Mass. company making diesel with sun, water, CO2

Mass. company making diesel with sun, water, CO2

news.yahoo.com

A Massachusetts biotechnology company says it can produce the fuel that runs Jaguars and jet engines using the same ingredients that make grass grow.

Joule Unlimited has invented a genetically-engineered organism that it says simply secretes diesel fuel or ethanol wherever it finds sunlight, water and carbon dioxide.

(visit the link for the full news article)

Holy crap, I hope this works out! It would be such a wildly game-changing technology.

Of course ... the one thing many of these oil rich countries have going for them is, well, the oil. What would happen is the countries that feed the world also fuel the world's cars and trucks and airplanes and more?

That said, it would be amazing to see the USA be energy independent.

The AP article says that this had been kept hush-hush for a while, as development was finalized. For good reason, I am sure.

news.yahoo.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

reply to post by mother1138


Whatever ecological alternative for fuel companies come up with get kicked out of the game by massive oil corporations.
So, why should we even bother finding alternatives? Maybe when we run out of oil, then these alternatives will come back to light. But before that happens, there will probably wont be any humans left. Why? Because there will be wars for last drops of oil. We will destroy each other.

We've been hearing about algae based oils for years now, hopefully they can create something that turns out efficient.

This seems way too good to be true. However, if it is, they will find a way to ban or outlaw it under health, or safety, or environmental concerns.

reply to post by ReVoLuTiOn76


Ironic isnt it?

2nd line.

I don't think is really as fantastic as most are making it out to be. It is definitely good and could in theory reduce oil dependence and decrease costs to $30 a barrel. Assuming they can find a cost efficient way of extracting the oil from the wastewater.

I don't think this really addresses the real underlaying problem which isn't so much the reliance on oil as it is the reliance of taking any oil product to use as a combustion source for energy. would much prefer to see a project of this funding and scope go towards feeding the world. If you can make a fuel bacteria you can make a food bacteria.

As for alternate fuel sources the ones that are truly cheap and free are the ones being tucked away. I saw a car running on a viable hydrogen fuel cell five years ago. It cost nothing to fill up and had no emissions. Granted it was slow and there was a risk of explosion but these are only relatively minor mechanical issues.

There quite a few real options and places for technology to go that I think merely substituting oil is not what is needed. What is required is the total replacement of oil with an entirely new technology.

Originally posted by ReVoLuTiOn76
This seems way too good to be true. However, if it is, they will find a way to ban or outlaw it under health, or safety, or environmental concerns.

They'd just hypocritically state that it's a hazard because if this microbe gets into the wild it can overtake regular microbes and ruin this and that... While at the same time defending or overlooking GMO crops overtaking regular crops.

I'll believe it when it comes to the gas station. The company can probably do it, as can others mentioned some years ago, but they have been/will be bought out/ outlawed or similar. Too much at stake for big oil

Can any of you name a viable oil replacement which has suffered the fate you have so paranoicly described?

This sounds cool and all but I have to agree with everyone else. Oil is in high demand, that gives oil companies a lot of money thus a lot of power. If we became dependent on another energy source then that would be a problem for them, unless they ended up taking control of that energy source or kept it from becoming mainstream.

Fuel is getting made in water so wouldn't that pollute our drinking water, at least if they don't figure out an efficient way to collect it. That could something the oil companies could use...

Now, if the DO contaminate teh "outside" enviroment...
Id hate to walk around kneehigh in diesel and ethanol...

reply to post by HunkaHunka


Do you expect to see MSM reporting how a promising new energy source is purchased and hidden before it becomes viable, or possibly a few federal regulations that turn an otherwise useful energy source useless under false pretenses of public health and safety?

If I was a big oil executive and I came across a promising technology that woud provide cheap or free energy I would purchase the patent, pay the inventors some be quiet money and couch it all in the fact that it needs further R&D and during the R&D process let the inventors know it is not yet economically viable but will bring into production in the future and they need to keep quiet about it until it goes public...

You wouldn't know what is being hidden because it is being hidden with an efficiency and ruthlessness that is used when billions of dollars are at stake. Considering people get killed every day for thousands of dollars imagine what people are capable of for billions...