Obama announces low carbon fuel plan at UNH

[jpak]

http://www.fosters.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070421/NEWS81/104210224

DURHAM — Barack Obama rolled up to the University of New Hampshire in a rented, flexible-fuel Chevy Impala, but instead of ethanol it ran on gasoline.

If a plan he unveiled Friday morning to drastically reduce carbon emissions should take effect, future visits by the Illinois senator and Democratic presidential candidate could be powered by the alternative fuel.

On the eve of Earth Day, Obama introduced at a news conference the National Low Carbon Fuel Standard. It requires all transportation fuels sold domestically contain 5 percent less carbon by 2015 and 10 percent less by 2020.

By then, Obama said it would reduce annual gas emissions by about 180 million metric tons — the equivalent of taking about 32 million cars off the road.

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[illinoisprogressive]

1. very cool. thanks for the story.

[sandnsea]

2. Is Flex-Fuel a good idea?

I like Obama so this is just an honest question. I had hoped we'd move towards electric and wean ourselves from an oil-based economy.

[papau]

3. Flex fuel via corn is pandering to Iowa - in my opinion. But perhaps algae conversion is

what he has in mind - but then the 2020 dates are just politics as algae will not be producing the volume he is talking about in that time frame.

[sandnsea]

5. Oh I see

The snip confused me. No, this isn't a solution in itself at all. It's just a small step really, Portland does more than this already.

http://www.portlandonline.com/osd/index.cfm?c=42843&a=125803

I like Obama's enthusiasm and hope for a better future, but I still wish this country were smart enough to support Gore and Kerry.

[papau]

6. B20 Biodiesel 's supply of soybean/canola oil/animal fat/recycled cooking oil may be limited -but it

tends to not warp national priorities like corn conversion and the Iowa primary.

I like diesel so I like bio-diesel - - but I wish there was some magic that converted a large amount of the city waste into the bio part of biodiesel.

But there is hope - http://www.unh.edu/p2/biodiesel/article_alge.html reports algae produced alcohol bio diesel is feasible with little of the problems of E85 -

Maybe the grandkids have a future - if a Democrat is elected to the Whitehouse.

[sandnsea]

7. Check out that site

Portland is doing an incredible number of things and has an agency that draws together all functions of the city to maximize the green effort, even the garbage and refuse dept. I think a lot of people who live there don't even know how much is going on. I sure didn't until the Kerry's book.

And still, the left here criticizes the greenest city in America. That's how left the left in the west is.

[papau]

9. :-) - I may need to move West! :-)

:-)

[sandnsea]

8. Like this

As of July of 2006, SeQuential Pacific Biodiesel owns the only commercial biodiesel production facility in Oregon (Salem), producing one million gallons of biodiesel per year.

The feedstock for this facility is primarily used cooking oil, with the balance being imported from the Midwest.

http://www.portlandonline.com/osd/index.cfm?c=42843&a=123351

It looks like we're going to have to have a group who does nothing but monitor biofuel companies to ensure we are recycling everything possible.

[papau]

10. great idea - but the quanity needed to extremely large - but a great start! :-)

:-)

[razzleberry]

4. applies to aviation, or not?

tax on jet fuel for international flight is zero.
tax on jet fuel for dometic flight is four cents a gallon