Yeah, there was a government grant I read about recently which funds the production of biofuel from wild grasses, not farm crops.

It would be nice if Dr. Mercola would write about the possibilities of algae.  And get off the garbage of "Global Warming" being one of the problems.  THAT is what the liberal polititians are looking at to make their money in the near future, just like Gore.  Make it a problem first, then watch them collect our money!

global warming is not man made,it's a scam, the people who think otherwise should do more research, peak oil is a scam, stop being conned. let's all get informed and fight the control freaks.

Hi a-i-f, my husband works as a process engineer for PetroAlgae and is very excited about this technology. He spent a number of years in the fuel cell industry and also developed a technology that takes landfill gas and separates the methane and CO2 from it. The CO2 data collected indicated that the CO2 he separated out was so pure it was food grade. The ability to create viable alternative fuels is out there folks. It only needs some more support to really move it forward.

The problem with switch grass right now is the cost of the enzymes to break the grass down into starch. When that cost gets down, it'll work much better than even sugar cane/root that they use in Brazil. Corn is 'readily' available, cheap to grow (in the short term) and has a relatively easy starch to access. That's why the focus on corn.

The problem isn't the use of biofuels, it's the lack of sustainable farming practices. If you want more details on how to produce sufficient food and fuel, read "Alcohol can be a Gas" (www.alcoholcanbeagas.com) on how a polyculture (vs. our modern monoculture) design provides an abundance of food, a way to improve the land, and a byproduct of 'alcohol' that can be used as fuel.

If they want to make alcohol, they should ask a bootlegger.  Corn works well but not the way they are trying to do it.  Much more sugar can be excracted if they use the whole plant, and harvest before the ears complete,but they can't use their giant machines to do this so they only use part.  Stupid, stupid, stupid.    

Big oil and big Chema are dumping their collapsing U.S. dollars into farm land with intent to corner both the food and fuel markets, add to that the diminishing buying power of the dollar, the real culprit in this scam, and track the criminals to their roots, The secret and evil member/owners  of the Federal Reserve Bank/s.

RMayer,

If my knowledge of hemp is correct, you can use it to make paper as well thereby heavily decreasing the need to cut down trees. You are right on as well with sugarcane from Brazil. Sugarcane takes about 3 weeks to grow. I'm not sure about the type of conditions needed to grow sugarcane. I'm sure the US could grow it. Algae is wonderful and I scratch my head on why nothing yet has been pursued in making algae work.

I've heard from a local radio station discussing crops and alternative fuels, that the U.S. government actually pays ranchers (who have A LOT of land) not to grow crops! They state this is very common in the west Texas and Oklahoma regions. The reason: The increase in crops would "flood the market," and drive prices way down! Has anyone else heard of such a thing?

I wonder if the big oil companies are bracing for long-term, devastating declines for oil in the future? They know alternative sources of energy are being pursued (even though it's at a frustratingly slow rate now), but enough public pressure is going to force sugarcane and algae to be considered for alternative fuels. In addition, new types of vehicles are coming into the market with high miles per gallon (mpg). In the long run, enough people are going to buy those kinds of vehicles that also use alternative sources of energy. We know of hybrids now, but don't be surprised to see tri-brids and even quad-brids (vehicles that use or combine oil, hydrogen, electricity, water, and/or use sugarcare, algae, and/or ethanol.

Big oil does not have plans to join the high-mpg, alternative fuels wagon. The high price of gas is survivability in the long run and to compete with high demand of alternative fuels in the future (that is when we will see gas prices go way way down). Big oil is going to make every attempt to fight alternative fuel sources for a long time.

Again, this is my interpretation and foresight. Anyone have any similar views? Agree? Disagree? Thanks for reading! :)

The US government has paid farmers for at least 20 years to leave acreage lie fallow. This is all over the country--not just Texas and Oklahoma. The US government's farm plan is a result of the farm crisis that occured in the US in the 80's. It was designed to bail out farmers who were faced with losing their farms due to increased fuel cost and the incredibly low crop prices.  The gov't put a minimum price fix in place, as well as the fallow land subsidy. It's still in place. Farmers are actually not allowed to plant their entire acerage, even if they wanted to. And in this election year, there's no way any politician will even approach this subject and risk losing the vote of the farmers.  I for one, having come from several generations of farmers, fully support the farmer finally getting a somewhat decent pay for their honest hard work, and dare any of you to live that life. Most people are too soft to even make it for a day.  However, I digress.

Here's a thought...  Let's leave the farmers who grow food crops alone, and instead convert tobacco farmers to other cash crops.  Is any one aware that the US gov't also subsidizes tobacco farmers? And the more laws that are passed against smoking, the higher those subsidies go. I for one do not appreciate my tax dollars going to pay tobacco farmers to raise tobacco, then more of my tax dollars going to pay for the health care of people adversly affected by tobacco, and still more to pay for the judges who try tobacco cases, and on and on. I'm sure the gov't can "guide" tobacco farmers to other cash crops with incentives, just as they incentivize farmers to leave land lie fallow.