Bio Fuel

We're all feeling the strain at the pumps right now and we all know there's absolutely no legitimate reason for the exorbitant price of a gallon of gas.  We also know what's going to happen to the economy, our jobs, and our lives if it the prices don't go down.  So what is the answer?

Hybrid cars are wonderful, if you're in the position financially to buy one.  But what about those of us who struggle at the low end of the middle class who can't afford to add a car payment to the monthly bills?  Solar panels are a wonderful way to reduce, or even eliminate our electric bills, but who can afford to buy the solar panels these days?  The truth is, it takes A LOT of money to buy all this energy efficient, money saving technology and none of it will do much to help us right now.

The high price of fuel is not a new thing.  It nearly bankrupted the country three years ago and still there are no viable solutions.  The government's solution is "use less fuel" so we all did and instead of going down, the price went up because since the demand went down the oil companies reduced production.  The truth is, they don't want the price at the pump to go down.  In fact, they would all be very happy if it kept going up.  Case in point, BIO-FUEL!  You may wonder what I'm talking about, after all, bio-fuels are supposed to reduce our carbon footprint and save us money.  Eventually.  If only they didn't cost so much to manufacture.

The excuse for the cost of bio-fuel is that it's SO difficult to make.  I just watched an episode of NOVA that was all about alternative energy, including bio-fuel.  Soybeans and corn are two of the main sources of bio-fuel.  One fellow developed a yeast that distills bio-fuel that comes out ready to be used with no additional refinement needed.  Wonderful!  But he used sweet grass so the fuel cost $100,000 to manufacture one tablespoon.  Sweet grass?  Really?  I even heard of an oil company that's attempting to make fuel from algae.  It all sounds good on the surface, after all, soybeans and corn are food and we shouldn't be using food for fuel, but come on!  It sounds to me like they're deliberately choosing raw materials that will never be cheap enough to be cost effective.

But there's a perfectly good and potentially abundant, cheap source of the sugars needed to produce bio-fuel.  It's called...wait for it...SUGAR!!!  Yes, that's right!  SUGAR! Sugar comes from sugar cane, something that the US is capable of producing in abundance.  Nearly every state in the country could easily grow sugar cane, in fact, it's one of Louisiana's key agricultural crops.  Unless you've been to southern Louisiana in the fall, around Franklin and the surrounding countryside, you wouldn't know what goes on there then.  The fields around the town grow sugar cane and it's harvested in the fall.  What isn't needed for the harvest is burned.  Yes, I said burned, miles and miles of cane fields burned off because the cane isn't needed to make sugar.  It's been this way for many decades and I'm sure Louisiana isn't the only state that engages in this practice.  Researchers in Hawaii experimented with making bio-fuel from sugar cane several years ago and found it to be much cheaper and easier to manufacture and of much higher quality than fuels made from soy or corn, and won't deplete anyone's food supply.

So why aren't the oil companies who claim to want alternative energy pursuing the use of sugar cane as a viable source of bio-fuel?  I think that's the question we have to ask, and demand an answer too.  According to last night's NOVA, it should be as simple as adding yeast to sugar and distilling it, and that could be done at the local brewery.  Imagine that.  Cheap and abundant, renewable fuel that's as easy to make as beer.  I can see it now, the oil companies would all go out of business and Budweiser would become the king of more than just beer.  No wonder the oil companies are stalling.