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Originally Posted by 142 Guy
I also have a beard; but, sort of past middle age.
Carbon capture and ethanol / methanol fuels are a loaded cannon. Around here, ethanol is primarily derived from wheat and other grains. Its primarily an agri subsidy because the the CO2 generated in the seed to fermentation process generally exceed the reduced CO2 during combustion of the fuel. In Brazil where they use sugarcane as the 'fuel stock' sugar cane at the southern latitudes is a much more efficient photosynthesizer. Depending on how they use the bagasse and particularly if they do not burn the trash I believe that ethanol dervived from sugar cane provides a net CO2 reduction as a fuel relative to gasoline.
There is a process that uses enzymes (like in the guts of cattle) to digest cellulose products like straw and other 'trashes' to create ethanol, generally referred to as cellulosic ethanol. This process would represent a net reduction in CO2 released to the atmosphere. There is / was a company in Canada called IOGEN that was attempting to commercialize the process; however, I am not aware that they have been able to stick wings on this cow and make it fly - yet.
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I take your point. As with all arguments about the efficacy of green measures, it depends on what and how things are measured as to whether it makes sense or not. What is undeniable though is that taking some carbon from the atmosphere and some photons from the sun today must be better than unlocking carbon and energy that was captured millions of years ago as fossil fuels.
