Blatant Reality

I don’t know if I have just completely missed the build up to this but the announcement that DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) has successfully extracted oil from algae at $2 gallon really caught me off guard.

The brains trust of the Pentagon says it is just months away from producing a jet fuel from algae for the same cost as its fossil-fuel equivalent.

The claim, which comes from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa) that helped to develop the internet and satellite navigation systems, has taken industry insiders by surprise. A cheap, low-carbon fuel would not only help the US military, the nation’s single largest consumer of energy, to wean itself off its oil addiction, but would also hold the promise of low-carbon driving and flying for all.

Darpa’s research projects have already extracted oil from algal ponds at a cost of $2 per gallon. It is now on track to begin large-scale refining of that oil into jet fuel, at a cost of less than $3 a gallon, according to Barbara McQuiston, special assistant for energy at Darpa. That could turn a promising technology into a ­market-ready one. Researchers have cracked the problem of turning pond scum and seaweed into fuel, but finding a cost-effective method of mass production could be a game-changer. “Everyone is well aware that a lot of things were started in the military,” McQuiston said.

Now, I don’t want to be blamed for over-analyzing the use of one word here but there are a couple things one might want to note about this article before they get too excited.

For off, the article seems to focus strictly on extracting the oil from the algae with no mention of what the cost of refining the oil is in addition to extracting it.

Additionally, the article doesn’t clarify if the $2 cost includes the cost of growing the algae either. The actual growth process is where the real expenses add up, not the extraction. I don’t know exactly how much it costs but OriginOil’s Single Step Extraction method seems pretty cheap when you watch how simple it looks in a video of the process in action.

Now, I may seem really nit-picky of me to focus all my attention on the extraction bit but from my experience in researching algae fuels, growth, harvesting/extraction, and then refining are often considered three completely separate processes with algae companies often focusing on developing one at a time.

Therefore, when someone says that they have “extracted oil from algal ponds at a cost of $2 per gallon,” I typically take it as a very literal meaning: the extraction process alone costs $2.

Now this may have just been poor wording by the Guardian but with my inability to find an actual press release where these numbers are quoted, this article is really all I have to go on.

However, the thing that makes me think that it is a little more than just the extraction process is the fact that the Pentagon believes that they are “just months away from producing a jet fuel from algae for the same cost as its fossil-fuel equivalent.”

That is a pretty bold statement and, if it holds true, could do wonders for the algae biofuel field, illustrating that they can in fact be produced at a commercially viable price.

If you want to learn more about what DARPA was looking to do in the development of algal fuels, check out this Fact Sheet.

One last thing to note, if you do run across something that answers my “extraction” questions above, please post it in the comments.

Here is another article I wrote for American Solutions about the recent formation of the “Congressional Coal Caucus.” Take a look:

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This past week, a bipartisan Congressional caucus consisting of three Republicans and three Democrats formed around the often-contentious issue of coal. This “Congressional Coal Caucus” has pledged to be a voice in Congress for the many coal-producing and coal-reliant communities located across the country.

The formation of this Congressional Caucus sends powerful signals to the energy industry and fellow members of Congress; it shows that various Congressional members from both sides of the aisle are determined to ensure that coal continues to play an important role in supplying our energy needs.

It also serves as a signal to President Obama, who has stated that he wants to bankrupt the coal industry, that energy policy must include positive incentives to use one of the most affordable and abundant sources of energy in the United States.

This bipartisan caucus has the potential to greatly influence the energy debate since the current cap-and-trade bill, H.R. 2454, barely passed the House in June. While all six of the founding members of the caucus voted against the bill’s passage, many fellow congressmen from coal-reliant states voted for it.

If the Congressional Coal Caucus is able to recruit enough members who originally supported H.R. 2454, they may be able to form a coalition to stop its final passage as well as other energy bills that would impose higher energy costs for all American taxpayers.

Coal provides Americans with affordable and reliable energy, in addition to many other resources such as oil, gas, and nuclear. In addition, coal supports over 130,000 jobs in the United States. With the U.S. harboring roughly a quarter of the known coal reserves in the world and some estimates showing that this supply should last for over two centuries, we have the resources in America to make help make us energy independent while also continuing to provide needed jobs for Americans.

