Florida's Going Orange!

[gtalum]

:uarrow: The problem is, it's going to be very hard to come up with fuel cells that can take a car thousands of miles without a recharge.

Who needs thousands of miles without a recharge? With induction recharging systems, you can recharge in about the same amount of time it takes to fill a gas tank. You'd just be stopping at a power station instead of a gas station. Improve battery technology, and we could easily get 500 or 1000 miles between charges.

Long-distance trucking can and should be almost completely replaced with trains, which are much more efficient and safer anyway, and it's relatively easy to electrify rail corridors.

Our system currently is extremely inefficient, and is only continued because the oil companies have such powerful lobbies.

[Ed Mahmoud]

:uarrow: The problem is, it's going to be very hard to come up with fuel cells that can take a car thousands of miles without a recharge.

Who needs thousands of miles without a recharge? With induction recharging systems, you can recharge in about the same amount of time it takes to fill a gas tank. You'd just be stopping at a power station instead of a gas station. Improve battery technology, and we could easily get 500 or 1000 miles between charges.

Long-distance trucking can and should be almost completely replaced with trains, which are much more efficient and safer anyway, and it's relatively easy to electrify rail corridors.

Our system currently is extremely inefficient, and is only continued because the oil companies have such powerful lobbies.

The press doesn't explain it very well, but hydrogen is more of an energy storage medium than a real fuel. It doesn't exist in its useable state in nature. Instead, it exists as water, and energy must be put into it to turn it to molecular hydrogen. Ditto rechargeable batteries. The electricity has to come from somewhere. Wind farms are part of the solution, but they have a bad habit of killing birds.

Nuclear power might be the most promising solution, but the aging hippies from the 70s still remember 'The China Syndrome' and the mishap at Three Mile Island.


If one uses coal to generate the energy to produce hydrogen or recharge car batteries, one has simply moved the carbon pollution to a different place, but not eliminated it.

[Ed Mahmoud]

The government subsidies on corn for ethanol are making corn for people, and feed corn, and therefore pork, chicken, and beef, more expensive.


Sugar cane is a better biofuel, but ADM and Midwestern farmers won't get rich off of it, and it only will grow where it is warm and wet.


Corn ethanol is a joke, really, it takes almost as much energy to make as it produces, and without heavy subsidies would not be economic at all.

[Squarethecircle]

One of my big issues with the US government and better fuel opportunities: We need to make a deal with countries in South America (my pick is Brazil) so that they can import their stuff here. We already still make enough corn so that none of it would be wasted.

Long-distance trucking can and should be almost completely replaced with trains, which are much more efficient and safer anyway, and it's relatively easy to electrify rail corridors.

I did actually mention the institution of public mass transport, which would naturally be an efficient way to move freight.

[HURAKAN]

Once again, depending on harvests is not the answer.

[Squarethecircle]

Sugar cane is more than plentiful enough to satisfy any car needs there could potentially be with a better mass transit system, and harvests are hardly ever ruined enough so there would be a very large impact. Regardless of its potential for the future, it's much better than corn (or barley, etc.).

[gtalum]

Becoming dependent on South and Central American countries for our energy needs seems nearly as problematic as depending on Middle Eastern countries is.

[Squarethecircle]

Not exactly; I cannot foresee our entire car industry depending on sugar cane shipments. If they want to ship it to us, then let them, I say. If they don't, then we have corn.

[Stephanie]

IMHO, we can't just limit ourselves to just one source of alternative fuel. I'm leary of depending on all food products because of harvests and HURAKAN said and the soil does not support the growth of a specific grain, vegetable or fruit forever. The crops need to be rotated because the nutrients in the soil are used up. Lastly, it's a finite source of energy, just like oil and coal.

Nuclear scares me plus the NIMBY's (I would be one of them) wouldn't want to see something that used nuclear anything buried somewhere near their backyard.

I think that solar and wind for electricity and heat are the way to go since there is an infinite supply of it. Scientists should be able to come up with a way to harness solar power for vehicles or a combination of solar, ethanol, etc. to create another fuel source.

[DaylilyDawn]

Over here in Lakeland the Juice Bowl plant uses the peels from the oranges they use to make juice with, to make cattle feed with it. It smells good when the feed is being processed. I live about 1 1/2 miles from the plant and when the wind is right you can smell it.