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$1 Ethanol Isn't Innovation, It's a Commitment to Business as Usual
Americans do not reduce. We may reuse, and we may recycle, but our economic system is predicated on steady consumption. So it makes sense that while trying to invent our way out of the consequences of global warming, we would seize upon those ideas that encouraged us to, well, consume. In other words, business as usual.
Today's quick fix is brought to us by Coskata. This Illinois-based energy startup, thanks to a hefty investment from GM, has already announced its triumph in the race for a new global energy source. The winning product? Bargain ethanol. Coskata's innovative technology, which lets anaerobic "patented microorganisms" eat syngas (a carbon monoxide and hydrogen compound formed by processing biomass such as corn husks), allows the company to produce waste-free ethanol from almost anything you give them: tires, factory waste, switchgrass, you name it.
What's more, says the company, because its process can convert so many different types of material into essentially pure ethanol, the fuel could be locally produced anywhere in the world. Each gallon will generate nearly eight times as much energy as it takes to make it, and the product reduces carbon emissions by 84%. The production cost of this miracle fuel? $1 per gallon.
Don't get me wrong. It sounds incredible. And though some of the company's claims may be overenthusiastic, the underlying premise—that all of our scraps could make a whole lotta energy—is essentially sound. There's a danger, however, in hyping solutions to our energy problems that don't require people to change a single habit, or even to know any more about where their fuel comes from. One of the attractions of corn-based ethanol was the ease with which it could be substituted for regular fuel: sell enough of it to your local gas stations, and as long as his car kept moving Joe Driver wouldn't even notice the difference. But debates over peak oil and fealty to "energy independence" obscure widespread denial of the fact that it is not just our energy supplies, but our lifestyle that is absolutely unsustainable. Coskata could fill every gas pump in the world with truck-tire ethanol, and it wouldn't change the fact that at some point there won't be enough truck tires. Our oil needs are a problem, but our energy needs are a bigger one.To reiterate: I'm all for technology that reduces emissions, shrinks landfills, and otherwise makes use of all that we currently throw away. And if Coskata really does get its production facilities up and running by 2011, as it claims it can, I'll happily get in line. But in the interest of long-term survival, it'd be nice to see someone devote the same kinds of resources to livable city design, efficient and far-reaching mass transit, and local economies. Unfortunately, scaling down does not a profit make.—Casey Miner
Casey,
I want to thank you for writing on this topic. I understand the basis of your article. We need to consume less oil. I whole heartedly agree. We believe that ethanol is one of MANY solutions to achieving this. There are electric cars, 2 mode hybrid vehicles, and even hydrogen vehicles that may be able to displace our oil use someday. The most immediate solution happens to be ethanol though. GM will make 50% of their fleet flex-fuel capable in the next 5 years.
Let me introduce myself. I am Wes Bolsen, the CMO & Vice President of Coskata, Inc. The Coskata process, which is laid out on our website (www.coskata.com), as well as in your article is commercially viable today. We are not waiting for invention. We are only waiting for the plant to be built. I understand that it is not going to solve all of the world's problems and there will be lots of other approaches to fuel, but we are proud of our Coskata scientists and engineers who have developed this very exciting process that will turn not only trash and tires, but wood scraps, new energy crops, and left over agricultural waste into ethanol. The USDA and DOE estimate that over 1 Billion tons of biomass exists in the US to produce fuel. You can read the report here: http://www1.eere.energy.gov/biomass/pdfs/final_billionton_vision_report2...
Given that Coskata can turn a dry ton of material into more than 100 gallons of ethanol, we have the ability to produce as much as 100 Billion gallons of biofuels. We currently consume about 140 Billion gallons. If you just don't like ethanol in general, we will be producing butanol and other fuels in the future with microorganisms that we have.
We believe that ethanol can be a viable replacement to oil, not just a blend though. I would enjoy talking with you in more detail about Coskata, the independent validation by Argonne National Labs of our numbers for greenhouse gas emissions (up to 84%) and some of the other things that got GM really excited about Coskata. So excited that they decided to "put their money where their mouth is" and invest in commercializing the technology. They spent almost 7 months in our pilot facility watching the Coskata process work.
I am sorry that we could not speak before you wrote the article. Please feel free to reach out.
Sincerely,
Wes Bolsen
This sound's like baloney to me. I'll believe the Coskata process when I see it.
Unfortunately, Casey is quite right though. Our consumption seems impossible to stop. We need freedom FROM cars and the soulless sprawl they produce, regardless of what they run on!
