>Oil from Grass.!!

[Update 02/02/2006]
Auhtor of AlFin commented on this article. I visted his log and really liked what he has up there.
Would encourage you to visit his logs. The topics he has written on deeply intersts me.

For more on this topic of ethanol visit. Ethanol from Cellulose: More than anyone dreamed?
[Update ends.]

Instead of coming exclusively from corn or sugar cane as it has up to now, thanks to biotech breakthroughs, the fuel can be made out of everything from prairie switchgrass and wood chips to corn husks and other agricultural waste. This biomass-derived fuel is known as cellulosic ethanol. Whatever the source, burning ethanol instead of gasoline reduces carbon emissions by more than 80% while eliminating entirely the release of acid-rain-causing sulfur dioxide. Even the cautious Department of Energy predicts that ethanol could put a 30% dent in America's gasoline consumption by 2030...!!

read more HERE..

some points...

• Ethanol has already transformed one major economy: In Brazil nearly three-quarters of new cars can burn either ethanol or gasoline, whichever happens to be cheaper at the pump, and the nation has weaned itself off imported oil.
• To refine enough ethanol to replace the gas we burn (140 billion gallons a year) would require thousands of biorefineries and hundreds of billions of dollars. Yet one of capitalism's favorite visionaries is convinced that very soon filling up on weeds and cornhusks will be no more remarkable than tanking up on regular. Says Richard Branson, whose Virgin Group is starting an ethanol-inspired subsidiary called Virgin Fuels: "This is the win-win fuel of the future."
• Sugar cane, the most energy-rich ethanol feedstock known to science. Sugar cane generates far more ethanol per acre than corn
• Ethanol accounts for more than 40% of the fuel Brazilians use in their cars.
• With Brazilian ethanol selling for 45% less per liter than gasoline in 2003 and 2004, flex-fuel cars caught on like iPods.
• "I spent two years trying to convince myself that this was never going to be more than another minor alternative fuel," he says. "What I discovered was that ethanol might completely replace petroleum in this country. And a lot of countries. This was a great shock to me." Vinod Khosla.
• Nth Power, a San Francisco energy-investment firm, estimates that $700 million of the $21 billion flowing into venture funds last year were earmarked for "clean technology" startups.
• "In terms of key energy and environmental benefits, cornstarch ethanol comes out clearly ahead of petroleum-based fuels, and tomorrow's cellulosic-based ethanol would do even better." Energy Department.
• Because cellulosic ethanol comes from cornstalks, grasses, tree bark--fibrous stuff that humans can't digest--it doesn't threaten the food supply at all. Cellulose is the carbohydrate that makes up the walls of plant cells. Researchers have figured out how to unlock the energy in such biomass by devising enzymes that convert cellulose into simpler sugars. Cellulose is abundant; ethanol from it is clean and can power an engine as effectively as gasoline. Plus, you don't have to reinvent cars. Ratcheting up production of cellulosic ethanol, however, is a gnarly engineering problem.
• Genencor says its enzymes have cut the cost of making a gallon of cellulosic ethanol from $5 five years ago to 20 cents today. Now refiners have to learn how to scale up production. Canada's Iogen is the furthest along in commercialization; another hopeful is BC International, a Dedham, Mass., company that's building a cellulosic ethanol plant in Louisiana.

What to do after reading this.!!

1. Find companies which do this research and creates patents on how to most effectively change from raw forms of cellulose to ethanol.
2. Find companies which make the chemicals and enzymes which help in this conversion process.
   
3. Find companies which makes machines to process the sugarcane or corn or whatever it takes to make ethanol.
4. And find companies which would make ethanol using this machines and enzymes.
   
5. also find companies which would grow the sugar cane and corn.
6. Find companies which would help in transportation, storage etc etc of sugar cane.
7. find em all...!!