We have 4 cars and a New Holland TC18 tractor running on B99 biodiesel. For us it's all about the carbon. We can not keep dumping more carbon on the system and hope to let nature sort it out. If we just stopped using all fossil fuels today it will take hundreds of years to lockup what we have dumped in already.

We have also cut the power line and gone solar. It works well even here in the rainy North West, we even have a biodiesel backup generator.

We still have a few gasoline powered trucks for going to get hay and feed. When we replace them it will be with green fuel trucks.

Please look at my website I'm building and see what we are up to here.
http://web.mac.com/toadman_1/iWeb/Site/Welcome.html

It depends on what you mean by biodiesel... Those that take advantage of used "french fry oil" are reusing something that would be dumped otherwise, while not contributing to standard oil dependence and also not requiring that fields of corn be grown to produce ethanol fuel.

Certainly, both hybrids and bio-diesel vehicles are tremendous improvements over the status quo. Both have great potential; however if anyone here has ever watched the documentary Who Killed the Electric Car?, it is apparent that industry will tend to want to guide our opinions and limit our choices. Both hybrid and bio-diesel vehicles should be used according to specific NEEDS (not a desire to "keep up with the Jones's"). We also need to develop and promote more effective and affordable public transportation (grossly lacking here in the middle of the country), and walk or ride bicycles, when practical.

We have both a Prius and a VW Passat TDI wagon. The Prius gets about 47-50 mpg while the Passat gets 33-37. The Passat is a more pleasant and solid car to drive and is quieter. There are potential problems with both technologies. What to do with the worn out batteries in the Prius? Most of the large biodiesel refiners use commercially raised soybeans for their vegetable oil because their isn't enough waste oil and local products for them to use. Some of the soybeans are GMO, which are making Monsanto richer and are bad for our planet. I guess a solution for biodiesel and ethanol would be to legalize hemp or outlaw GMO products.

While I drive a hybrid, I think the question is wrong. We should be looking at how to improve our quality of life while reducing our carbon emissions. Both hybrid or biodiesel vehicles are about maintaining the status quo and not rethinking what a good life is about. Perhaps we should, for example, be investing in more telepresencing applications so that you don't have to drive or fly? That is neither hybrid nor biodiesel yet dramtaically reduces emissions. My quality of life improives when I don't have to step on a plane for yet another business trip or spend an hour a day in a car. Let's get outside of our four wheeled boxes and really think about what a good life can be.
Andrew

Tihomir In reponse to your comment "so can we spare land to grow the organic matter needed for the fuel??? I don’t think so"

The future holds great things for biodiesel and it is in the non-generic sources of biomass such as algea and micro-algae. 1 acre of land can produce 180,000 gallons of biodiesel per year! It growsso fast that all of the worlds fuel needs could be supplied from an area of land no bigger than California. Check it out google algae for biodiesel.

We just bought a Prius and its great!

When you talk about what cars release you have to consider both CO2 and particles like Nox. It is well known that cars using diesel are not good for the local environment. If you compare Prius and VW Polo, first there are a different in size, second Polo is a diesel car. The release of CO2 is Prius: 109 g/km and VW Polo: 102 g/km.

Biodiesel have 3 problems:
1) It will compete with food production
2) Change of areas from forest to biofuel will it self increase the release of CO2
3) Depletion of soil

Last; the process of making biofuel into fluid will demand energy itself.

So far I think the best option is hybrid cars if you do not compare it with using your legs or public transport :-)

I think the deseil hybrid is a necessity for town use, and the more people use this option the smaller and more powerful the batteries become. Hydrogen is also an option and by the looks of the amount of test vehicles in use and with Iceland, going down this path all it will take is consuer demand to switch the balance.
I recently moved to Brazil and the desil engine is not permited for consumer use only for pick ups and lorries. they have been using alcohol since the late 1970's and it is refreshing smelling the sweet smell they produce knowing that its not harming me or the enviroment.

I have seen a Golf gti for sale powered by alcohol with 300bhp, and its not hard to do this. So that's one in the eye for formula one and all the petrol heads saying they miss the power.

These are the consumers we need to educate, once this happens the balance of the scales will tip.

In times gone by our fore fathers pioneered the car and even had to drive with someone walking in front of it. Where is the pioneering spirit these days, outside of the educated we are just known as greenie's So what if a battery powered car is slower, it won't be for long if we all refuse to keep buying unenviromental vehicles!

To all people concerned about Global Warming or Climate Change?

