'Harvesting' oil like milk - are we saved after all ?

[Pennine Ten Foot Drifts]

No need to go over the 'peak oil' stuff again, but is this the new latest hope ?:

http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2219188/...alley-funds-oil

Will technology save us after all ???

[Osbourne One-Nil]

Wouldn't it be better if they developed bacteria to produce pure diesel and get rid of all that troublesome refining nonsense in the process?

[Gray-Wolf]

Cool! With cows farting like Kangeroos (gut bacteria that doesn't have methane as a by product) and oiley E-Coli things are on the up and up.......

Edited June 18, 2008 by Gray-Wolf

[Osbourne One-Nil]

How much energy does it take to get these bacteria to produce the "oil"? Oil takes vast quantities of energy to make, so I'm guessing that's the case however it's produced.

[Pennine Ten Foot Drifts]

How much energy does it take to get these bacteria to produce the "oil"? Oil takes vast quantities of energy to make, so I'm guessing that's the case however it's produced.

Well I guess as E-coli are bacteria, the output per unit is probably quite low !!! However, if you had for example an area the size of a couple of football pitches, (which is in fact, if compared to something like bio-fuel output per hectare, very small), presumably the output would be worth considering ?

Alternatively, I see Honda have started selling their first hydrogen fuel cell cars, so who needs oil anyway ? (apart from for all the other stuff we need it for of course !!!):

http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2219208/...s-hydrogen-fuel

[Bobby]

It's only of use to us if it is cheap, has a high energy return on energy invested and can be used on a mass scale. I highly doubt it meets any of these. I keep up to date every day on developments with regards to energy and I see things like this literally every day. I must have come across 100 different things that are supposed to save us.

[Osbourne One-Nil]

But one of them might Magpie. There were hundreds of designs for a flying machine over the years. One of them worked, etc etc.

I suspect the energy source would be the Sun, so that could be viable.

[jethro]

Is Algae the way forward?

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/envi...icle4133633.ece