Anxious for Some Things to Change

There is no reason for any country to be dependent on oil for energy needs.  It is all about politics and corruption.  Those are the only factors holding back the flood of talent and ingenuity of human creativity.  For those of you familiar with Mother Earth News magazine, you know that back in the 70's and before, there were photos published in there of guys who were powering their entire farms and vehicles with chicken manure!  Nearly any kind of compostible waste can be turned into energy.  Methane gas is all over the place and I wouldn't know how to harness it, but there are people that do.  That comes directly out of the earth in places and is also created from garbage.  Here we are making huge landfills which could be turned into energy.  I imagine some preliminary sorting would have to take place but that could be done from the get-go.  In New York City, for example, people have to sort their recyclables into paper, plastic, glass, etc and trash is separate.    (I've also read about living rooftops in NYC which are covered with crops...wonderful!...but that is another subject).  

At least there are electric cars now at long last.  But they still require plugging into a source of electricity that is mainly coal-produced.  Coal mining has to be one of the most primitive and dangerous ways to obtain energy in the world.  We should have been done with that years ago.  But we do have some bio-fuels now which is also a hopeful direction.  Why we are growing corn to turn into ethanol is beyond me.  As I mentioned in my last post,  there are miles of dried up corn rows out west right now from the drought.  I understand they can make ethanol out of switch grass.  I'm not sure what that looks like but I bet it doesn't have many other uses.  They can make ethanol out of other products that are not consumed as food for animals or people.  They can run cars on used cooking oil.  Everybody has read about that and I have read that there are some fast-food franchises that are selling their used oil for that exact use.  I know it takes some cleaning/filtering/processing before using in a vehicle, but I have read about it (where else?  Mother Earth News)and it is not very complicated.   People are doing it on a small scale all over the country.   They also need to make some changes to the car and it is much easier to do on a diesel engine. I intend that my next vehicle runs on cooking oil.  I call it a french fry car.   I'm hoping that availability of cooking oil will be stepped up by then.  My present car is getting pretty old.