I don’t really understand what else people expect to do when [edit: oil and gas] runs out. Electric from renewable resources is the only long term solution, and if that doesn’t deliver the same power capacity that fossil fuels do then they’ll have to cut power usage. Biofuels are impractically inefficient to produce to be the workhorse, and that’s without considering emissions.
Or do people expect we’ll move to coal-powered steam engines? Portable nuclear reactors? There would have to be a big breakthrough in hydrogen production techniques for it to be viable.
Plant based bio diesel isn’t too bad in terms of energy investment, especially ones that are made from used cooking oil. But the big breakthrough will be if someone can figure out large scale algae fuel farming, algae is a great little bio machine and once we get the process down, probably through genetic engineering, to slim down the gene sequence for species of algae that converts sunlight and something common, like nitrogen or carbon dioxide directly into a burnable byproduct in a stable and fast growing way we’ve got it. There’s already small scale testing, and it has the added benefit of being convertible to long term space travel if we can produce algae that make fuel and oxygen while absorbing waste products like urine feces and carbon dioxide. But that’s getting a little ahead of this conversation.
From an Australian point of view our biofuel project did actually amount to an extraordinary waste of taxpayer money because the govt insisted that they would use sugar cane, so in that particular example it would have diverted our food farming lands. But it depends on the fuel you use… Or the byproducts.
i’m a bit late to this party, but a Ford concept has this covered, they had a Focus with solar panels on the roof, which yes no big deal at first, but they also gave the concept of a “solar collector” parking spot, where the roof of a parking spot essentially acts as a magnifying glass. takes a lot of sunlight and then focuses it all on the panel, leading to the car being charged with no dependence on existing electrical infrastructure. however there is the obvious issue of these solar collector parking spaces having to be built first
EDIT: @squidhead for the Hemp argument, i heard of this supercapacitor developed up in canada that is actually based on hemp. it does need some revision, though it could lead to a potential replacement for corrent battery technology
I used to think ethanol to have no drawbacks then I realized the horrible implications of having to share farmland for both food and fuel.
I am a firm believer that humanity should never be overdependent on a single resource. When electric cars become mainstream and power stations run in nuclear, gasoline consumption will drop to sustainable levels where it is possible for the two types cars to coexist.
Autogas (LPG) is the third most popular automotive fuel in the world, with approximately 16 million of 600 million passenger cars powered using the fuel, representing less than 3% of the total market share. Approximately half of all autogas-fueled passenger vehicles are in the five largest markets (in descending order): Turkey, South Korea, Poland, Italy, and Australia.
I am just gonna pipe in here to say LPG is crap. Shit mileage and getting as expensive as petrol. It is however very very good for boosted applications however expect to use 3 times more LPG than you would regular fuel
Gonna have to interject here and say that it does improve mileage in some cars. We had an old Range Rover P38 with a 4.0l V8 that could barely do 15 mpg on a good day. Converted to LPG, started hitting right into the mid-20s, big cost saving right there…
Which is immediately negated by how unreliable it is
But, costs aside, just finding the darn stuff is so annoying. Only around 1/5 the garages in the UK sell LPG, and they aren’t evenly distributed.