I think we need it all. Ethanol, hybrid cars, less consumption, recycling, and general social enlightenment. but.... If big corporate giants who produce ethanol are the result at least it's a step up from big corporate oil giants.
Well, Wes Bolsen just threw his general damage control comment up without reading the post. Which actually seemed pro turning waste into a cleaner-than-gasoline fuel (pro Coskata) and anti the american attitude of "consume-more-forever."
I guess GM has an active damage-control department...
the big "Energy" companies are actually "Fuel" companies, and fuel is their only product.
there are many thousands of energy sources available, but the only ones the "Energy" companies want to know about are based on burning fuels, because that's where they make their money.
we need many things, including increased efficiencies in our energy usage, and proper insulation of houses, but in the end we need a fuel-free society.
and it can be done .. if only some of our leaders would get a spine!
btw, don't fall for that old furphy about "renewables can't provide baseload power" - this is utter crap.
The Coskata Process is sound, however, the jump from laboratory to commercial production (>10MMGY) is easier said then done.
But that's not what concerns me.
What concerns me, is the fact that the Coskata Process is reliant upon the use of PROPRIETARY MICROORGANISMS.
The word "proprietary", suggests manufactured lifeforms that have been engineered, altered and/or possibly mutated at the genetic level.
In the Coskata Process, said lifeforms live in a bioreactor where they covert syngas streams (CO,H2) into ethanol (EtOH).
The question for Mr. Bolsen then becomes...
Can Coskata's "proprietary microorganisms" survive outside of the bioreactor?
And if so, what would happen to the natural environment should these lifeforms escape?
Moreover, what guarantees can Coskata put in place to ensure that the above does not occur?
It amazes me how so many people are willing to shoot down every advancement just because it doesn't match some standard of ideological purity that they have invented. What possible damage control needs to be done when a company announces a breakthrough that could significantly help our environment and our economy.
In reality Mr. Bolsen's comment is probably underselling the importance of this technology. If the savings in CO2 is 84% compared to the overall figure for gasoline, it would be significantly greater when compared to the sources of marginal supply the U.S. is now turning to... oil sands and oil shale.
I think environmentalists lose serious credibility with the main stream audience when they insist upon taking unwarranted potshots at people making significant contributions. There is simply no need to create a competition between varying solutions. We need all the solutions we can get.
Umm, isn't the whole goal of replacing oil to find an energy source that allows us to continue business as usual. I really get annoyed at people who seem to prefer the planet and nature to technology and fellow humans. However, we need the planet to exist, so some environmental efforts need to be taken of course.
However this idea of reduced consumption is simply ideology not necessity. What we have is a technological problem, which is simply how to generate energy from sources other than oil that leaves low carbon impact.
All the technological ideas and solutions will not change the fact that we live in a limited resource environment: one single planet. Mr. Miner is correct in seeing the larger picture. This is not to say technology does not have its place; our manipulation of our own invented tools are what sets us apart from all other animals! But using these tools (aka vehicles) to such an extent as to destroy the very ecosystem that keeps us alive?
I praise Mr. Bolsen and Coskata for their somewhat sustainable steps toward using resources that already exist. However, as the Green Hero noted, there are *risks* to using these technologies (like ANY technology or tool) and those risks must be assessed and heeded if we are to be truly responsible.
Let us not bash the small steps, but let us also not make haste into another catastrophe.
I agree wholeheartedly with RhapsodyInGlue. This is one area where environmentalists really have to do some introspection. If using our waste can cut dependence on fossil fuels where's the foul? In his argument Mr. Miner stated his annoyance with "a danger, however, in hyping solutions to our energy problems that don't require people to change a single habit,". If recycling waste to energy isn't a good habit then what exactly are you after? It's when kooks like you propose we all live on twigs and berries and live in grass huts that really turns off the mainstream toward meaningful change. Sustainablity has as a main premise that the earth can sustain man. Recycling and renewable energy are part of making that happen. At present you are correct that our lifestyle is not sustainable. But don't knock new technologies that may change that paradigm. Or have you immersed yourself into the sustainability mantra so much that it is a beloved theology, and no amount of science will change your faith.
We (the industrial world) ARE GOING TO consume less oil, less natural gas, and in the long run less energy whatever its source. It simply will not be available. There are renewable sources of energy, and in theory there is enough of this 'free' energy to sustain any imaginable lifestyle, but in practice the huge up front cost of developing and maintaining such an energy infrastructure makes the Manhattan Project look like a walk in the park. Our lifestyle has been unsustainable for 50 years or more, and now we have run out of time to invest in alternatives. We do not have enough energy left to build an alternative energy infrastructure, given the hideous inefficiencies of our way of life. Any system of energy production based on recycling 'waste' energy from unsustainable sources is itself unsustainable. We need to invest all we can in genuinely renewable and sustainable sources, but also plan for powerdown as fast as you can. Ethanol is a hideously inefficient way of using a finite resource (agricultural land) to produce energy to power an unaffordable technology (personal transport). We and the world need the land to grow food.
