"Field crops now have the potential to replace oil gradually as our source of everything from fuel to plastics. Black gold may be replaced by green.
"This revolution already is under way, its progress hidden by our fixation on the availability and price of oil. Agricultural wastes and fast-growing, little-known native crops such as switch grass are being developed to produce ethanol, a viable gasoline replacement and for years a major raw material of the chemical industry.
"Remember ethanol? After brief fame during the Arab oil embargoes of the 1970s, it vanished from public interest as the price of oil fell, making it uncompetitive. Since then, oil's price has fluctuated dramatically - it has more than doubled in the past year, and can only climb higher in the long run - but the cost of ethanol has dropped steadily as experimenters get far greater yields from improved processes. In 1980, ethanol was $4 a gallon; today, it's $1.25. The goal over the next few years is to reduce that to 76 cents; many believe it can be cut to 50 cents a gallon within a decade. Even at 76 cents, researchers, ethanol would be cost competitive with gasoline - without ravaging coastlines with oil spills."
Op-ed by Edward J. Sylvester
and Lynn C. Klotz
USA Today, February 1, 2000
