no discount. Plus the hydrogen needed would cost about 30% more then filling it with gas.

Average Joe 6 pack would by the V8.

People are not willing to pay more to save fuel, look at all of those hybrids that have big tax rebates to make people pay the premium to buy one up front.

Biodiesel and WVO are just a side show, it would be impractical to fuel the worlds economy on those fuels.

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1999 SL500
1969 280SE
2023 Ram 1500
2007 Tiara 3200

Uh, No.

He just wants to pump more from the US soil so him and his friends make more money.

Jatropha grows down here. Currently as an ornamental. Occasional escape from cultivation until a frost comes along. In the French Quarter (before the flood, anyway) you could see it growing in some courtyards. I had no idea it had an actual use. Thanks for teh heads-up.

Backpeddling on energy independence already.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/02/AR2006020200232.html

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'83 240D with 617.952 and 2.88
'01 VW Beetle TDI
'05 Jeep Liberty CRD
'89 Toyota 4x4, needs 2L-T
'78 280Z with L28ET - 12.86@110
Oil Burner Kartel #35

http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b1...oD/bioclip.jpg

all we need is algea oil to become more cost effective .. that way it can be grown in idle ponds and lakes. or in power plan cooling lakes and such.. their are so many places where it can me grown its not even funnny.. on the roofs of warehouses if neccesary!


ive got myself 100 gallons of bio in my garage just incase an oil embargo is upon us ... and when those diesel prices go up before hurricane season im going to costco and buying a couple 35lbs oil jugs.. and maybe a lil dumpster diving