Thread Game Changer?

OzSTEEZ

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Nov 11, 2008
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http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news...rld-of-fossil-fuels-on-demand/article1871149/

A brave new world of fossil fuels on demand


In September, a privately held and highly secretive U.S. biotech company named Joule Unlimited received a patent for “a proprietary organism” – a genetically adapted E. coli bacterium – that feeds solely on carbon dioxide and excretes liquid hydrocarbons: diesel fuel, jet fuel and gasoline. This breakthrough technology, the company says, will deliver renewable supplies of liquid fossil fuel almost anywhere on Earth, in essentially unlimited quantity and at an energy-cost equivalent of $30 (U.S.) a barrel of crude oil. It will deliver, the company says, “fossil fuels on demand.”



This could be big.
 
Until it gets hindered by big oil

I'm sure that Big Oil will lobby against to try to save their profits, but I'm sure the US could hugely benefit from this by becoming a major fuel exporter. Though that is still a long way off, a possibility nonetheless.
 
I don't see how harnessing trillions of e Coli would ever pose an issue of safety.

:lol:

Really interesting news, though. Too bad it still involves burning fuels for energy.
 
I don't see how harnessing trillions of e Coli would ever pose an issue of safety.

:lol:

Really interesting news, though. Too bad it still involves burning fuels for energy.
 
If big oil was smart, they would hop all over this. Instead of expensive drilling and oil shale pressing, they could just grow cultures in a lab. Far cheaper production in less politically volatile areas but still keeping the consumption of the general population growing and distributions channels unchanged, sounds like a HUGE win for big oil.
 
If big oil was smart, they would hop all over this. Instead of expensive drilling and oil shale pressing, they could just grow cultures in a lab. Far cheaper production in less politically volatile areas but still keeping the consumption of the general population growing and distributions channels unchanged, sounds like a HUGE win for big oil.
It *would* be smart, but Big Oil is like the wintel of the energy world.
 
I don't see how harnessing trillions of e Coli would ever pose an issue of safety.

:lol:

Really interesting news, though. Too bad it still involves burning fuels for energy.

Safety doesn't seem to be an issue in this country. The FDA nor the people care about it..
 
I don't see how harnessing trillions of e Coli would ever pose an issue of safety.

:lol:

Really interesting news, though. Too bad it still involves burning fuels for energy.

most forms of e coli are harmless bacteria. Hell, you have them in your intestines already.
 
Mr and/or Mrs Valve can set us straight about the dangers of e.coli, right?

Most strains of e. coli are harmless. E coli is all up in your intestines right now. There are two main types of e. coli- enteric (in your gut) and hemorrhagic (from outside the gut, causes internal bleeding due to vascular dialation from a toxin produced by the bug). It's when you get a virulent strain such as O157:H7 (the O and the H denote various phenotypes of their O-antigen and their Hemagglutin), which has gotten a lot of press due to food-borne illnesses stemming from mass-produced food plants, then you have a problem. We use e. coli in our lab all the time- it's exceptionally genetically pliable and harmless.
 
Organisms that excrete refined products like jet fuel and gasoline? What a bunch of bullsh*t.

It's not, really. All bacteria are programmed to survive based on a simple algorithm of building block (such as sugars and amino acids) intake and processing, consumption, and then excreting. Their genetics dictate how certain building blocks get processed. So what would happen if you inserted a gene or overexpressed a gene to process something that it normally doesn't do/in large quantities? Bacteria can burp out shit that glows in the dark, so why not fuel products, or at least the components of fuel to make a decent product?
 
I don't see how harnessing trillions of e Coli would ever pose an issue of safety.

:lol:

you realize that a trillion bacteria can fit onto like, um, a quarter of a petri dish if that? try in the googleplex quantities. DuPont and other laboratories trying to harness bacterial processing use containers the size of industrial mash tons to do this stuff.