I would recommend that you go see the new movie "The Eleventh Hour" with host Leonardo Dicaprio! It's a "Must See" and explains what will be happening to our planet in the years to come plus has some vital tips on what we need to do today and has a expert scientific explanation! Time is running out and we all need to make some sacrifices to start working now on slowing down this devastating destruction of Planet earth!

This is an either or question. True electro-motive hybrids make very efficient use of whatever fuel/engine combination. Hybrids like the Chevy Volt (if they actually ever make them) use a small 3 cylinder constant speed engine to power a 55 k/w electric generator which stores power in batteries or uses it directly. The engine/generator/drive chain/battery package are all separate modules an can be changed independently. The engine envisioned currently is a multi-fuel engine.

But the major problem with bio fuels of any kind is the conflict between food supplies & bio-supplies. Prices for seed corn have already made the price of food corn increase all over the globe because of ethanol production increases from corn. So biodiesel from local waste sources can make sense but as the competition for those sources go up the temptation to grow biodiesel stocks will increase. Let us skip the middle man (plants) and use the sun directly with solar electrical generation. Plug in my electro-motive hybrid at over night, let the solar panels on the car charge it while I'm parked 8 hours a day at work or in my driveway an what would the CO2 footprint be then? Chevy claims fuel mileage of 150 mpg (by plugging in) to start. Well gain of salt and all that but won't it be wonderful if all came together?

Looks like the best answer is "depends". And, it depends, in large part, on what you mean by "green", a human political endeavor.

Diesel always gets more of the available energy in burning a hydrocarbon, called the Gibbs free energy, so from a combustion-energy return perspective, diesel is always more efficient than a regular fueled internal combustion engine at producing useful mechanical energy. A well designed turbin is still more energy efficient than either type of internal combustion engine. None return more than about a quarter of the total available combustion energy into something useful to us (mechanical energy). The rest is incomplete burn, the resultant byproducts, and losses in the form of heat energy not turned into mechanical energy (entropy). Fuel cells return about 100% of the chemical bond energy, but there had to be a source of energy to create the reaction products (hydrogen)for the fuel cell, which ultimately, so far, is again dependent mostly on hydrocarbon combustion. Interesting new biotechnologies (bacteria, etc) may revolutionize hydrogen production. We'll have to see what the oxygen footprint of that would be overall.

Electric engines (motors) are much more efficient at converting electrical energy to mechanical energy, but ultimately almost all available electrical energy has been produced through the burning of hydrocarbons to produce mechanical energy, which is then converted to electrical energy, as in a hybrid. The other sources of electrical energy are, ie "plugin", are also mostly dependent on hydrocarbon combustion, though some comes from nuclear fission sources, and some from fussion nuclear sources. The former as local uranium/plutonium reactors, the later, fussion reactions in the sun, that produce the radiant energy captured by wind turbines or solar panels, etc. to make electricity. Then you have to deal with losses in transmition of that electrical energy to the consummer, the energy costs and carbon footprint, byproducts, waste, etc of creating and maintaining the entire system over it functional life, compared to the mechanical energy return utilized by consummers of energy.

So, ultimately, the supply side of human consummed energy is a system wide engineering problem, and it requires complete design and evaluation of an the entire actual functioning system to assess the efficiency of the system and its ecological impact, its footprint. That cannot be done outside the context of perceived human consumption needs and actual aggregate social behavior patterns, ie political and economic processes. There has been in the past, an almost linear relationship between fuel efficiency of a motor vehicle, and its emissions footprint, heat, particulate, CO, CO2, sulfur, nitrogen, O3, etc. There are combustion catalysts to consider, like lead in the past, and the effects of these compounds on our environment. Improved conversion and scavenging devices will need to be considered in the future. Most certainly, as already mentioned, the weight of a vehicle that is to be moved impacts this footprint in exponential ways, the "wind resistance", rolling resistance, etc.

So, what constitutes "green"? Which of these engineered improvements on the status quo is the greenist?

