I'm talking about ethanol fuel here. There are plenty of other great things about Brazil (AKA Brasil), but I'll talk about those things another time.
Before watching this video I was "on the fence" in regards to whether I was convinced in the economic and overall environmental benefits of the United States making the move to ethanol. I now think it's not a matter of whether we should move to ethanol or not, but rather what percentage of each type of ethanol generating items should be included in the move to ethanol.
So here's the scoop:
The guy who helped create Sun Systems & the Java programming language, Vinod Khosla, started a venture capitalist organization and his main focus in recent years has been bio-fuel production.
This video is about an hour long in total but the main "meat" of the idea is in the first 20-30 minutes.
It's worth noting that this presentation was given in 2006 just before Prop 87 was put on the ballot in California and was subsequently defeated. Another key point I would like to make is the current price of oil is, in fact, hovering around the critical $35/barrel price tag that would make ethanol less profitable than petrol/gas.
I have been to Brazil and used both gas (petrol) and ethanol (alcohol) in the same car while there. There was a slightly noticeable decline in acceleration with ethanol but the price difference far outweighed the compromise in performance.
At a time when the Federal government has the U.S. auto industry by the short-&-curlies and Obama will be in charge of making the call of whether or not they are economically viable (not that I agree with that concept, but there it is...), a critical point ought to be that ALL new vehicles be compatible with ethanol and gasoline. It's a simple and inexpensive (approximately $100 per auto) procedure on the assembly line and the Brazilians have already been there for over 20 years. Let's join them.
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Just for the record, this is completely idiotic . . . let's force inefficiency on the masses, for (their own sake).
ReplyDelete-M
I must not have been clear enough on the government intervention side of it. I don't think the government should be involved with the auto industry at all (specifically in regards to price fixing and subsidies).
ReplyDeleteIn terms of efficiency, the message I got out of the presentation was that it is entirely efficient. Artificial forces, not market forces, control the price of oil and if we're going to be exposed to massive wasteful spending by the government we may as well get something good out of it.
BTW...my "for the record" statement will be that I voted "No" on prop 87 exactly because I am generally against the idea of the government meddling in the private sector for two key reasons: 1. They (federal & state) have not convinced me they have any business sense. 2. They can't afford it.