Wes Bolsen back to comment.
I am not part of any PR machine or even a spokesperson for GM. I am simply a normal guy that is one of the leader in an extraordinary company, Coskata.
I probably won't be able to post a whole lot more here with respect to time I have to actully help move this process along, but I wanted to do a quick reply. I have the same love for the earth as many of you, I want it to be sustainable. Hence the time I am taking to answer.
The biggest question for me was about how "harmful" these "proprietary organisms" are. In fact, everyone reading this will be glad to know they are not genetically modified, they are naturally occuring (hard to find...I will give our scientists some credit) and then advanced by figuring out how to feed, grow and develop the organism. In short, this is true "mother nature" since our creator is the one who put this organism on the earth, not man.
The organisms are anaerobic. This means that if they "get out" they die in the presence of oxygen. Not harmful to people, animals, or the environment.
I love the earth and our environment as much as many of you. Instead of people looking for the silver bulllet of "aha...here is why this new technology is bad" it would be nice for some people to clap from the environmental side. We already have enough guys who don't like us because we may displace oil usage. Support from the "green" side of the equation is appreciated.
I really look forward to the day when landfill waste, purpose grown crops that help marginal land be more environtmentally sustainable, and agricultural residues are able to provide us enough clean and affordable fuel.
Sincerely,
Wes Bolsen
CMO & VP, Coskata Inc.
DEAR MR BOLSEN
CORRECT ME IF I AM WRONG SIR BUT ARE YOU NOT TALKING ABOUT MAKING METHANOL ?
I UNDERSTAND YOU CAN MAKE MATHENOL EVEN FROM WOOD BARK OR ANY TYPE OF MATERIALS AS YOU MENTION ABOVE .
BUT , I WAS UNDER THE IDEA THAT METHANOL IS SOOO CAUSTIC TO ALL OF THE GASLINE SEALERS , SEALS , CARB SEALS ETC ETC , AND THAT IT LETERALY MELTS THEM AWAY .
AM I WRONG HERE SIR . COULD THEY MAKE THESE SEALS OUT OF CERAMICS SO THAT THEY ARE NOT EFFECTED ? IS IT METHANOL OR ETHANOL YOU WILL BE MAKING SIR .
I USED A 10% ETHANOL HESS GASOLINE ABOUT 3 MONTHS AGO AND EVEN WITH JUST 10 % ETHANOL I GOT SUBSTANTIALY LESS MILES TO THE GALLON THAN REGULAR UNLEADED GASOLINE .
PLEASE CONFIRM TO ME THE IN'S AND OUT'S OF MY OBSERVATIONS AND THOUGHTS OUTILNED ABOVE .
MAYNARD SMITH
Sounds like a red herring to distract us from REAL solutions. My understanding is you cannot transport this stuff through a pipeline so its use is limited. This is not going to happen as long as DOLLAR A BARREL OIL is available from IRAQ. WE HAVE TO GET OFF OIL PERIOD. A major car producer is coming out with a smaller half-price HYBRID next year? If so I will buy. Never again a gasoline engine car; attention GM,FORD and CHRYSLER.
Casey,
Whether you know it or not, you are a permaculturalist. Check out David Holmgren's "Principles and Pathways Beyond Sustainablity" for an entire book about your perspective, and what's being called "energy descent".
Yes, unfortunately, no matter what fuels us, our culture is undeniably unsustainable!
Corn, God made corn for people to eat, not to burn in fuel inefficient cars. This Corn program is 90% political, Iowa primaries are first. Real Progressives are against depriving people of food. We will not have enough food within the next three years. Tax gasoline, like the Europeans do, have $6 a gallon gas, and you will see all the unnecessary trips disappear as well as the SUVs and people will have less children(no room for them in the SUV) and people will take the bus and car pool.
Casey,are you ready to live in a cave somewhere. Maybe, not have children to reduce world population. Maybe ,we need to work on a lot of things, however most people just want to enjoy a comfortable life. Don't you? I've got to wonder how you live.It's very difficult to ask people to down grade their lifestyle.What about the rest of the world ? They are looking for a better life also.
Joe, you talk like a Republican. You are on the wrong blog site. You do not have a sense of social consciousness for mother earth. Stop raping your mother, mother earth.