The good news is that it is highly unlikely that the Senate will pass an exact version of H.R. 2454 or any cap and trade bill this year, so the House will have another chance to vote on the future energy policy of our nation.

Whether or not the outcome of that vote is friendly to reliable American energy, however, will depend on how actively American Solutions members are pressuring their elected leaders to vote against devastating energy taxes. It may also largely depend on how many members have joined this particular caucus.

If you live in a coal-dependent community or just support coal as a continued source of energy, call your member of Congress and ask if he or she has joined (or plans to join) the Congressional Coal Caucus.

Today, I published my first energy article for American Solutions. I am looking to write for them roughly once a week about various energy issues facing our nation. To check out my article about the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository, click the link above or just read on below.

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This past week, a disagreement occurred between the Energy Secretary Steven Chu and White House Budget Director Peter Orszag over how much money should be cut from funding the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository. This disagreement once again brings up the question of what are the United States’ plans for long-term storage of nuclear waste since support for expanding nuclear energy is growing within the public and with policymakers.

Nuclear energy has seen a resurgence in popularity in the past couple years, as evidenced by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission receiving roughly 20 applications to build over 30 reactors in just the past 4 years.

In June 2008, the Yucca Mountain facility submitted a much-anticipated application to build a deep geologic repository for used nuclear fuel and other high-level radioactive waste, and the goal of increasing our nuclear energy production levels looked to be achievable.

However, over the past year of the new administration, we have seen conflicting statements and actions concerning increasing nuclear energy production within the United States.

For example, not even a month after the inauguration, the Obama administration announced that it will cut off almost all funding to the Yucca Mountain Facility and instead wants to look into finding a “better solution for management of our nuclear waste.”

With the Yucca Mountain solution taking over 25 years to get to the point where they can even apply to start building the facility, how much longer will the American people have to wait for the Obama administration’s “better solution” to come to fruition?

Of course, their proposed solution has not yet been announced, one year after halting funding for Yucca Mountain. This haphazard discontinuation by the administration of a project that has received previous endorsements from all three branches of the U.S. government contradicts their pro-nuclear energy stance and statements.

Even though recycling the spent nuclear fuel for further use in nuclear reactors should be the ultimate goal, there are those that feel that a long-term nuclear waste repository must first be demonstrated before these reprocessing efforts will be expanded.

That is why this facility, which Congress passed legislation to create in 1982 and was meant to safely store nuclear material from across the country for thousands of years, is necessary if we are to expand the nuclear energy production capacity of the United States

After decades of work and roughly $10 billion spent on research, the country needs a place like Yucca Mountain that is authorized to store 70,000 metric tons of nuclear fuel, and has been rated by the Electric Power Research Institute to safely and securely store up to 570,000 metric tons of nuclear waste.

While this may seem like a lot of waste, critics must consider that 0.0007 pounds of nuclear material can produce the same amount of energy as 1,780 pounds of coal. In fact, over the past 50 years of nuclear energy production, only 60,000 metric tons of waste has been produced.

Currently, nuclear power plants are forced to store their nuclear waste on-site. While many argue that the fuel is safely stored at the reactor sites, it is surely less than ideal since these measures were to be a temporary fix rather than a long-term solution like the one Yucca Mountain can offer.

The on-site storage of nuclear waste is very expensive, both for the companies operating the plants and the American taxpayer. Since 1998, the government has been on the hook for paying for many of these on-site storage capabilities, the product of a partial breach of contract signed two decades ago whereby the government would construct a permanent federal facility for the safe disposal of nuclear waste.

The DOE has estimated that the cost to the government of on-site storage litigation will be roughly $11 billion by 2020, the year when the Yucca Mountain repository would be complete if positive actions were taken today.

Overall, this recent disagreement between the White House and Secretary Chu highlights the fact that the administration has not upheld its end of the deal. With the cut in funds to the Yucca Mountain repository, the administration promised to quickly set up a panel to find alternatives solutions to our nuclear waste problem, but in the year since the initial cuts, no steps have been taken to do so.

As the months go by and funding is slowly but surely eliminated from this project without any sign of an alternative solution, one has to wonder if the White House truly is serious about expanding our nuclear energy capacity. Regretfully, the administration’s recent actions seem to point to the contrary.

