Move aside you makers of plug in hybrids and battery-constrained electric cars.
The internal combustion engine has lots of life in it and the prospect of inexpensive biofuel is just around the corner, says clean-tech investor Vinod Khosla.
Khosla has made waves by shrugging off the popular belief that electric vehicles and hybrids will be the panacea to global warming. It’s not that he dismisses their role, just the size of it. The efficiency of the internal combustion can be greatly improved, and if that efficiency is doubled, carbon output falls by 50 percent – a far larger contribution to the reduction of greenhouse gases than the 25 percent mileage improvement of hybrids.
Internal combustion engines can be made sharply more efficient and may still be the path to the future, says Vinod Khosla
And when biofuels become competitive…well that’s more icing on the cake. Khosla said Tuesday that he is almost certain biofuels will be cheaper than oil in three years.
That will have a dramatic impact on consumer habits.
Millions of Indians are destine to drive the $2,500 Tata Nano, not the $25,000 Honda Civic hybrid, he points out. So without upending the industry with the task of building a new infrastructure of electric charging stations, big improvements in the fight again global warming are possible.
In the next two to threes years, the technologies for harvesting as many as a half dozen bioluels will be proven, he predicted during an appearance at the AlwaysOn GoingGreen conference in Sausalito. The real question will be who will risk the funds to scale up production.
Khosla said his calculations assume oil will fall to about $30 barrel in order to compete with biofuel. And he threw one bone to the hybrid people. Hydraulic hybrids for heavy trucks and machinery – now there is a technology he likes.
One hundred percent improvements in mileage are possible, he said.
Interesting! What are the most promising biofuels made from?
There are an expanding number of sources of biofuel. Some of the better known are corn, sugar cane, soy, rapeseed, jatropha and algae. Trouble is the fuels take a lot of water and energy to produce. But techniques are getting better.
I read recently about a breakthrough in the production of butanol – an alcohol that mixes well with gasoline. A researcher doubled production yields. Pretty promising.