As a biologist, I can say that the concept of using carbon based products of many sources is quite feasible, assuming that the materials are finely ground to provide close contact for the microbes. The biggest concern I have is the 'agricultural waste' line, as that means less carbon being put into our soils, harming them even more. As far as the fear of 'proprietary organisms' being released to the environment, fear not, there are microbes everywhere that can digest almost anything, including the VERY hot oil in your auto's crankcase.
Note too, our urban/suburban sprawl has been promoted more by our government than anything else, notably the home mortage interest deduction that penalizes renters and encourages people to get the biggest mortgages they can possibly afford, massive fed investments in roads, and even bigger breaks and subsidies for petroleum products.
Ethanol, etc, from biomass and methane from landfills are not speculative, they're now. Hydrogen is at least a generation away.
On the economic side, How much $3.00+ per gallon gasoline will a gallon of this ethanol replace? Wil l it be $1.00 per gallon AT THE PUMPS? Will it be irrevocably denatured so as not to be potable?
Perhaps you should read more about the Coskata microorganisms before you speculate.
First, they are not genetically engineered. They were found in swamp mud.
Second, they are anaerobic. Thus, if the bioreactor that they live in is opened to an oxygen-rich atmosphere, they die.
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/01/gms_partner_cos_1.php
For those of you who think economic decimation is the only real way to fix the environment, let me ask you this question: how many innovations are coming out of 3rd world countries with economies like you hope for us in solving our environmental problems? None. Developing technology like this is incredibly expensive and needs a robust economy to support it. The biggest hurdle to fixing environmental problems are radical environmentalists who are nothing more than closet communists and really want to destroy capitalism more than anything. Scientific innovation is much like saving for retirement. If you don't make money to put into it, you won't get anything out of it.
I also want to comment that for supposedly being a bunch of enlightened progressives, I haven't seen more ignorant comments on one forum in a long time. Methanol ISN'T the same as ethanol. It is easy to make methanol from wood and this technology has probably been around for 100 years or more. The innovation here is making ethanol from biomass.
Also, ethanol contains about 70% of the energy that gasoline contains, so $1/gallon ethanol would be equivalent to gasoline costing $1.48, so unless gasoline drops below $1.48, $1 ethanol is cheaper to use. Containing less energy per molecule is a ridiculous reason to reject a fuel. Cost and environment impact of making that molecule should be much more important.
eleanor: good observation. The "energy" companies seemingly want us to think of them, when we think of energy. They present themselves as THE channel to energy, and as the cutting edge of energy technology, when they really only sell (and only WANT to sell) fuels that burn for energy; not such technologies as wind or tide power, solar, et al.
Mr. Bolsen, your input is appreciated, but please don't frame this article as an attack on your company, your product, or your priorities. The author used your product as a starting point, and then asked why we aren't doing more of what needs to be done, besides just finding more efficient ways to keep doing business as usual.
The shape the world is in, we cannot afford business as usual. We need to take a hard look at our lifestyles and find out what parts of it we can DO WITHOUT. We need, acutely, to throttle back our energy usage, not just find other sources. If there are eventually enough energy and material sources to bring the whole world up to our standard of living, that will be great. But there is no indication that such a thing is possible, much less doable. Every indication of available energy sources (including those Coskata is working on) says that there is no possible way to increase the world's energy usage, or even maintain the status quo. And the status quo is not just energy use, but pollution and resource usage. If every person on Earth lived as well as Americans, we'd have the equivalent of SEVENTEEN BILLION people on the planet.
We urgently need, as the author said, to reduce our usage of resources at large; and energy falls under this consideration as well. The more energy used, the more resources of other kinds are used as well. After all, the energy does SOMETHING. We need metals to make the cars your fuels will power, and if we can get the fuel cheaply, we'll keep on driving ad infinitum. Powering trucks and planes and ships more economically will postpone the day that we stop shipping our foods and goods clear around the world, and will let environmentally damaging fertilizers and pesticides continue to be produced cheaply, degrading the soils and environment. In this regard, relieving the pressures of the growing scarcity of petrocarbons begins to seem irresponsible.
Your company's product may actually do more harm than good, by postponing the inevitable day of reckoning. Third-world nations will still crave our lifestyle, as long as we hold to it ourselves, and will push their own development to match ours. Do you also have a source of cheap metals, soil enrichment, and pollutant remediation?
Yes, your approach is better than doing nothing; but it will in the end MEAN nothing, if it does not lead to reduced usage of energy, as well as reducing the cost of it.