It always shocks me to see articles where the reporter seems shocked that a subsidy or some other government intervention into the market will end up causing more harm than good. This is the exact tone that is taken in a recent Washington Post article titled “The unintended ripples from the biomass subsidy program.”

In this article, the author argues that the government’s recent “Biomass Crop Assistance Program” will end up costing millions, if not billions, more then expected as well as drastically increase the cost of many cheap wood products.

It sounded like a good idea: Provide a little government money to convert wood shavings and plant waste into renewable energy.

But as laudable as that goal sounds, it could end up causing more economic damage than good — driving up the price of raw timber, undermining an industry that has long used sawdust and wood shavings to make affordable cabinetry, and highlighting the many challenges involved in decreasing the nation’s dependence on oil by using organic materials to create biofuels.

In a matter of months, the Biomass Crop Assistance Program — a small provision tucked into the 2008 farm bill — has mushroomed into a half-a-billion dollar subsidy that is funneling taxpayer dollars to sawmills and lumber wholesalers, encouraging them to sell their waste to be converted into high-tech biofuels. In doing so, it is shutting off the supply of cheap timber byproducts to the nation’s composite wood manufacturers, who make panels for home entertainment centers and kitchen cabinets.

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In at least some cases, that’s not happening. The federal government can provide up to $45 a ton in matching payments to businesses that collect, harvest, store and transport biomass waste to an authorized energy facility. That means sawdust or wood shavings may be twice as valuable if a lumber mill sells them to a biomass energy company instead of to a traditional buyer.

This is bad news for the composite panel industry, which turns these materials into particleboard and medium-density fiberboard, and outranks the U.S. biomass industry in terms of employees and economic impact, with 21,000 employees and annual sales of $7.9 billion, according to 2006 U.S. Census data.

The biomass subsidy program could “wipe us out,” said T.J. Rosengarth, the vice president and chief operating officer of Flakeboard, the largest composite panel producer in North America. “You can say, ‘I’ve made more alternative energy,’ but at what expense?”

Pay special attention to the bold sections above. In certain cases, the government is essentially giving wood producers twice as much money to sell their wastes for biofuel instead traditional products. This will essentially inflate the price of wood waste on the open market to the government subsidized level, forcing everyone to pay that price.

Once again, this is a perfect example of why not to create fuel from sources that already have broad, alternative uses. This is why I am a very big supported of alternative fuels like algae that do not have any current uses in our market other than very limited uses in nutraceuticals and some health foods.

While this subsidy may be beneficial in some regards for increasing alternative fuels, the unintended consequences like the case above are almost never addressed or even foreseen. Sadly, this is just another example of the government potentially doing more harm then good through a bill that relies on agencies to implement the vague instructions located within it.

U.S. Senator Patty Murray has included $2 million in the 2010 Energy and Water Development Appropriations bill for algae biofuel research at Washington State University.

However, I don’t know if Senator Murray views this as a good thing or not. Take a look at this quote:

This funding will support cutting-edge research that will create jobs and continue to position Washington state as a leader in the clean energy economy,” said Senator Patty Murray. “It provides a shot in the arm for Washington state biofuels research, and will help our country move toward cleaner and more efficient energy use.”

Shot in the arm? I’m guessing she’s referring to a medical shot but I’ve never heard the phrase “shot in the arm” in a positive light.

Obama’s popularity may still be pretty high but his issue support is quickly dropping. In fact, after just a few short months, the American public is beginning to trust Republicans more on some key issues like the economy and soon on healthcare if the polling trends continue.

So what does it mean if the president enjoys personal popularity but declining support on particular issues?  Well, if things continue on these trends, Democrats will at the very least lose seats in the 2010 midterm election.

In an article that looks at these polling trends, the author argues that Obama will face a tough election in 2012 and makes an interesting contrast to the Clinton presidency.

Interestingly, Obama’s polling is now the exact opposite of President Clinton’s in the days after Monica Lewinsky. Back then, the president’s approval for handling specific issues was his forte, while his job approval remained high but his personal favorability lagged 20 points behind. Ultimately, it is a politician’s performance on specific issues that determines his electability. Personal favorability withers in the face of issue differences. Obama is about to find out that you cannot rely on image to bolster your presidency when the underlying issues are crumbling.

