Electric cars and renewable energy sources for power will be far better than putting our automobiles in competition with food production. Rich people shouldn't drive at the expense of feeding poor people. Biofuels may be used very sparingly as a very short term way to reduce CO2 emissions. But, increased reliance on them may be a huge mistake.

When our electricity comes from wind, solar, geothermal and tidal sources, cars like the EV-1 (oops, that's dead) or the Tesla and others can provide real answers with no sacrifice in our lifestyles.

Corn is of the least effective commodities to use for ethanol in that it uses more energy to product the ethanol than it produces. Of course, this won't stop American agribusiness from using it due to government subsidies. Sugar cane is a much better commodity for ethanol which is why Brazil uses it as a matter of national policy. The US sugar cane industry is propped up by government subsidies and chemicals for its production. Sugar cane is best grown in the Caribbean, including Cuba, which makes it easily accessible to the US market for those countries. It could serve to take places like Jamaica out of its grinding poverty.

They are right. If we continue to look into biofuels, there will never be any advancements. Just like they will ever put a man on the moon, nor will they be able to make a computer that can fit on the top of a desk.

They shouldn't even try, competition is bad. They should only concentrate on the "renewable" forms of energy--I'm sure those wll actually exist some day.

Dave, They already do. You're not paying attention. Electricity from wind is already on par with fossil fuel generated electricity. Solar is readily available and almost as cheap. There are plenty of examples of both. Near Vegas there's a huge photovoltaic farm now. New York City already has a tidal generator.

Wake up.

As for electric vehicles, they predate fossil fuel burners. GM made one so good the Japanese got nervous and built one almost as good. It's the elecrical part of all of the toyota hybrids now. Tesla makes a sports car that does 0-60 in 4 seconds flat and has a 250 mile cruising range. Not bad by any standards.

We don't need to sacrifice a bit of lifestyle for this. Maybe we need to drive a tad slower and preferably not in unsafe SUVs anyway. But, is that really much of a lifestyle change?

At home, compact fluorescents are an improvement. You can choose to get rid of your yellow incandescents and replace them with a wide variety of colors (2700K-3500K if you like yellow. 4100K-5500K if you like white, leaning toward blue at the upper end, or full spectrum, just like daylight.)

I've already reduced my home electric by 16%. I've got terrapass for my car. It's not that hard. We just need to change our minds more than our lifestyles. We can't stop all climate change, but we may avert catastrophe.

Cars...large, high speed--fuel burning or electric...way too many in this world. Every time they raise billions for more freeway lanes these fill up so the traffic jams continue.

When will we learn to go back to designing our towns and cities for people instead of cars. Cars make some sense in sparsely populated areas where longer distances abound and mass transit is non-existent. But urban and suburban areas that can be designed so work places aren't a zillion miles from home?

Those who MUST HAVE private transport might be happy to know many of us are getting around much faster on electric bikes than is now possible in an electric car!!! Why not ultralight "e-velomobiles" when the weather is foul? Why not government subsidies for non-freeway legal vehicles too!

And as far as solar power subsidies...the intent was to lower the price, which hasn't happened (as the oil companies like BP, Texaco now manufacture panels and we the people make sure they generate great profits!). Only property owners can take advantage of the subsidies under the current system! Get government out and let free enterprise rule!

Bye to all you bio-fuel lemmings!

"Electricity from wind is already on par with fossil fuel generated electricity. Solar is readily available and almost as cheap."

I thought we were talking about powering cars, and not runiing a cottage on the quixotic windmills of dreamers. Your own Ted Kennedy wouldn't even allow windmills within sight of his compound.

Good luck with solar; here in the Northeast, we'd have to hire a midget to live on the roof and scape off the ice.

These alternate sources are nice to augment and aid in conservation, but as a primary source they are impactical for many parts of the country.

