Everything the War on Terror has done over the past seven years has been ultimately directed at Saudi Arabia.

Saudi Arabia, which sells the US more oil than any country except Canada. Saudi Arabia, which has used the proceeds of this trade to turn Islam into a fascist doctrine worldwide.

That's why Bush is trying to get Americans to switch to biofuels. That's why we're engaged in this elaborate game with Shia-Muslim Iran, our so-called enemy, a country which we have massively secured and enabled since 9/11.

Iraq and Afghanistan have helped in this process, just as Iran has helped us to stabilise those countries. Medium term, prepare for the world's most rapid oil-price slump and "regime change" in Saudi.

Your continued efforts to paint Bush as some kind of misunderstood chessmaster have once more succeeded in amusing me. I would be beyond thrilled if we returned to the days of true grand strategy, deftly playing our rivals against one another and operating through clever manipulation of underlying forces, rather than inelegantly applied brute strength. Bush just isn’t that kind of statesman, no matter how you read into what passes for policy these days.

The next President will have the opportunity to engage with Iran in some fashion beyond bellicose saber-rattling. The next President will have the opportunity to deal realistically with Iraq beyond the simplistic wishful thinking to which we’ve become accustomed. The next President will have the opportunity to make real strides towards developing the post-fossil fuel economy beyond the ever-more-servile kowtowing to the oil lobby we see now. I’m not saying that he’ll take those opportunities; but they will exist for him.

A quick word about biofuels. First of all, Bush has done nothing to forward that technology beyond the occasional passing mention in a few of his aimless, rambling speeches. Certainly the new call to open up every square inch of U.S. territory to oil exploration isn’t helping matters. Second, the raw physics of biofuel isn’t even remotely understood by the American people. In all cases so far, the overall energy delta has been either alarmingly close to zero or just plain negative. That is to say, you have to put more energy into the process of making biofuels than you receive using them. While other energy sources remain abundant, it is easy to hide or ignore this fact, but we can’t do that forever. We’ve been very lucky to have fossil fuel, which represents the concentrated essence of hundreds of millions of years of photosynthesis, but as we’ve almost depleted that resource, we need to develop something sustainable once the rest of the world follows in U.A.E.’s footsteps. With a negative energy delta, biofuel is not even close to being that substance, and never will be unless some kind of major breakthrough occurs in our production process (I for one do not like counting on miracles). Despite our best efforts, the Laws of Thermodynamics continue to thwart us. Nonhuman life on this planet subsists on current sunlight. So did we until recently. Without the material basis for our wonderful technology, the potential exists for a population crash back to our pre-industrial levels. I think we can avoid this, but not if we keep ignoring the problem. We’re at the beginning of the end of the fossil fuel age, and it’s time we accepted that. This issue needs to become a major strategic focus. Bush has not made it thus, and never will. He’s an oilman. Why would we expect any different?

As for your theory of regime change in Saudi Arabia… well, I’ll just say that I’m standing by to be pleasantly surprised by Bush’s cleverly concealed strategic genius. If it turns out that I’m wrong, I will fly to England and buy you the frosty adult beverage of your choice, and you can drink it while telling me at great length how very wrong I was. ;-)

"We’re at the beginning of the end of the fossil fuel age, and it’s time we accepted that. This issue needs to become a major strategic focus."

Quills -

Very well said.

Does your equation with respect to the overall energy delta of current bio-fuel technology include the solar energy required to grow the crop?

Bush hasn't said one single word of criticism against the Saudis, but we are supposed to believe that "secretly" he wants America to stop trading with them? LMFAO!

Not only is this one of the the worst "strategies" ever, and Bush has succeeded in empowering Saudi Arabia more at every turn by pursuing foreign policies that couldn't have been better designed to drive up the price of oil, and hence the "secret enemy's" ability to fund "Islamic fascism"! Furthermore, bio-fuels have caused food prices to skyrocket, leading to yet more instability and inequity of the type that feeds "terrorist" recruitment!

This must be satire! Great job, too - it's hilarious on so many levels! :D

No. If I remember correctly, the numbers I've seen started with sunlight already converted into biomass. Poor sun. Everyone takes it for granted. ;-) I guess that also neglects the machinery and labor needed to plant seeds and bring a crop to harvest. The Laws of Thermodynamics will not be denied. Everything takes energy and energy must come from somewhere. It should be an interesting next few decades.

