The methane endlessly created by a natural biological process can be stored in a simple bladder; to be fed into a ceramic fuel cell,
Rhosty,
I saw several of these in Indonesia. Although not quite as refined as you describe but nevertheless, they're making good use of the gas.
I suppose in Australia we don't have to do that because we're so clever or so I keep reading.

It was interesting that at the end of the doco the ABC showed the other night - Can I Change Your Mind? - that the one thing Minchen and Rosie agreed on was that we'd be better off not burning fossil fuels, irrespective of whether there was global warming or not.

I would have thought this was something that we could all agree on without respect to where we stand on global warming. At some stage fossil fuel becomes largely too valuable to burn, and then we need a fall back.

The way universities are funded these days, there definitely has to be a role for government funding in the research into replacements.

Graham, don't tell me you are now falling for this push for central planning.

I can not think of a single development of any major item that has come from government control of research direction.

It does not take much looking to find that all the costly, stupid blind alleys we are rushing down today have had seed money, or major funding by government.

Example, wind power, a total loss.

Wave power, ask Spain.

Ethanol, destroying engines, & starving people.

We will never get major new ideas developed by government funded research because of the way research dollars are allocated. It is the old guard, who's "new ideas" if any all stopped 30 years ago, who do the allocation.

Once it becomes profitable to develop a new power source, or transport fuel, industry will do it.

If you need convincing, just think of the T model Ford, & the GM Volt. the first devised by a businessman/dreamer, the second devised by government direction & subsidy.

Government picking winners always ends in expensive failure, because of the type of people who go into politics, & public funded employment. People who won't bet their own shirt on their dreams, will never develop anything, just profit from the effort of others.

Individual; thanks mate for the input. Ethiopia became a barren lunar landscape, caused by survival mode deforestation and eating habits, during repeated droughts! [Compounded by "GREEN" preferred agrarian culture modelling?]
Well, Ethiopians live virtually hand to mouth from agriculture, with a few artisans providing the essential tools and equipment, cooking utensils etc. Exactly the preferred model as described by Jet setting GREEN activist David Suzuki?
Simple methane producing digesters provided as part of our international aid program, would have at the very least replaced the health damaging open wood fires, which in turn would have preserved the forests and natural habitat of so many now extinct species.
Myriad very small dam projects, would have provided some water during these extended dry periods by literally forcing it into the landscape; from where it would gradually leak out during extended dry periods, to sustain some agriculture outcomes or self sufficiency?
It is often said give a man a fish and you fed him for a day, but provide him with a fishing boat, [or its agricultural equivalent,] and you fed him and his family for a life time.
Even if that agricultural equivalent was very low water use algae farming/bio-diesel production, which would provide cash flows or incomes, all while actually helping to actually address climate change.
I mean, algae absorb 2.5 times their bodyweight and under optimised conditions, virtually double that body weight every 24 hours.
Finally, future modelling and or preferred GREEN outcomes, need to be scientifically examined in light of Ethiopian/sub Sahara outcomes, and perhaps jettisoned as climate change, changes all the relied on dynamics?
Doing what you've always done all while expecting a different outcome is simply madness! Quote unquote. Cheers, Rhrosty.

Graham, it’s always a safe bet to point to the fact that carbon fuels are finite and should be replaced at some stage with something else. I can’t imagine you would ever get any objection to that.

Your next caveat is <<irrespective of whether there was global warming or not>>. Which should read, “whether or not there was man made global warming”? Again I doubt you get any objections at all. Unless of course you cannot show evidence and have to invoke “the precautionary principle”

Your premise depends entirely on the separation of any known imperative other than it is a finite resource. All too late I’m afraid, that will never be allowed. This is an omelet that can never be unscrambled because the vested interests have crafted it that way over 20 or 30 years.

There exists a vast and well funded international network whose very existence, power and financial well being depends totally on the premise that there is global warming and it is man made.

These include elected governments, non-elected governing representatives, industrial opportunists, media, academia, scientists, NGO’s and literally thousands of international, national, state and local bureaucratic regulators.

They exist not because of the search for replacements for carbon based fuels, but because of political and financial gain derived from making people pay for CO2 emissions. It is naïve to suggest that this can be dismantled to make way for a valuable but essentially benign initiative to replace fossil fuels.

In any event whatever funds could have been made available for such activities over the past 30 years have already been poured down the gurgler with no market ready solutions, just enormous liabilities. The developed world has been driven into austerity and is scrambling to revert to fossil fuels as quickly as possible. There is no political stomach for any more “March of Folly”. This one is a dead parrot, an ideology that will be left to whither on the vine. The international political interests that seek to use this particular “sustainability” mantra will just have to find something else.

Global Cooling anyone?

>>I can not think of a single development of any major item that has come from government control of research direction.<<

But you've probably handled a lot: our marvelous plastic banknotes were developed by the RBA, University of Melbourne and the dreaded CSIRO.

Cheers,

Tony