Fresh From The Sea

"Fish, and plankton, and sea greens, and protein from the sea. It's all here. Ready! Fresh as harvest day!"  Box - Logan's Run 1976


Scientists have discovered a way to generate ethanol by designing a custom e. coli that breaks down seaweed at temperatures that are close to ambient.  Other ethanol processes require the application of large amounts of heat.  This reduces that energy benefit from the resulting fuels.  There are some studies that indicate that creating ethanol from corn actually consumes more energy than is present in the resulting fuel.

As the story indicates, algae is still a better alternative to seaweed processed by e. coli.  But if we can come up with seaweed based fuels, then what other options can we discover?

A Leak For Science

They haven't perfected it yet, but it looks like we may someday be able to turn urine into rocket fuel.

Scientists on Sunday said they had gained insights into a remarkable bacterium that lives without oxygen and transforms ammonium, the ingredient of urine, into hydrazine, a rocket fuel.

 

So-called anammox -- for anaerobic ammonium oxidation -- germs caused a sensation when they were first identified in the 1990s, but uncovering their secrets is taking time.

In a letter published by the British science journal Nature, researchers at Radboud University Nijmegen in the Netherlands reported they had identified the molecular mechanism by which the bugs do their fuel-trick.

Sort of makes renting your beer on Friday night seem as if it is almost worthwhile!

Grow Your Gas

Scientists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison are working on a process to turn bio-mass into gasoline for our cars....and jet fuel for our...um...jets.  I don't think that they are quite to the point of being economically viable, but we are getting closer to the day when we can be free from foreign oil without sacrificing our standard of living.