Re: Hydrogen is too difficult. - Page 10

 

According to this on the DOE pages, biomass can be converted to fuel.
http://www.eere.energy.gov/biomass/thermochemical_platform.html

 

Here is a good place to start on biomass fuels.
http://www.ucsusa.org/clean_energy/renewable_energy/page.cfm?pageID 6

 

Corn, soybeans, switchgrass, etc. are a good start, even though
they can never be the solution. Fresh water and land restrict the
amount of these crops far below that needed for petroleum
replacement. Nonetheless, using these crops to produce fuel will
create a market and encourage entrepreneurs to find a better
solution, probably marine algae.

Paul wrote:

Humbly--Ed

"If the man doesn't believe as we do,
we say he is a crank, and that settles it.
I mean, it does nowadays, because now we
can't burn him."  (Mark Twain)

 

Seems to me that if a truck pulled up to a pump and it said 'petro
diesel $2.50' and 'biodiesel $2.49' they would ALWAYS be sold out of
biodiesel. You could sell as much as you can grow. Its just up to some
co-op of farmers and truckers to get the production cost down so when
the retail cost is competitive, there is 3% or 5% or 10% profit to
divvy up to the partners/shareholders. Maybe this US Biodiesel company
could garner some significant percentage of domestic diesel. 10%? 50%?
Maybe the spreadsheet doesnt generate any cash flow at $2.50... just
wait a few months till its $3.00 a gal.... then start the trucks
rolling.

 



If the two product were identical, you can be sure the prices would be
identical.  Farmer cooperatives and oil cartels have one thing in common,
they both try to control the supply to boost prices.  The oil companies have
been far more successful at this than farmers.  If oil wells were run like
farms, gas would be a nickel a gallon.  If farms were run like oil
companies, a loaf of bread would cost 15 bucks.