Startup Says It Can Make Ethanol for $1 a Gallon, and Without Corn.

[denem]

A biofuel startup in Illinois can make ethanol from just about anything organic for less than $1 per gallon, and it wouldn't interfere with food supplies, company officials said. Coskata, which is backed by General Motors and other investors, uses bacteria to convert almost any organic material, from corn husks (but not the corn itself) to municipal trash, into ethanol.

"It's not five years away, it's not 10 years away. It's affordable, and it's now," said Wes Bolsen, the company's vice president of business development...

The discovery underscores the rapid innovation under way in the race to make cellulosic ethanol cheaply. With the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 requiring an almost five-fold increase in ethanol production to 36 billion gallons annually by 2022, scientists are working quickly to reach that breakthrough.

Besides cutting production costs to fire sale prices, the process avoids some key drawbacks of making ethanol from corn, company officials said. It wouldn't impact the food supply, and its net energy balance is high because the technique works almost anywhere using almost anything with great efficiency. The end result will be E85 sold at the pump for about a dollar cheaper per gallon than gasoline, according to the company.

http://www.wired.com/cars/energy/news/2008/01/ethanol23

OK, this may be yet another perpetual motion machine, but to me it underscores that the United States has been sitting on it's hands since the 70's when the writing was already on the wall.

Whatever Exxon's position, Green looks like a win - win to me. American Technology which can be exported and green collar jobs that can not.

[SaveAmerica]

1. It's affordable and it's now...

[HCE SuiGeneris]

2. 'bout time the ATF steps in and shuts them down then,

can't have untaxed, unregulated free enterprise undermining the collusive relationship between the oil companies and this cabal

[SammyWinstonJack]

5. Ayup! Maddening isn't it?

:banghead:

[frogcycle]

3. and if we just got switchgrass planted on all the idled acreage

there would be a steady supply of material in addition to that mentioned. It would be growing prolifically, without pesticides, herbicides, or irrigation, to be mowed and processed each fall, happily extracting carbon from the atmosphere and providing habitat for wildlife

Last time I checked there were some 40 million acres where the fed is paying farmers not to grow anything, rapidly being converted to heavily-subsidized corn to favor agribusiness.

There are also some 600 million acres in "rangeland" that could be planted. Switchgrass is the second-highest yield, behind sugarcane. Get more cane growing in climates where it will, switchgrass everywhere else - NOW! It takes 3-4 years to get a deep root system and produce at potential. And there is nowhere near sufficient seed - so we need to sow all we can YESTERDAY to get seed crop for the future.

The technology to produce cellulosic ethanol economically WILL be developed, even if this report is overoptimistic. We need to be betting on that and planning for it.

[RC]

13. Ahhh, wait a minute. If this switchgrass is mowed in the fall,

just how will it provide a habitat for anything? Especially if it doesn't sufficiently recover before the eggs hatch/birth occur. Also the carbon will be returned to the atmosphere when the ethanol is burned.

What really is needed is to quit using so much energy. We have already 'expanded' well past our means to sustain our life style when the oil runs out. There is nothing on the horizon to fully replace the energy we are using from oil. When the oil is gone, there will be some major readjustments for the survivors world wide.

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

4. Wow. This Is Awesome. Just Read More About It Too. Now How Do I Invest In Them?

Man, would I love to have a stake in that start-up. The process seems amazing in its simplicity and from what I've just read through a few searches seems extremely encouraging. Putting out 7.7 times the energy taken to produce it and a reduction of 84% carbon emissions is pretty damn impressive.

Thanks for the article!

[denem]

6. ...

kick

[GliderGuider]

7. Hooray! We've been saved!

We can continue living just like we are now!

I can't wait for the dream of sustained development to come true!



Oh dear, do I sound snarky?

[JackRiddler]

8. Hardly, and I understand your sarcasm.

Biofuel from waste and other unused organic product (which is what this amounts to) is by definition a recycled or secondary energy source. The corn husks generally come from stalks grown in oil-fertilized fields. So it's not going to solve even the present energy crisis, let alone replace more than a tiny fraction of the oil.

But the hype is going to make it sound that way, isn't it? It's an imperative in our society to sell things as doing much more than what they actually do, otherwise you are lost in the cacaphony of competing bullshit. And you're right, people are going to treat this as a reason to pretend the oil problem has been fixed and present consumption levels are sustainable.

It's a lot better than food as fuel - the corn ethanol scam so beloved by corrupt and ignorant politicians, which wastes land and uses about as much energy as it produces. By contrast, it's an undisputed good to turn a waste problem into a resource. I hope people can even make the distinction, but generally they won't: you will see the same companies promoting the corn ethanol scam alongside waste biomass conversion as though they are the same thing.

[piedmont]

9. And every couple of months we hear of a start-up that will make super-cheap solar cells.

So where are my super-cheap solar cells?

[porphyrian]

10. I'll kick that. -n/t

[Raster]

11. "Impact the food supply" is code for "impact the high-fructose corn syrup harvest"...

which is now being added to just about all corporate agri-business food products. Don't believe me? Check your labels! In addition to being a "cheaper form of sugar," it's also a huge factor--read: number one factor--in the surge of Type 2 Diabetes, which is no longer called Adult Onset Diabetes because CHILDREN are now developing Type 2 Diabetes. HFCS is nutritional CRACK, and is just about as bad for you as the cocaine version.

[Johonny]

12. Green looks like a win - win to me

That's why Republicans are bad for the economy. It turns out spending on new technologies creates more jobs and industries not less. The EPA and clean air acts made the US one of the leaders in environmental technology. It created whole new fields of work. I laugh at Bushes 2000 address pointing out regulating carbon emissions could cost 500 million. That's what a day and 1/2 of the Iraq war. What a joke.