Biofuels are the future – Yet where is the Investment?

OilPrice.com ^ | 02/06/2011 | John Daly

[bananaman22]

Investors looking for the next big thing after a hydrocarbon economy have a panoply of options, from solar to wind, as well as biofuels.

In terms of quickly ramping up production biofuels clearly win the race, but navigating the PR fluff and reality is not a simple thing.

The three main contenders for investor dollars are algae, jatropha and camelina. All have strengths and weaknesses, leaving investors to choose amongst them. Stripped of PR flummery, the only issue is where and when production can begin on a viable commercial scale. Investors who unravel the complexities of biofuel production and have cast-iron stomachs stand to profit, but biofuel production in the U.S, while having major players like Goldman Sachs and the Carlyle Group, are moving their chess pieces around a board already gamed by the major players.

While everyone agrees that biofuels are the future, investment is lagging.

But the interest is there. Fuel and oil comprise 25 percent of civilian airlines’ operating costs. When the price of jet fuel rises one cent, it increases the global cost of aviation $195 million. Full article at: Biofuels about to take off

[DManA]

No one’s investing in bio-fuels because they know there are oceans of rock oil available.

[DManA]

No one’s investing in bio-fuels because they know there are oceans of rock oil available.

[Turborules]

Oceans of Oil are everywhere in the world...go get it! we do not need any energy that can not pay for itself in the world markets, period! Technology cn make it as clean as any solar or wind farm!!!

[DaxtonBrown]

algae is a big loser. I investigated it, bought some website names I’m sitting on. You need to grow it next to a coal fired plant to grab the CO2, but then you might as well dump it in the boiler furnace because it takes so much tonnage to make it into biofuel.

[Dogbert41]

Bio-fuels? Ever see Soylent Green? There’s bio-fuels for you. Bio-food too! How can you lose?

[oldenuff2no]

Natural gas is the fuel of the future hands down.

[RetiredTexasVet]

And just why has not George Soros, T-Bone, et al not just jumped on this. I’m sure that the proven economics of bio-fuels would just beg the investment of the big bucks.

[BuffaloJack]

Why would anyone spend money on biofuel?
It’s a losing prospect only held up by subsidies.

[Vince Ferrer]

Yet where is the Investment?

Most of the first wave of investment in bio fuels, especially algae, is already gone, spent, and bankrupt. Any new money will necessarily need better business plans, not pie in the sky dreams that drove the first wave.

[ROCKLOBSTER]

They’re all biofuels already!

Why the hell do you think they call it “organic” chemistry?

[CowboyJay]

‘Biofuels’ are a sloppy way of transforming sunlight into usable energy. I personally think their chic is more an artifact of how we think about energy use now as it relates to petroleum distillates. At some point in the future, electric vehicles will become the norm. Still a long ways off.

[SunkenCiv]

It's the Obamacare, stupid! One-half gallon of oil in the form of pesticides per bushel of corn would cost $2 to $3 per bushel. If this were true -- and it clearly isn't -- it should be enough to illustrate to literally anyone that the price of petroleum is quite literally the ONLY thing driving corn prices. And this idiotic piece of agitprop -- from a hydrogen "energy" advocacy site -- also shows the guy in the encounter suit spraying chemical fertilizer, a sight that I've never been privileged to see, what with me *growing up on a farm*. The Bum Rap on Biofuels [2008] Campaign to vilify ethanol revealed [2008] Oil Price Pressure Driving Global Switch to Biofuels [2006]