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A Viable Biofuel?
natural rah writes "A laboratory in India has developed a process for making diesel fuel from an inedible plant which grows in barren wastelands. Although biofuels are mass produced and used in USA and EU, they have been traditionally derived from edible oils like soy bean and rapeseed. Using edible oils to make fuels is evidently not an option in a country like India. This fuel is "carbon neutral" (at least theoretically), has potential to make good use of barren wastelands, is clean and sustainable. Read more here -- could you have a SUV and not put excess carbon into the air?"
Hemp and Marijuana aren't the same thing.
:)
http://www.artistictreasure.com/flier4.html
So smoke all the Hemp you want.
250 years from now, after everyone is growing and using biofuel, someone's going to accidentally strike oil and realize "we can this shit from the ground, practically for free!"
I have to wonder why this is modded as a troll. Despite the humor aspect of it, and the fact that hemp isn't smokable, hemp will grow where many other plants won't. My only thinking is that hemp has got such a bad reputation because it is basically marijuana without the THC that people just dismiss it. It is really quite the versatile plant.
According to that biodiesel-from-fuel article, you can grow the algae that's the feedstock for biodiesel at about half the current cost of diesel. So where is it? If someone can make tons of money doing it, that usually implies someone is already doing it.
Don't be so fast, cowboy! The carbon comes out of the air when the plant grows, and is put back into the air when you burn your fuel. Its a novel idea.
The key to the energy production is using the incident solar radiation (of about 1 KW/m^2 on the surface of the Earth) to effectively take carbon out of the air and turn it into fuel. There is alot of energy required to do this which be impossible for us to do today economically (except perhaps with a nuclear plant). This is why it is impractical to have underground corn fields, for example. This is also why food production on distant planets, in the future, may require nuclear power to shine light on plants for extended periods of time.
What I am particularly interested in biodiesel is if it can be successfully adapted to be used in fuel cells for higher effeciency (is there a technology where the impurities won't poison the cell).
Additionally, an adaptation of this idea could help reduce the CO2 in the atmosphere. Consider burying 10% of the oil produced over time. If the oil is mass produced, that is a lot of CO2 that has left the atmosphere.
Suddenly, the hairy finger of a familiar monkey tapped me on the shoulder. It was time.--G. T.
So, two people marked me as a troll. This is not a troll, it's a valid question.
Let me put it another way: what makes more oil? Hemp, or rapeseed?
Stupid moderators.
Fascism trolls keeping me up every night. When I starts a preachin', he HITS ME WITH HIS REICH!