Looking at the other side of this equation, implied climate change, warming, or effects, and that which can be imputed to human activity, therefore potential partial control, what is the definition of green? If you subscribe to the global dimming discoveries, from particulate emissions created by humans, mostly, and the quasi-quantitative statement that this has about halved the projected average global temperature rise to date over the last couple of centuries, then is it more green to remove particulate emissions rapidly by changing fuels and hydrocarbon combustion sources of mechanical energy (desiel v biodesiel, gas, gasahol, ethanol, etc), faster than the CO2/CO is removed from emissions and the atmosphere? Its undeniable that life processes over the last three billion years created the ocean, terresterial, and atomospheric ecologies that we live in today. So what about the sulfur metabolizing bacteria in aquatic environments that produce hydrogen sulfide, in low oxygen environments, and the huge amounts of methane taken out of the atmosphere ions ago, stored on the ocean bottoms? Could we burn the methane or hydrogen sulfide as energy sources? Could we contain and reuse the products of such a burn? Would it make things worse? Is it possible that global dimming is saving our asses so far, delaying the crossing of an irreversible atmospheric threshold?

Most certainly, ramping up alternative sources of energy, conservation, recycling plastics, metals, paper, and making transportation and electric generation more energy efficient will help slow the problem we create for ourselves. Controlling the byproducts of energy production and utilization will also help. That's an attempt at managing a problem, rather than coming to a basic solution to a problem that is inherent in human ecology.

Most Americans expect to spend their days in a temperature controlled environment, including in their vehicles. As it gets hotter, how much more energy will we expect to consume to cool (air conditioning) our immediate environment, and how does that feed the average temperature rise in the environment external to the air conditioned environment? How many mpg's, thus emissions, are lost on the vehicle air conditioning? Many Americans like to wear fashionable clothes, as their presentation of self, and self-worth, so they expect to have a cool environment where they wear such fashionable clothes to make such presentations/images/social statements, so they will not sweat through such clothes, and become unfashionable. It takes energy to transfer heat energy against a heat energy gradient. What about grilling the steaks, chicken, and hamburgers in the back yard, eg in the LA basin? Human habits, culturally created and driven, that push engineering, technologies, and ultimately always energy consumption!

At the level of human society, we cannot escape the second law of thermodynamics. While we know something about the emissions and energy conversion characteristics of the technologies we created, we know much less about the total systems in the biosphere around us, and how they interact. We do not have a well developed functional concept of "buffering" (from chemistry and engineering) or "homeostasis"(from biology) for the biosphere, and how these work, and to what degree, in the biosphere. We do not know what or where the thresholds are, yet.

Currently, we don't seem to be much interested in the reasonable data bases we do have about the biosphere, so these reasonable information sources that we do have don't seem to be used effectively to inform the creation of policy. Or, a currently functional definition of what is green! We don't seem to be able to admit that we don't know a lot. And, that is the stuff of power brokerage in human ecology. So, answering what appears to be such a simple question, hybrid v biodesiel, in an up to date and knowlegeable way, turns out to be a complex, and mostly politically driven set of potential responses.

Velban called it "conspicuous consumption", something it turns out all human societies do, mostly to determine social ranking within a given social group. It may be that any consensus answer achieved to this simple question, based on current reasonable data bases about the biosphere or not, expertise or not, etc is largely tangential or even irrelevant, and for many potential reasons. Of course the average temperature is getting hotter, and that's in significant part due to human activity! Duh! Humans effectively deforested the Mediterranean Basin ten thousand years ago, just to keep warm and build shelters. We don't seem much interested in the reasonable data bases we have about our own aggregate behavior as social primates either, particularly power brokerage.

Human aggregate greed (therefore green impact) can only be minimized to some baseline level. So, controlling the "footprint" of human activity on our larger environment, the biosphere, is a matter of controlling two basic parts of human ecology: average energy (per capita) consumption, and total population. Both are culturally driven, power brokerage driven, human social end points/outcomes. Western anthropologists and human ecologists have verifying and advertising these controling ecological forces for well over half a century. The school of Rome economists showed the importance of these human ecological forces in their stocastic models in the 60's. We are consumming several orders more energy in North American culture per capita than more "ferral" humans societies do, and our population, by whatever means, is rising rapidly. We are the image of conspicuous consumption to which the rest of the world aspires, and we have an aggregate cultural expectation that this will continue into our future, both average energy consumption and population rise. Welcome to anthropology 301.

So the answer to the question of hybrid v biodesiel depends. And, it depends on human perception, greed, power brokerage, belief, and how that defines what green means, and human actions/choices. It depends!

hybrid bio diesil is still natral gas hybrid is better

I currently own a hybrid, and take pride in doing what I can currently to reduce my consumption of gasoline, using technology available today. I do believe however that the use of hybrid technology should not be used as a means to boost horsepower alone, but to increase efficiency in miles per gallon and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
I believe biodiesel can be another way to wean us off gasoline, but that we should not use food crops to produce biodiesel fuel. There are other sources, such as switchgrass and waste biofuel sources that would be a wiser choice.
Overall, I think the use of more than one technology would be the best approach to solving the problem of getting the world's transportation away from the use of fossil fuels.