 

All this data suggests that Obama might run out of steam just as he gets to his healthcare agenda. As unemployment mounts, month after month, and Obama’s claims of job creation (or savings) ring hollow, it is possible that he will not have the heft to pass his radical restructuring of the healthcare system. The automaton Democratic majority may pass it anyway, but it will be a one-way ticket to oblivion if they do.

Read the rest of the article.

In other news, only 26% of Americans feel the economy is improving.

In today’s Rasmussen Consumer Index, only 26% of Americans believe the economy is getting better while 52% Americans feel it is continuing to get worse. This issue even crosses political lines with more Democrats and Republicans viewing the economy getting worse than better.

Nationally, 26% of adults believe the economy is getting better, while 52% disagree and say it is getting worse. Democrats are much more optimistic than Republicans. Thirty-five percent (35%) of Democrats think the economy is getting better, while only 16% of Republicans feel the same way. Meanwhile, 45% of Democrats say the economy is getting worse and 62% of Republicans say the same thing.

 

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Among investors, 30% think the economy is getting better, while 48% say it is getting worse.

Since I think this consumer index changes each day, here is a screen shot of the article:

A day before the election, I decided to download every single Fact Sheet I could find on Barack Obama’s campaign website to have a record of the billions of campaign promises made that he won’t be able to fulfill. I never uploaded them here because all of the promises were still up and easily accessible on BarackObama.com for a while after the election.

Now, however, I discovered that they aren’t easily accessible on his site so below is the complete lists every.pdf Fact Sheet that was on his website a day before the election.

You may notice that some Fact Sheets have seemingly two copies below. I purposely did this because those PDF’s appeared in two separate places on BarackObama.com with two separate file names.

Overall Promises

Obama’s Blueprint for Change.pdf

Business/Tax

Tax Plan Fact Sheet.pdf

Small Business Fact Sheet.pdf

Tax Plan Fact Sheet.pdf

Domestic Issues

Urban Fact Sheet.pdf

The Impact of the Obama Economic Plan for America’s Working Women.pdf

Tackling Domestic Hunger.pdf

Rural Plan Fact Sheet.pdf

Immigration Fact Sheet.pdf

Transportation Fact Sheet.pdf

Poverty Fact Sheet.pdf

Economy

Obama’s Fiscal Policy.pdf

Mortgage Fact Sheet.pdf

A RESCUE PLAN FOR THE MIDDLE CLASS.pdf

Education

Pre K-12 Education Fact Sheet.pdf

National Service Plan Fact Sheet.pdf

Making College Affordable for Everyone.pdf

Education Reform Fact Sheet.pdf

Environment/Energy

Energy Fact Sheet.pdf

Wildfire Fact Sheet.pdf

Environment Fact Sheet.pdf

Government

Taking Back our Government Fact Sheet.pdf

Health

Supporting Americans with Autism Spectrum Disorders.pdf

Healthcare FAQ.pdf

Healthcare Full Plan.pdf

AIDS Fact Sheet.pdf

Cancer Fact Sheet.pdf

Disability Plan Fact Sheet.pdf

Science and Technology

Science Fact Sheet.pdf

Innovation and Technology Fact Sheet.pdf

War/Defense

Obama’s Plan to Defeat Terrorism Worldwide.pdf

Keeping Promises to our Nation’s Veterans Building a 21st Century VA.pdf

Homeland Security Fact Sheet.pdf

Defense Fact Sheet (1).pdf

21st Century Threats.pdf

Defense Fact Sheet (2).pdf

World

Israel Fact Sheet.pdf

China Fact Sheet.pdf

Latin America Fact Sheet.pdf

Foreign Policy Democratization and Development Fact Sheet.pdf

Europe Fact Sheet.pdf

Other

Obama on Faith.pdf

Katrina Fact Sheet.pdf

Arts Fact Sheet.pdf

Child Advocacy Fact Sheet.pdf

CREATING EQUAL OPPORTUNITY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL.pdf

With the recent flip-flopping in the administration’s policy, it shouldn’t take you too long to discover other campaign promises listed in these documents that has been flipped on as well. Good Luck.

If you didn’t see this already, Gateway Pundit linked to my story on Obama signing the GIVE Act. Check out his story here. Thanks for the link GP.