Steven Chu on alternatives to foreign oil

Steven Chu and others discuss alternatives to foreign oil in the episode "Growing Energy" from the PBS series e² energy. In response to the oil crisis of the 1970s, Brazil created a domestic ethanol industry that is now thriving on all levels, from production, to distribution at gas stations, to nationwide adoption of flex-fuel cars. The episode examines what we can learn from Brazil's extraordinary success with ethanol, and whether other countries could follow suit.

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[mlmenere]

hahaha "marginally better, maybe 15% better". that is an absolute s**t load better taking into account how much oil is burned in the us everyday. what an obviously bias comment...

[dreadlord45]

I assume by your comments that you are unaware of how tightly the polarized bonds of a water molecule bind hydrogen to oxygen and how much electricity you therefore need to do such a thing. We will need ALOT of solar plants. Do you also know that a smart grid will be required to distribute power? I'm also guessing that you havent considered how much infrastructure this requires, nor the fact that infrastructure improvements require the use of petroleum-fueled construction... peak oil anyone?

[brotherjupiter]

I guess it won't be politicaly exceptable to use distributed solar power and electrolisis to create hydrogen for our current internal

combustion engines until we are absolutely certain

we have destroyed our biosphere beyond repair.

Sad creatures.

[TheFormalizer]

Morons. What's going to harvest those crops? mexican workers?

[darkvader47]

Most of the corn we grow in the US is genetically modified, and even the starving nations don't want it. Keep listening to the politicians and the people who says it's years off instead of individuals like myself who have been making their own ethanol and running it in our cars. Anyone who's ever made moonshine already knows how to do it.

[darkvader47]

Corn is not environmentally friendly? What a fucking joke! What we need from the corn or any crop to make ethanol is STARCH, and we can get that from the corn and still have what we need to feed the cows who can't DIGEST STARCH ANYWAY. I guess gasoline is environmentally friendly? If this program is on PBS, then I'm convinced their is oil money behind it to tell us it's years away, just like they told us years ago.

[darkvader47]

What ASSHOLES making these claims. Most of the corn we grow goes to feed mostly cattle, not people. We have more than enough land to grow OTHER crops that yield more ethanol than corn. Brazil is the blueprint as to how to convert, but we have a variety of crops to do it now. Anyone telling you this is years away are fooling you and in the pockets of the oil people. We could have been off it 30 years ago, but the lobbies keep buying politicians off. WAKE THE FUCK UP!

[mikemikef]

The US could be growing sugar cane in much of our south and making ethanol there and shipping the cane to the north for distilling using the energy in the cane.

[ferdyss85]

If you dont believe me, take a look on wikipedia and others sources for how they make ethanol in Brazil.

[ferdyss85]

No, the plantantions of Sugar-cane in brazil are at least 2000km away from Amazon, and besides that, the soil of Amazon is very, very, poor, the Amazon lives by itself, if you take out the florest you cant grown anything on that soil.