Ethanol a cheaper source of energy than gasoline? I don't think so. Latest quote for NYMEX unleaded gasoline was USD 2.2516/lb, whereas CBOT ethanol is at USD 2.535/lb (both for Spetember delivery). Of course there is more energy in a pound of petrol than in a pound of ethanol.

Nice graphic from the Peak Oil Portal. Nice unbiassed source too.

--d.

Ethanol is a whole lot dearer than gasoline, about 80c litre.
Ehanool is mythylated spirit and in the supermarket on the shelf metho is $3.12 a litre.
Here is definition of Mythylated spirit:
Methylated spirit (or Meths, also denatured alcohol) is ethanol which has been rendered toxic or otherwise undrinkable, and in some cases dyed. It is used for purposes such as fuel for spirit burners and camping stoves, and as a solvent. Traditionally, the main additive was 10% methanol, which gave rise to its name, but this is not always the case now. There are diverse industrial uses for ethanol, and therefore literally hundreds of recipes for denaturing ethanol. Typical additives are methanol, isopropanol, methyl ethyl ketone, methyl isobutyl ketone, denatonium, and even (uncommonly) aviation gasoline.

Now if Australa switched to making Methylated Spirit from wood to making it from sugar cane to make it cheaper we will cause inflation on all food goods in supermarkets.
In supermarkers all manufactured food has a percentage of sugar.
Will people buy manufactured food wityhout sugar in it? NO.
Therefore all foods must rise in price.

If you don't beieve it . . . bananas wee about $1.99 kg. Then a cyclone came aloing and they went to $16 kg and have settled about $12kg. The same thing would happen when we make ethaqnol from sugar cane. It would force inflation on food through the roof.

Though what I'd really like to do is make some comments regarding the 'had to' comment in Jackmanson's post, I'll try and stick to the article -

There are two very basic things that aren't being considered here - the monopolies present within the oil industry, and the inescapable fact that crude oil is not a renewable resource. Sooner or later supply will not meet demand, unless an alternative is developed.

(And these alternatives really aren't that hard to achieve - for many years in New Zealand my family drove a Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) car, and while it was about 20 per cent less powerful than a comparable unleaded car, it did the job).

But what irks me about the article is that it doesn't even mention the fact that there are only a few key players in the oil industry - it makes no reference to the fact that in recent years, price has not been pegged to supply - governments talk about investigations into oil pricing, but lets say that the Federal Government did make a finding that an international oil company was guilty of price fixing.

What exactly are they going to do?

There is nothing that the government can do - these corporations are now international entities, and exactly who is to bring them to heel?

Any grandstanding on oil prices is ludicrous - all the federal government can do is abolish oil taxes - once that is done, the only option is to subsidize fuel, but that would be at a ridiculous cost with very little impact.

petrol is getting dear, what an opportunity!!

Why dont instead of whinging we do something about it.

hear is one example of a concept that works, and will be implemented in our lifetime.

there are unlimited opportunities and here is one such one. whilst i am sceptical of this the end of the day things like this get snapped up and archived and when there is dire need, we will change over.

http://netmar.com/~maat/archive/watercar/h20car2.htm

The USA is soley intent on spreading democracy throughout the Middle East?

I believe that Lebanon and Palestine both have democratically elected governnments for all the good it has done them.

The price of oil isn't set by OPEC, it's set by oil barons in New York and is primarily interested in satisfying America's insatiable thirst.

Oil politics has been directly or indirectly responsible for almost all conflicts -major and minor- throughout the 20th Century and looks like continuing well into the 21st.

It's interesting that every President for the last 38 years has a background in the Oil industry or comes from an Oil state. (Except Carter whose contribution was to stop the growth of the domestic nuclear power industry).

The results of the recent pipeline failure in Alaska shows how vulnerable they are to supply interruptions.

All Australia can do is hang on for the ride. We won't be permitted to diversify too much from the traditional sources via ethanol and other substitutes because that's the main way we are kept under control.

The writer is correct insofar as the Iraq debacle has resulted in a temporal loss, rather than a gain, in world oil production.

But why is the writer joining the queue of people trying to aportion blame for increasing petrol prices?

The Iraq invasion, even if successful, could have offset dwindling oil supplies by a matter of 15 years. The Iraq failure perhaps did us all a favour (albeit at horrendous humanitarian cost) in that it may have helped to bring on the oil crisis sooner rather than later.

The faster we create a less energy intensive socity, the less trauma in the long run.

In every other respect the Iraq invasion was a foreign policy debacle of monstrous proportions.