Jason Liu

Ethanol: Our Answer to Reducing U.S. Dependence on Foreign Oil

While biofuels are currently still the only viable replacement for oil, few people believe that ethanol derived from food-based feedstocks (e.g. corn) is the answer to the energy problem. Its just too dependent on subsidies and inefficient to boot (there's a neutral energy balance for corn).

What is the future is cellulosic ethanol (which uses non food-based feedstocks) . Energy balance and yields are significantly higher than traditional ethanol with the only problem being the expensive conversion process. That's why the U.S. DoE and companies such as POET are investing so much money into developing cellulosic ethanol. With government policies such as ten in twenty, ethanol will continue to grow in the U.S., but more so the 2nd generation biofuels such as cellulosic ethanol and BTL biofuels rather than traditional biofuels.