Slashdot Mirror
New Wonder Weed to Fuel Cars?
Hugh Pickens writes "Jatropha, an ugly, fast-growing and poisonous weed that has been used as a remedy for constipation, may someday power your car. The plant, resilient to pests and resistant to drought, produces seeds with up to 40 per cent oil content that when crushed can be burned in a diesel car while the residue can be processed into biomass for power plants. Although jatropha has been used for decades by farmers in Africa as a living fence because its smell and taste repel grazing animals, the New York Times reports that jatropha may replace biofuels like ethanol that require large amounts of water, fertilizer, and energy, making their environmental benefits limited. Jatropha requires no pesticides, little water other than rain and no fertilizer beyond the nutrient-rich seed cake left after oil is pressed from its nuts. Poor farmers living close to the equator are planting jatropha on millions of acres spurred on by big oil companies like British Petroleum that are investing in jatropha cultivation."
To meet the gasoline consumption needs of the USA would require about 9 billion acres at the above rate
Except it's not petrol, it's diesel. If you were running nice fuel-efficient modern diesels, you'd be using about 1/6th the fuel of the wheezy gutless petrols you have now.
I think you are missing the point.
NOTHING is better than what we've got.
Oil and coal an order of magnitude easier/cheaper to use than anything else.
Nuclear energy is safe and virtually unlimited. It is also fairly cheap (just not as cheap as oil).
Eventually we WILL be forced to switch over to other forms of energy, but they will be inferior. Economic growth will slow, and people will starve.
Mostly because we want pot to be legalized. Keep your laws the fuck away from my private life.
You and your buddies keep your pot smoking asses the fuck away from my kids and perhaps the laws wouldn't be required. Just a thought.