There are a lot of issues which many of the previous posts have addressed. But the most likely answer will have to be some 'Hybrid' of many energy sources. We will not and should not concentrate all of our energy needs into one source - this is why we are in the present economic and geopolitical stranglehold today. With multiple energy sources the market will be far more flexible but with this comes the problem of pollution both of out of tail pipe and storage of spent materials. All of these issues need to be addressed and forum like this are very helpful in getting everyone to participate and learn from each other.

One other issue that is coming up is the relative lack of material for batteries like lithium. It is a rare earth material and cannot be relied upon for ALL of our batteries in computers/cars....etc... So, it behooves us all to consider thinking in terms of more efficient machines/home appliances/transportation/living spaces/city planning. Long distance travel and food distribution is another problem but that may become a trade off where the majority of us use solar/biodeisel etc for our everyday needs. The inter-connecting transport for goods and services will have to use the 'bad' stuff because coal and oil are the most concentrated form of energy.

I agree with an earlier post that we should not rely on corn or other food crops for our cars' needs. This is folly! First, as the Climate warms, we will have less arable land and less fresh water which if used for our transportation will further erode our communities into haves and have-nots. And if economic strata are determined who gets to eat and who doesn't - that would definitely not be a place where I would want my children to live.

All in all, I think a mix use of energy resources (clean!!) and a smart use of space, transportation, and living conditions is the best and most challenging method for the future. I also know we can make this a cultural and economic boom for all of us, too.

weell about hybrids i will love to have one they are awsome and having one will make me feel really nice beacause i am not destroying my world as if i were using a normal car but in my country there is not hybrids there is nothing of this green technology, and well i started practicing your tips but i don´t feel like i am doing enough maybe if you community from liveearht can come to my region it will be much better latin amercia has so much beautiful places that are being destroyed specially in ecuador our president as i can see is in contact with this ecologycal things but not enough !!!HELP US i want to be heard my planet needs me and i want to help the EARTH!!!!

I am Brazilian and I fell a little bit worried when I hear about the great entusiasm with which Biodisel is spoken of. I believe Biodisel has a great advantage when compared to petrolieum and that is: the use of petroleum releases CO2 that the Earth has stored many years ago - in a way that the total amount of this gas keeps increasing on the atmosphere. The Biodisel, in the other hand, is produced and used within a cilcle - the plants take from the atmosphere the CO2 the fuel will latter release. It is, therefore, better.
BUT
Biodiesel, as it is produced now, depends on monoculture - which is a highly questionable practice. It kills the soil by exposing to direct sun light. It depends on the use of chemicals (because of its lack of diversity)that polute both water and soil. It depends on huge amounts of water. It depends on the use of heavy veicles and machinary. It might lead to cutting down forests. And monoculture has also its social impacts on the countryside that leads to migration to cities. In two words: NOT SUSTAINABLE.

Over the past year I have been doing research on bio-diesel and it's just a matter of time before the auto manufacturers release more diesel vehicles that are affordable for Americans to purchase and use B20. Check out biodiesel.org. This is the National Bio-Diesel Board. Here you can see all the latest legislation, where bio-diesel can be purchased at a pump anywhere in the country, what the manufacturers of autos are going to be coming out with in the next couple of years. I love the idea of b100 and elec. However, I believe b100 would be sufficient according to the bio-diesel council. For the same price as diesel you are looking at 70 miles to the gallon in most cases, in a v-8. I also believe it to be true that as oil is on the stock exchange and the world revolves around it, we as individuals will have to continue to educate and make choices outside of the norm, raise our children to do the same so that the need for gas in automobiles diminishes over time. Bio-diesel is something that will revolutionize out economy it is just going to take 10-20 years to come full circle. All the soy beans can be bio-engineered and grown all over the world. One example of using existing farm land is in the southern states of the US, replacing the tobacco crop for soy crop. NC is trying to become a non-tobacco state and grow soy. If we all invest into the soy products & soy corporations for bio-diesel production, there will be a huge financial gain for all involved. I am curious to see what the electric and oil lobbiest have up their sleeves for the next ten years or so to prevent the change over from happening globally.....I have already seen the Chose Oil ads in magazines and TV commercials, do they think we are that stupid???? But, in the end, everyone has to eat....
Hope everyone finds the biodiesel.org useful! Cheers