Dan: Our philosophies are quite the opposite. Conservation is nothing more than a red herring. Here is why:
1. There are only two ways to "force" lifestyle change - tax the crap out of all energy usage (including green energies - like you said energy is energy and if you have a high energy consumption lifestyle that needs to be changed, no cheating using green energy), or you can just form an authoritarian dictatorship and control how much energy is allowed to be consumed by each citizen. Now I'm hoping that the second option here isn't an option (although reading some of what people around here think, I suppose it is an option for them as long as the dictator is socialist). To me, it isn't an option, so let's go to the first option. Tax the crap out of all energy. This sounds feasible, but we aren't the United States of the World. China currently cheats with its currency to have a trade advantage over us - what makes you think they won't take advantage of this opportunity and consume the energy we don't in order to have a trade advantage over us? All that will happen is China will become the next lone super power. I expect that to happen eventually, but I'm hoping it happens slowly enough that sweeping political change can occur first.
2. Conservation doesn't prevent the inevitable - it just slows it down (and not by that much if you do the math either). But at what cost? Research into alternative energies comes from our excesses. If we have no excesses, there won't be any alternatives. In some sense, if we can assume that we will eventually come up with enough alternative green energy to break or nearly break all dependence on fossil fuels, then because conservation only delays the inevitable instead of eliminating the inevitable, it could actually by process of elimination speed up the inevitable.
3. No strategy will work if people aren't behind it. Currently, 88% of Republicans and 53% of Democrats DON'T think that saving the environment is a top priority. 76% of both parties think improving the economy is a top priority. How are you going to convince the masses to suffer for a cause they apparently don't even think is important? Even in the Democratic party? Do you really think if right now the majority of Democrats aren't on board that you will ever get enough from both parties to initiate a mandate of suffering? So basically, while radical environmentalists are rejecting every good innovation for conservation, the evironment continues to worsen and NO real solutions are coming from the group that wants them the most.
Bob, don't underestimate the turd world countries. They burn cow pies, like we use to do in Texas years ago. We need to go back to the good old days like we had in Texas when I was growing up. We lived off the land. The problems is we have too many turd world people coming here, before long, we will all be burning cow pies for cooking and staying warm. It is recycling to burn the cow pies. As Uncle Bill says, we have to slow down the economy. Of course he is a Southerner so he understands about going slow.
How are you going to convince China or Russia to slow down their economies?
I kind of see a pervasive element of technophobia in the far left. Liberals might say the far right is wrong about being against stem cell research, but how is the far left any different? I guess it is kind of ironic when you think about it, because it is the conservatives who seem to be seeking solutions to the environment through new technology and innovation(ask any conservative how we can become independent of fossil fuels and he/she will tell you it is fusion energy or some other high tech innovation yet to be harnessed) even though they have historically been apathetic/against improving the environment and it is the liberals who think new technology in medical research (like stem cell research) that will cure all that ails us even though they have a deep hatred for the pharmaceutical industry who will ultimately be the entity that utilizes that technology if it ever pans out (if you thought it would be hippies growing stem cells next to their pot plants, then you are off your rocker). Meanwhile, the conservatives, who are all about living forever using medical science and trusting in big pharma to solve all our problems are against new technology.
Nuclear power is used by the French, your intellectual superiors, you need to do the same. Unfortunately, too many people in America are of low intelligence(e.g. old Tex) and uncultured dregs.
I as a pro environment car junkie and follower of the auto biz believe $1 a gallon ethanol is possible and would be very low impact compared to fossil fuel. I also know that America needs to change its polices on development, we need more compact high density cities and mass transit systems instead of auto dependent suburban sprawl. The original article was right about cheap ethanol not being a silver bullet, but it would be a significant step in the right direction. Many of the posts here have been very reactionary and closed minded as others have pointed out. I suppose that that's a falling of people, whether French, American, Mexican, or Japanese, many of us our ignorant and closed minded.
Michael, you are closed minded if you don't support nuclear energy. Nuclear energy is the future of the planet. Only reactionaries and stupid people do not support nuclear energy. You can't stop progress. It is only a matter of time until everybody has it. It is our right.
I didn't say I was opposed to nuclear, I am opposed to those who claim intellectual superiority, or who believe that everything that comes from corporations it innately evil (skepticism is healthy though). While I made absolutely no mention of nuclear I do think it could play a significant part in solving our energy problems, although it has problems of its own that need to be over come. Besides nuclear can't solve our problems with gasoline until either better batteries or hydrogen fuel cells are perfected for cars making it somewhat irrelevant to the discussion here.
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