OrionWorks wrote, > > > I wonder about the expenses involved in supplying nutrients and other raw materials that would be needed to feed the algae? The report claims: > The wastes from livestock-dairy production, distillers grains from ethanol production (a travesty) and human food processing, service-preparation is probably an adequate supply for the algae farming.
> "The operating costs (including power consumption, labor, chemicals, and fixed capital costs (taxes, maintenance, insurance, depreciation, and return on investment) worked out to $12,000 per hectare. That would equate to $46.2 billion per year for all the algae farms, to yield all the oil feedstock necessary for the entire country. Compare that to the $100-150 billion the US spends each year just on purchasing crude oil from foreign countries, with all of that money leaving the US economy. " > > On the surface, sounds encouraging. > Algae Ponds floated the surface of lakes using hectares of plastic film would be relative inexpensive per square mile. The Great Salt Lake comes to mind. :-) > > OTOH, looking at this from a different and more cynical perspective: While producing ethanol is presumably not the same as generating oil feedstock there have been protracted debates within this discussion group, particularly from Jed, about how utterly inefficient it is (presumably under current economic/technological circumstances), to produce ethanol from corn due to the horrendous amount of fossil fuel consumed to produce the fertilizer as well as to run all the farm equipment. I wonder if there might still be huge hidden costs not mentioned in the above oil feedstock report. > I agree with Jed. Ethanol production-use on a local scale to support food production-agriculture should be the limit on it's use as a motor fuel. That was the intent when it started, but graft and greed took over. Fred > > Regards, > Steven Vincent Johnson > www.OrionWorks.com > www.Zazzle.comn/orionworks >