Thus is the type of question that makes me crazy with frustration. The answer is NEITHER. We should focus on creating a solution that is truly sustainable. We embrace this type of solution because we are so desperate to do something better, something greener, because we are passionate about making a difference. A Hybrid is still a petroleum based system. Could the solution be a true plug in electric? What about just making cars more efficient? Demanding that cars be efficient? Why do we take these as our only options? What about Biodiesel? I don't know allot, but what are the implications? Does that mean we finally have a use for all that fry grease we love? Or does this just mean that we create a boon for the pesticide industry? I feel that a true solution will take into account the full power production stream. And it wouldn't hurt if we could recycle it too...

I want to see all labels and packaging of, and on products made from recycled paper products. I want to see the glue used to secure labels to cans, jars, boxes etc. be made from biodegradable materials. This applys to fast food containers also.

Recycling programs can do so much better with coordinated guidelines across the world, and not just in a few places.

By doing this it would be so much easier,safer,and healthier to recycle products. I remember the landfills of the northwest, and how much land was consumed for material waste that went right back into the environment in the form of chemicals that became methane gas.

Something needs to be done with the recycled tire problems instead of dumping them on a Pacific island or in landfills which is still done in some places. Burning them is not an option.
I want to see something done about the fast food containers, and aluminum drink cans that are dumped in our waterways by people who don't care.

The only way these things can happen is by public awareness.

I LUV LUV U GUYS SO MUCH, KEEP UP THE GREAT JOP YOU'RE DOING PEACE OUT OLD HIPPIE IN BEAUMONT, CA.

Really,
Hybrid and Biodiesel are both "lipservice" responses to global warming. I believe electric fuel cell cars using hydrogen are the course we should point to. no matter what the US does with its national inventory of vehicles, all efforts are being offset by the industrialization of Brazil, China and India. We need huge increases in solar and nuclear electricity generation, worldwide, and much more.

James

I just read an article in The Times about biodiesels made from rapeseed and maize, which reported that the emissions of nitrous oxide were 50 -70 per cent more than with a fossil fueled vehicle. Nitrous oxide is 296 times more powerful as a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide. What is the truth about biofuels?

As a biodiesel user for a couple years, I believe it is one of the best solutions for the immediate future. But this question is faulty, since right now, with the technology that exists today, the better answer is BOTH. Diesel hybrids, that can run on biodiesel will create the best efficiency. A diesel engine is inherently 35-50% more efficient than a gas engine, and with the newer common rail designs, they have greatly reduced the particulate matter from the emissions, along with the NOx. Diesel hybrid technology is nothing new - pretty much every heavy rail train in the country is diesel-electric hybrid. With the efficiency of diesel engines, adapted to preferably a plug-in hybrid, we will have vehicles that get at least 100-150 MPG, WITH TECHNOLOGY THAT EXISTS TODAY. It's all ready for mass production, but unfortunately the car companies continue to put short-term profits ahead of sustainability.

Hybrid or biodiesel? Why does it have to be one or the other? Why not both, as each is best for certain kinds of driving?

Hybrids are gread in the city, or in stop-and-go freeway traffic. Diesel are great for long-distance highway driving. And of course smaller cars with efficient transmissions can get by with small 3- and 4-cylinder engines, so no need to 200+ horsepower V6 and V8 engines.

As for biodiesel, a small percentage blended with dino diesel works out quite well... B2 or B5 or B10. There's not enough farmland to supply B100 to a very large number of vehicles.

Biodiesel can be made by filtering the oil waste from restaurants. I know several people who have traveled from coast to coast without having to pay for gas because they syphoned and filtered oil from the waste bins at restaurants the whole way. Imagine a day when you can drive to a restaurant, have dinner, fill up your car with their excess oil (that they are selling pre-filtered), and drive away with a full stomach and a full tank of gas.

As long as your battery is rechargeable, I think that sounds like reusing at its finest.

138 million acres would be needed to produce enough bio-diesel to replace
5 % of gasoline consumption. I don't think it is a good idea.
If you are going to produce it from something which is currently being discraded, that would be ok, but I am curious to know how much you think you can get from that.

In general, bio-fuels are a scam.