Brazil has succeeded at energy independence through bio-fuels and other means. Of course they grow sugar-cane rather than GM corn. Also, they were a developing nation rather than a fully developed one, and farming more land was an option for them by destroying huge swaths of Amazon Jungle. In America, there just is no such option. The great forests are long gone - almost all of the potential farm land is already being used for farming.

"almost all of the [American] potential farm land is already being used for farming."

Try to get out of the city more. USA and Europe have farm subsidies which push our production way down to uphold farm prices. My thought is that bio-fuels will make the subsidies unnecessary ultimately, but I haven't seen any science on the point at all.

I am very excited about the potential for bio-fuels for our energy independence, and would love to hear - as I believe would Quillsinister - both presidential candidates talk on this point at length, in detail.

Fine, make that good farm land.

quill,

I'm pretty certain that the studies that show a net energy loss included the machinery, although I don't know about labor. On most American farms, the labor would be negligible in terms of energy anyway.

Savory Goodness:

"almost all of the [American] potential farm land is already being used for farming."

Try to get out of the city more. USA and Europe have farm subsidies which push our production way down to uphold farm prices. My thought is that bio-fuels will make the subsidies unnecessary ultimately, but I haven't seen any science on the point at all.

I am very excited about the potential for bio-fuels for our energy independence, and would love to hear - as I believe would Quillsinister - both presidential candidates talk on this point at length, in detail.

I hate to give Bush credit for anything but in his state of the Union address a couple of years back he mentioned using "switchgrass" as a source for alternative energy.

If we really want to get serious about biofuels then "switchgrass" or more properly a variety of native perennial prairie grasses are the way to go for two main reasons.

1. They have a much higher energy return than corn ethanol. Corn ethanl takes about the same amount of energy in as we get out in ethanol or close to a 1/1 ratio. Switchgrass has up to an 18/1 ratio. In other words we get 18 times the fuel out as the energy expended which is an excellent return.

2. This is a perennial native grass. Being native it's well adapted to the environment and being perennial there's no reseeding required. It also requires no fertilizers or pesticides and it has the added benefit of providing habitat for native wildlife.

We have vast stretches of largely open land in the middle of this country. If we were to return a portion of it to native grasses we could meet a lot of our fuel needs in a sustainable and largely carbon neutral manner. (The plants absord CO2 produced by burning the fuel produced from last years crop.) There would be land left over to grow corn and toher crops for food, a much better use of corn then for fuel.

We could place windmills all across the prairie whether we are growing switchgrass for fuel or corn or wheat for food to provide much more clean and sustainable energy which puts no CO2 into the atmosphere.

If we want to succeed and become truly energy independent we need to look at alternatives to oil.

"This is a perennial native grass. Being native it's well adapted to the environment and being perennial there's no reseeding required. It also requires no fertilizers or pesticides and it has the added benefit of providing habitat for native wildlife."

Prog -

Amen. As an addendum, native grasses covered the High Plains for thousands of years prior to 1901, when we decided that plowing them up was a good idea. As I recall, there was a slight environmental catastrophe as a consequence. Wouldn't it be cool to restore this habitat, and still reap the benefits?

Strongly recommended: Egan, Timothy, The Worst Hard Time, Houghton Mifflin, 2006, about the Dust Bowl.

Progressivebulldog said:

" I hate to give Bush credit for anything but in his state of the Union address a couple of years back he mentioned using "switchgrass" as a source for alternative energy."

No need to give him credit - he mentions a lot of things without any intention of following through. Sometimes that's to the great advantage of civilization, sometimes it's not. In general, though, thank God he and his cronies are so incompetent - can you imagine the mess we'd be in? I mean, like even worse than we are...

Actually, large tracks of good farm land, were, up until a few months ago, still regularly being bulldozed over for gated communities full of oversized McMansions. Pretty much any time an interstate exit goes up, all the surrounding farm land gets bought up for hideous and not really commercially necessary sprawl.

No, the land in the Eastern states is not as flat as the former praries, and, thus, not as suited to industrial farming, but it was certainly fertile, but when farmers have to struggle to just make ends meet, and some developer is offering $15,000-$25,000 an acre to pave over your farm, what would you do?

Just to be clear. Switchgrass is currently not a reasonable source of ethanol. We need a cheap method of converting the cellulose to ethanol, or extracting that energy in a form that will be otherwise useful.

If that works, it would be a good plant in many areas. There are also many spots where we could reintroduce flooding and let cottonwood trees grow. This would give us the wetlands benefits of reduced flooding, ag runoff etc. and another annual source of ethanol.

I like the idea of using hemp, personally. That stuff will grow anywhere, and it isn't also a food crop.