Can biofuels totally replace fossil fuels ?

Question

in other words , is it technically possible to run our cars on ethanol from crops ?

Answer 1

Yes, but not for seven billion people.  If the Earth's human population were a sustainable size they could.

Answer 2

Certainly. In the US we'd have to put every acre of farmable land into production and turn all that produce into bio-fuels. Then we'd have enough for half of us to drive our cars every day and we wouldn't even need that much because starvation would cut the numbers further than that in no time. Biofuel is the single stupidest idea to come along since using nuclear power to make things go boom, stupider really since it could cause millions or even tens of millions to starve every year.

Answer 3

Jazzman stole my thunder.  What kind of a stupid idiot decided to take food production and turn it into fuel?  Our enemies should be so smart as to come up with something this nefarious.

Answer 4

sure because millions will die of starvation so there will be less cars on the road

Answer 5

No, biofuels can not totally replace fossile fuels but it is another step in the "thinking" process of what are our alternatives.  

We, as a population and some of the input on this page, tear down what others are doing and send terse emails about how horrible these huge companies are but everything....and I do mean everything goes back to fossil fuels.  I seriously doubt any of these readers are always using eco-friendly computers, or energy because that is vitually impossible.  

Biofuels not are the only answer but a branch into our awareness of man becoming more eco-friendly.  However, in the end everything will go back to the natural elements.  The only question is when.

Answer 6

In order for the U.S. to produce enough ethenol to supply all of the vehicles on the road in the U.S. you would have to cover every sqaure inch of land in the U.S. with compatible crops to satisfy the demand and then you still wouldn't have enough fuel.

And then what do we eat?

Answer 7

not a sustainable solution already food prices are rising because of ethanol production

we need to look at alternative energy and for get about the internal combustion engine

http://byderule.multiply.com/journal/ite...

Answer 8

Not really because currently to make E85 you need to burn fossil fuels.  So that really wouldn't work

Answer 9

It's possible, but the real question is; how many millions of people are you prepared to do away with due to starvation.  Biofuels are impairing the food supply and many places you are already seeing protests and riots due to unnecessary food shortages.

Answer 10

It is possible but not practical. To sustain our current use of fuel we need a number of fuels, bio fuel, hydrogen fuel, hybrid, electric, so forth and so on. This would actually be a better system with no monopoly.  One thing I want to point out is the fact that we can make Bio Diesel without hurting any food source. There are millions of acres of land that is unsuitable for farm land across this nation, but can grow algae perfectly. Algae can produce up to 10000 gallons of oil per acre which is far more than anything else we currently use and with a little time and money it will be the main source of oil for Bio Diesel I hope. So there is a light at the end of the tunnel I hope that people see that not all bio fuels take from a current market,

Answer 11

Not at this point in time.  If they ever find a way to produce ethanol from wood or other cellulosic material, then maybe.  It will probably be more expensive, however.

Answer 12

NO!!! Fossil fuels will be around for another million years. Nature recycles them from CO2 through plants to Oil,and Gas

Answer 13

Not from ethanol, but a government study says we can with algae oil. We could accroding to the study not only grow all the fuel we need, but have some left over.

Right now algae oil in the test plants is about $20 per gallon, but the cost is expected to go down once full size plants come on line.

Also they would grow algae where normal food crops can't be grown.

Answer 14

I've converted a diesel to run on waste vegetable oil.So I only use 1 gal. of diesel a week.

Answer 15

Not unless you want to starve the worlds population. Of course then there would be less people to drive which would make it more feasible. But if that happened we could just go back to fossil fuel because there would be plenty of it.

Answer 16

It is possible but is it logical?No it is not.Electricity is the best renewable alternative because it takes a very short time to create it for vehicles unlike biofuel.Besides.Because of biofuel demand in the world many forests are being destroyed to make space for plants that will be converted to biofuel thus exterminating many animal species including humans that live in the forests.Biofuel is the dumbest idea since fossil fuel.