I support any technology which increases
gas mileage, including hybrids.

we drive almost 9 years both in a citroen xm drives very good, in 4 hours to Paris but we have at this time still an unleaded car but in about 3 month we have also a citroen hybride. I live in Europe you know and I have an American Adress and here in Holland we must pay very much for the cimatecrise, on every article we have to pay more for the climate.
Helma Thijsse St. Willebrord Holland

We make our own biodiesel. We use local discarded oil from restaurants. We drive a used older car as well. It is wonderful to be able to do this ourselves and it takes a lot less time than you think. We did not buy anything new, we even used an old used water heater for the diesel process. You have to think about consuming less and reusing more in the argument as well. Everyone is now “throwing away” their old car to buy new hybrids. Why can’t our first response be to use what we have better, or use less and consume less over all?

I don't believe the question covers all the possiblities to reduce our dependancy on fuel and improve our enviroment at the same time. There are other alternative means of propelling a vehicle that we have ignored besides hydrogen cells. We need to test vehicles that use compressed air, H2O and solar incorporated in the vehicle design.These vehicles have already been built. We also need to be looking at alternative power sources for our homes and businesses.

We drive a Prius and absolutely love it. My question is or comment is not that one is better than the other because they both pose issues of environmental positives and negatives. Why do they not make an ethanol or biodiesel hybrid and get the best of both worlds

I think the answer to this question by the editor isn't written in a way that puts climate first.

Fuel type and engine type are technologies- just means to an end. Why not specify the goal- reduced (lifecycle) CO2 per mile driven?

You can design cheap, highly efficient non-hybrid vehicles (see Toyota Yaris, Honda Fit, etc). You can choose fuels (biodiesel, ethanol, hydrogen, plug-in electric) based on their lifecycle carbon emissions and cost.

Simply set the standard for fuel CO2 and create the methodology to account for emissions instead of picking technologies which may not be the most benefitial (e.g. carbon negative muscle car hybrids and palm oil based boidiesel).

In my opinion Biofull is the solution to the energy crises and global warming.Wolswagen diesel cars make 47 miles per galon. The diesel technology has more than 40 years of experience. Europe is using alredy more than 40% of diesel cars. The convertion into Biofull is instantanius.I see some people thinking that Biofull will damage the environment because the use of vegetal resources. Reserch has been done about it and one of the answers is the use of mustard seeds that are easy to grow locally at the communities,also the processing plant could be local. The solution will generate employment and economic growth for the communities and eliminate the problem of the transportation costs.We need to be creative, thinking win-win.

We've driven a Honda Civic Hybrid for 4 years and we love it. I think it's getting about 40 miles to the gallon, and it's so quiet! That said, I do tend to wonder how much of the fuel efficiency is due to the hybrid technology, and how much of it is because the car is compact and lightweight (I've heard that the luxury hybrids being produced by companies like Lexus are not all that fuel-efficient). Also, the electric battery takes up a lot of trunk space that could otherwise be used for packing...so if we go on a longer trip than, say, a 3-day weekend, or take extra guests with us, we have to end up taking a larger car. I'd be the first in line to buy a plug-in hybrid if there was an affordable and reliable one on the market!

I'm glad to see all the support for plug-in cars as one important response to the climate crisis. Carmakers are starting to get it too, but they're moving too slowly: they still don't realize their business prospects, and our world's future, depend on going beyond "business as usual."

There are still many misconceptions about emissions from electric miles. On the national (half-coal) grid, those miles emit about half the CO2 of a gasoline car. There's no need to build more plants: a Pacific National Lab study found that if they plugged in at night, today's grid could power 82% of passenger cars and light trucks. And over 20 states are now under "renewable portfolio standards" to increase the green % of electric generation...that means plug-in cars will get cleaner as they age, because the grid will get cleaner! So increasingly clean electricity as the primary fuel and an evolving mix of biofuels for the "range extension" fuel brings together both solutions.

-- Felix Kramer, Founder, The California Cars Initiative (calcars.org)

The Toyota Prius has promised a plug-in in their 2009 model (beginning summer, 2008) at no additional cost. Estimates of 50 miles are possible with the plug-in, so it will go all year without using fuel, except for trips. Yes, the Prius battery is cadmium which is toxic, but Altair Nano Tech has developed a titanium battery that is non-toxic, raises the heat threshold by a hundred degrees, and can be recharged in 10 minutes! The battery's life is 20-30 years and is now being used on Phoenix Motor vehicles in California. They began making the club cab pickup in June, 2007.

Nobuta has it! Diesel electric is OLD technology. Trains have been using it for decades. It does seem odd that it isn't in the forefront of the options being considered.