I just remember the book, the Emperor wears no clothes. In it the author says that if 5% of the country is dedicated to growing Hemp, that would be enough to meet our energy needs now and forever more. Hemp has a lot of advantages over corn and sugar cane mainly that it doesn't require much fertilizer and can be grown on less productive land. But will this country wake up and do something? Hell no! Someone might get high. This country needs to wake up and stop rejecting a plant that nature has given us. I have said since the sixties that hemp needs to be brought back.

Yup Dave. We're talking about powering cars. I'm suggesting electric cars. They work. We've had them before. We had them before the internal combustion engine. We've had them again more recently. It won't help us get off fossil fuels until we get better electricity sources. But they are available.

As for Ted Kennedy, who said he was mine? I think a lot of people in both parties are making some really stupid decisions. Solar in the northeast is viable. It won't be as good as solar in the southwest. Keep in mind though that we could get our wind where it's windiest and our solar where it's sunniest and put it all on the grid. As we found out a few years ago, most of the northeast gets a boatload of power from Niagra.

Wind and solar are a good combination because when it's too cloudy for solar, it's usually windy. When it's too calm for wind, it's usually sunny.

Sam, I agree, anything to reduce vehicle use should be considered primary. All of your suggestions sound great to me. A couple of the choices were news to me as well, particularly the "e-velomobiles".

Peter Ehrhorn, 72.4% of all statistics are made up on the spot. I think at least one of us (possibly both) got ours from that pool. I had heard that if we convert all arable land for bio-fuels, it will get us a 20% reduction in fossil fuel. Perhaps that was only for corn. But, I have a hard time imagining that hemp will provide multiple orders of magnitude improvement. I'm all for growing the best crop for the job. But, I still think biofuels won't be the long term answer.

The future is the Hydrogen Fuel Cell.

Ethanol is a stop gap to the Hydrogen Economy.

Hydrogen may be a really good answer for the very long term. However, the number of real and severe technical hurdles that must be overcome make it impractical for a long time. And, we have technologies that work today.

Here are some problems with hydrogen:

1) Hydrogen is dramatically harder to store than natural gas.
2) Hydrogen is dramatically harder to transport than natural gas.
3) Hydrogen fuel cell vehicles are a very long way from being marketable and cost effective. They currently run about $1,000,000 per vehicle. Compare that to the cost of electric vehicles.
4) Hydrogen must come from somewhere. Splitting water is the best way to get it, but this requires exactly as much energy as you get back when you burn it.
5) Our lackluster leader has signed a bill requiring that all hydrogen must come from oil and natural gas. This gives no benefit over just burning the oil and gas.

So, let's look to existing technology for the foreseeable future and continue to research hydrogen as a long-term solution. It's certainly not a good basket in which to place all of our eggs.

Saying ethanol production will replace gasoline is a red herring. Ethanol is less than 5% of gasoline. If it hits 10% of supply the price of gasoline will fall precipitously. It irritates me when oil apologists pretend not to understand supply and demand when bashing ethanol. There is more than enough sugar and corn to flood the market with ethanol without affecting the price of either commodity, They would crash the gasoline price though if they supplied 10% of US demand.

Anything that is backed by any oil companies, especially if it is intended to supplant oil, is suspect.

If you trace the origins of the major corporations providing petrol and other power resources, you would probably find visionaries way back in the day. Now you have companies so bent on maintaining quarterly fiscal strength that they aren't willing to take temporary financial hits to reap long term success. After all, the BP's and Exxon's of the world have enough money to begin to stock up on the lands needed for eco-friendly energy, like wind and solar plantations, as well the patents and production rights on the componants needed. I don't really like the idea that so much of our economy flows back to such a small number of fat cats, but it is a reality. It just seems like real visionaries, even if they are not possessed of a conscience themselves regarding the environment and their grandchildren's health, would hear the public cry and think of a way to monopolize future energy and still leave a smaller mark on the world. But, no, I'm not naive enough to think they don't want to still be richer and greedier than ever, however I bet both could still be attained. We've had to make changes before as an economy based on similar issues.