Sustainable Oil

Now here is an article that interests me. Basically, a biodiesel refinery has joined forced with a biotech company to genetically engineer a plant that produces 20% more oil than conventional plants. But wait, there's more! This plant, known as the camelina, also grows in very arid regions which have very little agricultural use anyway. Sustainable Oil plans on producing 100 million gallons of biodiesel a year by 2010.

If this joint venture ever goes public, I think I might buy some stock. The only downside I see at the moment is the limited number of diesel vehicles available in the US. But if this catches on, perhaps biodiesel vehicle won't be driven solely by pretentious tree huggers concerned more about looking like they care more than their eco-buddies than actually doing anything for the environment.

I've been interested in biodiesel for a while now, but haven't been able to find sufficient data on it. Based on the studies I've seen, ethanol/E85 doesn't really cut down on any emissions when all variables are considered from the farm to your car, not to mention that it costs more per gallon than gas and gets about 85% of the mileage. Fuel cells still appear to be decades away if they are a viable alternative at all, and hybrid vehicles don't make sense financially and have such a minimal edge over traditional internal combustion vehicles that they really only appeal to the same crowd as current biodiesel owners: those people who want to slap stickers all over their car advertising how much they care about the environment. Battery technology has come a long way, and electric vehicles are now an option in terms of performance, but are still too expensive. And if you want to see a great unintentional comedy, watch Who Killed The Electric Car.

This article touts that biodiesel has 78.45% less carbon dioxide emissions than diesel, but doesn't mention any of the other emissions. I'm not sure why, but I've had a lot of difficulty finding data on biodiesel and so still remain skeptical. The internet is littered with ethanol studies, but why no biodiesel? What are they trying to hide? I'd like to believe it's a viable alternative to gas, and not just because the exhaust smells like french fries. At this point, I'm not sure that European style turbo-diesels aren't the best option, but for some reason they just aren't making it over here. I guess I'll just have to stick with my gas powered car until someone can convince me otherwise.