Great input Jan! Let's do it now.
0 emissions sound great!
My Wish:
Totally electric plug-in car with a solar skin.
Link to the Think car:
http://en.think.no/
Link to Google's vision:
http://blogs.business2.com/greenwombat/2007/09/googles-10-mill.html

One of the issues with all diesels except biodiesel in the US is the Refining Process. A Service Manager at a VW dealership has stated that the reason that VW is not bringing diesel Jettas into the US anymore is because they can't meet omissions standards that the exact same car has NO TROUBLE meeting in Europe, because of the difference in fuel refining, and rather than re-engineer the diesel model completely for the US market they instead decide to stop importing them. I imagine that our US based Oil Companies lobbying efforts with Congress are largely to blame for this.

I think we need to look at all options INCLUDING putting tighter Oil Refinery standards in place, as well as adding biodiesel to the mix and developing better hybrids, or even electric commuter cars such as the Think, which, to my knowledge, has not yet been approved for the US market.

The Think, which uses lithim technology for its batteries, uses a very interesting method to deal with batteries. They're leased. So the Think owner always has a good battery and doesn't have to deal with disposal. Cost, if my memory is correct, is approximately 100 bucks a month, which, when compared to the cost of gas and the cost of maintenance on an internal combustion engine, is very favorable. Downside is where to plug it in. If you have a driveway and an external outlet, fine. Range is pretty impressive, and certainly will meet most commuter needs.

I have no idea which of these two alternatives is less taxing on our environment. Some green sources of energy (ie. corn) require lots of oil to make. We probably haven't figured out yet, the most efficient ways to transport people.
I mean, who heard of hybrids, 15 years ago?

I'm just a normal teenager, but I really care about the environment we live in. I'm really worried about the future we will have, and I am hoping that every family is recycling or saving energy. But to stay on topic, I think that hybrid is most efficient. My mother has a Lexus IS 350 ,and it's not really fuel efficient. I've read Al Gore's "The Inconvenient Truth" and I have found out that the United States is one of the most polluted country in the world. I think hybrids are fuel efficient because it recharges when you brake, and you don't have to keep going to the gas station and get gasoline.

I have a 2002 VW Jetta TDI (diesel) that I love. Whenever possible I get bio-diesel (preferring B-99) and it runs beautifully. We measured milage and got 45 mpg on a highway trip to California and 40 mpg coming up the W. coast on slow roads. In the long run, I totally agree with the need for other types of transit options... and would love a plug-in diesel hybrid. Please, VW, bring them on!

If we want the best possible fuel efficiency, we should be moving towards a blue-tec, bio-diesel, series electric hybrid, that is also plug-in. There is no question diesel is more efficient. We should move away from current parallel hybrid vehicles. Their efficiency is poor. Why is everyone happy about a Prius getting maybe 50MPG? The mid '80s Honda Civic and Chevy Sprint got a real 60-65 MPG on the highway. We have gone backwards!! An aerodynamic, diesel, series hybrid should obtain 150MPG and that is without improvements with plug-in power. The technology is all available right now. But, here is the scoop, no current auto manufacturer wants to build a small, efficient vehicle because the profits are low. What the auto makers want to do is to make a pricey high mileage vehicle with fancy hardware to artificially increase their profit margins. Current laws make it very difficult and expensive for anyone to compete with the current auto manufacturers. The only thing smaller companies can do is to make three-wheeled, high mileage vehicles because they fall under motorcycle laws which don't require crash tests, emission regulations, and so forth.

I don't see the subject of one technology being better than another is getting to the point. We have to combine everything, and start demanding the auto manufacturers to do something for real by forcing them by law to do so. Understand the average fuel economies in Europe is around 40MPG, and in Japan around the upper 40's. Those vehicles are of course made by all the same companies that sell autos to us in the USA. We can just jump start that idea for vehicles by the year 2020 by selling and buying vehicles that are already on the market. Am I missing something??? It's time to wake up and save the planet. It's our only home.

My 2002 Prius would be the perfect car if my darling little hybrid weren't so dependent on fossil fuels. Indeed, I look forward to the day when ethanol technology has been perfected and my car runs on corn oil! By the way, in No. California where I live, the gas at Union 76 stations has ethanol instead of MTBE as an additive. It's a start.

Dear editors,

Your answer to the question "Hybrid or Bio-diesel" makes a lot of sense, but passes by some very important points, which are summarized in my items 28 and 134. Your original question does not go to the heart of the problem, which is" what is the most fuel economic and emission friendly transport solution".

A vehicle needs by far most of its power directly on the wheels. When that is done all friction losses within the car, significantly more than many people think, are gone. That is the first gain.

If we put sufficiently light, efficient and powerful electric motors in these wheels with the ability to recuperate nearly full energy when braking we are close to the ideal vehicle solution. This is certainly true when we take other significant advantages (see item 28 and 134) into account.

The battery/supercap technology is getting very close to complement the Direct Drive In-Wheel (DDIW) concept to realize the full electric vehicle with fuel economy well exceeding 100 mpg, still taking into account the fuel equivalents for electricity used and no emission at all at the vehicle.

This vehicle concept, based on PML Flightlinks' technology from the UK, was presented by Volvo at the latest Frankfurt Autoshow on their C30. An excellent initiative ! Others are working on it as well, but have by far not reached the status of PML's technology yet.

The Direct Drive In-Wheel (DDIW)technology technology can, because of its extreme flexibiltiy, through a diversity of automotive manufacturers, including Volvo, at full scale reach the market in 2010 instead of 2015, as claimed by Volvo. Public awareness, pressure from the society as well as introduction of proper legislation should be used to force the automotive manufacturers to do so. A sustainable society should prevail above commercial objectives of automotive manufacturers, which is reversed now. The technology is available for application, so let's go for it !

I would be happy to provide you with more information and assist you people to get things done properly and show the world how breakthroughs can and should be realized.

Look forward to hear from you,
with regards

For the interim solution, biodiesel is it. No matter how you look at the situation, as long as the hybrids are dependent on gasoline, biodiesel is mych beter solution for the environmental problems.

Second phase solution will be Biodiesel/Electric hybrids.

Third phase solution will be Plug-in Biodiesel/Electric Hybrids.

Fourth phase will be Plug-in Biodiesel/Electric Hybrids with good portion of utility grid power coming from renewable sources such as solar, wind, geothermal, biomass, ans wave/tide. At this point food vs. fuel argument will be almost irrelevant.

Let's separate emotions and attachments from the argument, and look at the scientific analysis. Then the answer should be clear.

I was going to vote for biodiesel/vegetable oil but after reading a letter above saying why not do both, I agree. We should have Plug-in Hybrids that can use USED vegetable oil to power the internal combustion engine. There are business's converting diesel engines in cars to run on USED vegetable oil from resturants.
In any case we should not expand our use of nuclear power. We have no right to burden our children and their children and their children... with the necessity of taking care of OUR waste.

Hello:

Biodiesel, apart from a rising of prices afecting poor nations depending on corn and similars, as an bigger green hose efect gas emissions than diesel itself.
The solutions is hybrid for the time beeing, with full objectives on electric only - hidrogen cells, solar pannels, micro nuke-reactors inside, etc....

The battery disposal issue of hybrids is a concern. But so is the source of biodiesel.

I have heard that the source of much biodiesel is palm oil - and that is being grown in places which were previously rainforest!

Also, do you know if when sugar cane is used to produce biodiesel, does the cane need as much 'chemical assistance' to grow as cane grown for sugar - if so, this adds another dimension to the sustainability argument.

I think biodiesel is greener than non-plug-in hybrid, but plug-in hybrid is greener than biodiesel. That being said, I think it is unethical to burn food sources as fuel. The biodiesel fuel should come from some organic matter than cannot be eaten. Otherwise, we need to go to plug-in hybrids, solar, etc.

PS I have a Prius and it gets 40-50 mpg. I live in a relatively hilly area and mileage also varies with ambient temperature. Better gas mileage in summer, batteries don't like cold weather.

PPS Toyota recycles hybrid batteries. I'm not sure how but that's what they say.

Neither option is fool proof. With biofuel such as Ethanol, valuable land that the US government paid farmers to set aside for wildlife is now being plowed under for corn because of the simple economics. So - farmers need to feed their families and are taking advantage of the higher corn prices but wildlife is paying the cost with less food and shelter. In Brazil the rain forest is being cut down for sugar cane. The best option seems to be reusing cooking oil and other oils in the 'fry' vehicles.

Hybrids still burn gas just less of it and then there is the issue of what to do with the batteries. I see hybrids as a stop gap.

Overall - the the auto makers are not going to make changes until there are enough consumers demanding it. Until then all of us are just going to have to step up and do our part the best we can and what works for one person is not necessarily going to work for all - but we have to keep working on it.